Should scientists moonlight as ideologues?

This is an edited excerpt from Chapter 7 of ‘Breaking Together’ where I get a bit technical on the nature of the scientific method and how unscientific some natural scientists and other experts have become when they discuss our societal predicament. Listen to the whole of this chapter on “recognising collapse and cultural decay” for free on Soundcloud. The release coincides with the availability of the paperback from the Schumacher Institute. Further ordering info follows at the end of this excerpt.

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Much of the discussion about risks and processes of societal collapse involves arguments about what people think is useful to believe, or how they wish to feel about the future. Such discussion is about people’s own identities and worldviews, involving lots of assumptions and logical fallacies. It can get quite nasty and resort to demonisation of individuals, condemned for being too negative. However, returning to the basics of scientific method can help to cut through this ‘noise’.

I reached the conclusion that the breakdown of industrial consumer societies had already begun based on the observation of trends showing the decline in both key inputs and outcomes of most such societies, which I detail in the first half of Breaking Together, and my contention is that those trends will continue (listen to Chapter 1 for some of that data and relevant definitions). On that basis, extrapolations from recent data imply that most of the environmental, economic and social indicators will continue to worsen in most nations across all continents, bar Antarctica. The most logical conclusion is that these negative trends will continue until the majority of people in the majority of societies can no longer satisfy their basic needs in the ways they do today. As the trends are rapid enough to make societies unrecognisable within a generation from when those declines began around 2015, this process can plausibly be described as ‘societal collapse’.

How might such a conclusion be confidently rejected on scientific grounds rather than emotional distress? This is where it is useful to return to a basic concept in scientific method—‘falsification’. That term is associated with Karl Popper, who is considered one of the 20^th century’s most influential philosophers of science. He focused on the importance of any theory to be potentially proven to be false through the collection of data. If not, he argued that any theory could be maintained by enthusiasm, selective attention and tradition. Whereas that might be suitable for some realms of knowledge, he argued that a theory should not be considered scientific if it can’t be refuted with potential evidence. Popper was rejecting the classical approach of seeking evidence to confirm one’s theories. It was a way of avoiding what some call ‘confirmation bias’, where we look to confirm what we think we already know.[i] So let’s consider what Karl Popper might think of the data on humanity’s predicament.

One part of the conclusion that widespread societal collapse has already begun is the simple observation of current data. The falsification of this component of the conclusion could be achieved if there were five consecutive years of future continued improvement of most of the key environmental, economic and social indicators for most countries in the world (as five years is often the convention for accepting there is a trend). At the global level, such data could include CO2 equivalent emissions falling, CO2 in the atmosphere coming down, the global average temperature coming down and biodiversity loss reduced or reversed. At national levels, such data could include the Human Development Index (HDI) increasing again in most countries. Does anyone really think that is likely? Assuming I am still here in 2028, I will joyfully buy a drink for anyone who turns out to be correct for claiming in 2023 (the date of publication of Breaking Together) that most indicators will have shown five years of sustained improvement by 2028. Sadly, it’s more likely they will need to barter a drink for me.

Another part of the conclusion that widespread societal collapse has already begun is the contention that most existing trends will more-or-less continue without stopping until the method of human organising no longer resembles what we now call industrial consumer societies. In the first half of Breaking Together, I either demonstrated that some trends in the fracturing of the foundations of modern societies are incredibly difficult to change (e.g. the expansionist nature of economy and money) or are impossible to change due to the previous damage (e.g. on committed warming of the atmosphere, ocean acidification and disease risk from past deforestation). In normal scientific convention, there is neither a need for such explanations nor a ‘burden of proof’ for conclusions based on mere extrapolation of current trends. Rather, if we stick to scientific norms, it is the people who argue that the trends will be changed sufficiently to prevent arriving at such a situation of ‘societal collapse’ who must marshal data to prove their arguments. That is because they are speculating on the future, rather than extrapolating into it.

To be scientific, the argument that various positive changes will combine to at least stop the negative trends, if not reverse them, must incorporate a range of theories on a range of areas. They must try to explain how changes in technology, land use and human behaviour are not only possible at a scale and speed to stop the trends but are likely due to policy and/or other societal dynamics. A prime candidate for these theories might include the decoupling of economic growth and resource consumption. Yet not only is this theory highly contested by independent research (as explained in my chapters on energy and on the biosphere), even if it can occur, it would need to do so at a magical rate to reverse the destruction, pollution and toxification of the Earth. Both ecosystem restoration and regenerative agriculture are important activities, and activities that I personally finance and promote. But ecosystems are degrading due to the fastest changes in climate in millions of years, while it took agriculture over half a century to become reliant on industrial methods in the way it is today (as explored in Chapter 6 on the food system). That should provide us with some reason for scepticism and therefore we should expect that theories suggesting we will change the trajectories if we choose to do so, need to be both specific and falsifiable. Otherwise, they are simply exhortations to believe. I think Dr Popper would agree: “a theory which is not refutable by any conceivable event is non-scientific.”[ii] That does not mean such a theory has no merit in how we try to understand the world, but that it should not carry with it any of the status that our modern societies associate with science.

For ease of reference, I have previously described anyone who believes in the salvation of modern societies from the unfolding breakdown as being ‘ecomodernist’. The people who use that term for themselves believe that technology, including that which is not yet invented, will ensure we can maintain modern societies. Recognising that technology cannot solve all the critical problems in the world through entrepreneurship and markets, more ecomodernists have been looking at what policies might force technology adoption to theoretically transform economies quickly enough to avoid catastrophic disruption. ‘Social tipping points’ is one of the terms that is used for this theory.[iii] Such work does not draw upon scholarship that investigates massive social change, such as social movement theory.[iv] Nor does it draw upon the existing scholarship on the pace of adoption of industrial technology, which would indicate that their projections have no precedent in modern history. However, the story of ‘techno-salvation’ being possible if only the political will could emerge to make it happen is very appealing to elite philanthropic groups, like the Bezos Fund, that supports this kind of work.

A positive response from elites can be alluring for experts and activists. I know, as twenty years ago it felt credible to me when a scientist or environmentalist said that things are finally moving because a CEO of a major company was making bold commitments to change. Now I realise that it was mostly solipsism, ego and ignorance about business that enticed me towards such deluded hopes. The distractions that can occur as a result of such processes are highlighted by the baselessness of a report funded by the Bezos Fund on three main tipping points which they argue could create wider effects: scaling electric cars, mandating the use of novel fertiliser technology (which doesn’t exist yet), and food technology such as plant-based meats.[v] I explain in Chapter 3 on energy collapse that battery and energy demands for electric vehicles means they will not solve transportation’s contribution to climate change, but will instead lead to the trashing of pristine wildernesses and indigenous peoples’ lands, as well as adding to the global energy crisis. In Chapter 6 on food system collapse, I presented the evidence that neither ‘green ammonia’ nor food technologies like ‘precision fermentation’ will significantly reduce the agricultural sector’s contribution to climate change. That does not mean that any of these things are bad in themselves. But wrapping them up in a way that argues they offer techno-salvation for modern societies and thus distracting us from reality is frighteningly unhelpful, as I will explore further in the book chapter on the ‘fake green globalists.’

Reading the various articles from ecomodernists over the last few years, I have never heard any suggestions from them about what evidence would falsify their theory that we can prevent a widespread breakdown of industrial consumer societies. Instead, they speak of positive technological breakthroughs and the rise in social awareness and activism. The implication is that activists should be promoting those technological solutions, which is an invitation that many are responding to. But as many of these ecomoderns are scientists, and gain their credibility from their roles as scientists, it would only be fair for activists to call for them to be scientific with their theories of techno-salvation. So, in the absence of them stating what data would falsify their theories, here are my initial suggestions:

• indicators of environmental, social and economic situations showing continued and widespread decline;
• evidence of a physical impossibility of zero carbon societies sustaining current lifestyles and populations;
• evidence of limitations of new sources of energy to displace fossil fuels in time before critical temperature thresholds are breached.

If you have read the first half of Breaking Together you already know the verdict. You already know there is sufficient data on each of these areas to reject the theories of ecomodernists that the current trajectory taking us to collapse can be stopped or reversed. But there is one area that we haven’t looked at yet, that is core to the ecomodernists and their theories of ‘super social tipping points’ and cascading change. It is an area they themselves don’t look at because they are not social scientists. It is their assumption that societies today are more able to change rapidly than in the past in response to the threats that ecomodernists so rightly worry about. Their theories would be falsified if there was evidence that there had been greater potential for major social and political change leading to technologically-enabled behaviour change in the past compared to now. This involves a question of where the source of social change comes from. Students of history and social change debate theories on this, but these are overlooked by the ecomodernists.

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If we take the quite normal view in social and political sciences that positive social change involves the wishes of the general public, rather than their coercion, then the potential for such change would be declining if there is a decline in the following aspects of society: general educational levels, leisure hours (to enable political participation), levels of community participation, capacities for pluralistic dialogue, numbers of people giving to charity and governmental power (local and national) in relation to global financial forces. All of these are also indicators of the cultural cement that holds societies together. In the book, I summarise the evidence that all of these areas are declining in many modern societies around the world (you can listen to that evidence within the full chapter). But to highlight my point here, we can contrast our current situation with that of the so-called boomer generation in the West. In the early 1970s, they already knew about the threats to the environment and the unsustainability of industrial consumer societies, already had the radical social movements like the hippies, anti-war and civil rights efforts, and already experienced oil price shocks that awakened them to energy scarcity. Compared to today, they had more spare time, relatively more spare income, more community participation, more trade union membership and far less individual and collective debt. There were only 3.5 billion people on the planet and per capita energy use was far lower, while ecosystems and climate were in a reasonable condition. If there was a moment for a social tipping point it was then, but it tipped towards the leaders of nearly all modern societies choosing neo-liberal globalisation and a continuation of the imperialist status quo, with sporadic wars to prevent any deviation by governments from this global order.

Ecomodernists are incorrect in claiming they are being more scientific than people who conclude the future will be more disrupted than they wish to accept. They are speculating on the future, whereas the people they might call defeatists or ‘doomers’ are simply extrapolating from current trends. Whereas many ecomodernists do science as their day job, when arguing that we can save modern societies they are moonlighting as ideologues. The principle of rationality, where we prioritise empirical data and build models of reality from there, rather than maintaining stories of reality through tradition, superstition, or brute authority, is one aspect of modernity that we have all benefited from. It is curious that the ecomodernists abandon rationality and scientific method when they proclaim the techno-salvation of the human race is possible if only we all believe in it enough. Personally, I find natural scientists much less interesting and wise on metaphysical matters than the teachers of the great wisdom traditions. Perhaps I just prefer my spirituality from people with less of an interest in statistics. Perhaps it is their suppressed anxiety that is causing them to depart from normal scientific principles into extremist techno-idolatry that helps explain why some ecomodernists misrepresent the arguments, intentions and politics of people they label ‘doomers’ as they try to ‘cancel’ them.

I might be dismissed as a prophet of doom and yet unlike the ecomodernists, I am not offering prophesies—I am just professing on what is already occurring, according to the scientists in various fields that collect the data. By focusing on what is already occurring, and largely beyond human control, I have reached my conclusion without needing to discuss threats from phenomena such as artificial general intelligence or asteroid strikes. They are addressed in a field of research called ‘existential risk’ that has been made popular by billionaire-funded philosophers. It is a field that has downplayed those processes that are already undermining the future of humanity, such as climate change, perhaps as to do so would involve critically considering the modernist ideology that led to—or at least accompanied—these crises, as well as their own intellectual frameworks.[vi]

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This text is an edited excerpt from Chapter 7 of Breaking Together. Listen to the whole of this chapter on “recognising collapse and cultural decay” for free on Soundcloud, or the Introduction to get a sense of the full arguments of the book. In the UK, order the book in paperback from Good Works (16.99 GBP, with proceeds to The Schumacher Institute). Order the kindle ($8.88) or hardback via Amazon in your country and the audiobook via various platforms. More purchase options coming soon, as well a free epub (subscribe to jembendell.com to receive notification of these).

It is unfortunate for humanity that so many professionals working on these topics have been framing the situation in ways that are more appealing to power and less disturbing to their own emotions and choices in life, while pretending they are being more scientific than those of us no longer succumbing to such weaknesses. It is sad to see young professionals being enticed to serve those profligate delusions, due to an understandable desire for a career. Therefore, it is important to try and help shift the way people engage with this topic. To explore your leadership on these issues, through an online course with me, Jem Bendell, consider joining the November cohort. If you are a scholar then consider signing the International Scholars’ Warning on Societal Disruption and Collapse, to receive opportunities for relevant education and peer support. You can discuss these matters with others in the Deep Adaptation Leadership group on LinkedIn.

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[i] Karl R. Popper (1963). Science: Conjectures and Refutations. Routledge. p.10.

[ii] Karl R. Popper (1963). Science: Conjectures and Refutations. Routledge. p.10.

[iii] Sharpe, S. & Lenton ,T. M. (2021). Upward-scaling tipping cascades to meet climate goals: plausible grounds for hope. Climate Policy, 21(4), 421-433. https://doi.org/10.1080/14693062.2020.1870097

[iv] Sovacool, B. K. (2022). Beyond science and policy: Typologizing and harnessing social movements for transformational social change. Energy Research & Social Science, 94, 102857. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.erss.2022.102857

[v] SYSTEMIQ (2023). The breakthrough effect: How tipping points can accelerate net zero. https://www.systemiq.earth/breakthrough-effect/

[vi] MacAskill, W. (2022). What we owe the future. Basic Books.