THESES
ON ANARCHISM
Paul Feyerabend
Copyright © 1999. University of Chicago Press. All rights reserved.
Feyerabend formulated these theses in rough draft for a conference planned for
20 March 1973,where he was to criticise Lakatos's defence of "Law and Order"
from an anarchist point of view.The theses were enclosed with a letter to Lakatos
dated February 1973;the letter reads: "Look what I have done for you: [ ... ] I have
written THESES ON ANARCHISM (enclosed), and I have also made an hour
tape, complete with arguments and music in case my feet get bad again and I cannot come. [ ... ] At any rate, you will be threefold prepared and should be able to
make mincemeat of me (usually I am very bad when I prepare too much -like a
boxer who overtrains before a fight). Has any opponent ever made your task that
easy?" A slightly revised form of these theses has already appeared as Feyerabend
1975d, 176-81, and Feyerabend 1996, chapter 1.
Anarchism is opposed to the existing order, it wants to destroy this order, or escape from it. Political anarchists oppose political institutions,
religious anarchists may oppose the entire physical world, they may regard it as a lower realm of being, and they may want to eliminate its
influence on their lives. Both hold dogmatic opinions about what is true,
good, valuable for man.
For example, post-Enlightenment political anarchism believes in science and in the natural reason of man. Remove all boundaries, and
natural reason will find the right way. Remove educational methods,
and man will educate himself. Remove political institutions, and he will
form associations that express his natural tendencies and may thus become part of a harmonious (un-'alienated') life.
The faith in science is partially justified by the revolutionary role
which science played in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. While
the anarchists preached destruction, the scientists smashed the harmonious cosmos of earlier ages, they eliminated fruitless 'knowledge',
changed social relations and slowly assembled the elements of a new
113
type of knowledge that was both true and beneficial for man.
Lakatos, Imre, and Paul Feyerabend. For and Against Method : Including Lakatos's Lectures on Scientific Method and the
Lakatos-Feyerabend Correspondence, edited by Matteo Motterlini, University of Chicago Press, 1999. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.c
Created from carleton-ebooks on 2023-09-11 17:53:38.
Copyright © 1999. University of Chicago Press. All rights reserved.
114 Paul Feyerabend
Today this naive and childlike acceptance of science (which is found
even among 'progressive' leftists such as Althusser) is endangered by
two developments, viz. (1) by the change of science from philosophical
inquiry to a business enterprise, and (2) by certain discoveries concerning the status of scientific facts and theories.
Twentieth-century science has given up all philosophical pretensions
and has become big business. It no longer threatens society, it is one
of its most powerful supporters. Humanitarian considerations are at
a minimum, and so is any form of progressiveness that goes beyond
local improvements. Good payment, good relations with the boss and
colleagues in their unit are the chief aims of these human ants who excel
in the solution of tiny problems but who cannot make sense of anything
transcending their domain of competence. Let someone make a great
step forward-and the profession is bound to turn it into a club for beating people into submission.
We have also discovered that science has no solid results, that its
theories as well as its factual statements are hypotheses which often are
not just locally incorrect but entirely false, making assertions about
things that never existed. According to this view, which was introduced
by John Stuart Mill (On Liberty) and whose most vociferous contemporary propagandists are Karl Popper and Helmut Spinner, science is a
collection of competing alternatives. The 'accepted' view is the view
that has a temporary advantage, either because of some quirk, or because of some real merits. There are no revolutions that leave no stone
unturned, no principle unchanged, no fact untouched.
Unpleasant in appearance, untrustworthy in its results, science has
ceased to be an ally for the anarchist. It has become a problem. Epistemological anarchism solves the problem by removing the dogmatic elements of earlier forms of anarchism.
Epistemological anarchism differs both from scepticism, and from
political (religious) anarchism. While the sceptic either regards every
view as equally good, or equally bad, or desists from making such judgements altogether, the epistemological anarchist has no compunction
in defending the most trite, or the most outrageous statement. While
the political anarchist wants to remove a certain form of life, the epistemological anarchist may want to defend it, for he has no everlasting
loyalty to, and no everlasting aversion against, any institution and any
ideology. Like the Dadaist (whom he resembles in many respects) he
'not only has no programme, he is against all programmes' (Hans
Richter, Dada: Art and Anti Art-an excellent textbook for a dadaistic
Lakatos, Imre, and Paul Feyerabend. For and Against Method : Including Lakatos's Lectures on Scientific Method and the
Lakatos-Feyerabend Correspondence, edited by Matteo Motterlini, University of Chicago Press, 1999. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.c
Created from carleton-ebooks on 2023-09-11 17:53:38.
Copyright © 1999. University of Chicago Press. All rights reserved.
Theses on Anarchism
115
science), though he will on occasions be the most vociferous defender
of the status quo, or of its opponents: "To be a true Dadaist, one must
also be an Anti-Dadaist." His aims remain stable, or change, as a result
of argument, or of boredom, or of a conversion experience, or because
he wants to impress some people, and so on. Given some aim, he may
try to reach it with the help of organised groups, or alone. He may appeal to reason, or to emotion. He may decide to proceed violently, or in
a peaceful manner. His favourite pastime is to confuse rationalists by
inventing compelling reasons for unreasonable doctrines. There is no
view, however 'absurd' or 'immoral', he refuses to consider or to act
upon, and no method he regards as indispensable. The only thing he
opposes positively and absolutely are universal standards, universal
laws, universal ideas such as 'Truth', 'Justice', 'Honesty', 'Reason' and
the behaviour they engender, though he does not deny that it is often
good policy to act as if such laws (such standards, such ideas) existed
and as if he believed in them. He may approach the religious anarchist
in his opposition to science, common sense, and the material world that
is examined by both; he may outdo any Nobel prize winner in his vigorous defence of scientific purity. Behind all this outrage lies his conviction that man will cease to be a slave and gain a dignity that is more than
an exercise in cautious conformism, only when he becomes capable of
stepping outside the most fundamental convictions, including those
convictions which allegedly make him human. "The realisation that
reason and anti-reason, sense and nonsense, design and chance, consciousness and unconsciousness [and, I would add, humanitarianism
and anti-humanitarianism] belong together as a necessary part of the
whole-this was the central message of Dada," writes Hans Richter.
The epistemological anarchist might agree, though he would not express himself in such a constipated manner.
Having stated his doctrine, the epistemological anarchist may try to
sell it (alternatively, he may keep it to himself, considering that even the
most beautiful ideas get worn and shabby when they start circulating).
His methods of selling depend on the audience. If he faces an audience
of scientists and philosophers of science he will produce sequences of
statements liable to convince them that the things in science they appreciate most have been brought about in an anarchistic manner. Using
propagandistic moves most likely to succeed with this type of audience,
i.e., using argument, he will demonstrate from history that there is not
a single methodological rule that does not occasionally inhibit science
and not a single 'irrational' move that may not further it, given the right
Lakatos, Imre, and Paul Feyerabend. For and Against Method : Including Lakatos's Lectures on Scientific Method and the
Lakatos-Feyerabend Correspondence, edited by Matteo Motterlini, University of Chicago Press, 1999. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.c
Created from carleton-ebooks on 2023-09-11 17:53:38.
Copyright © 1999. University of Chicago Press. All rights reserved.
116 Paul Feyerabend
circumstances. People and nature are very whimsical entities which
cannot be conquered and understood if one decides to restrict oneself
in advance. He will rely heavily on anarchistic utterances by revered
scientists such as the following utterance by Einstein: "The external
conditions which are set for [the scientist] by the facts of experience do
not permit him to let himself be too much restricted, in the construction
of his conceptual world, by the adherence to an epistemological system.
He, therefore, must appear to the systematic epistemologist as a type
of unscrupulous opportunist .... " Using all these bits and pieces of
propaganda to maximum effect, he will try to convince his audience that
the only universal rule that can safely be in agreement with the moves
the scientist must make to advance his subject is anything goes.
Imre Lakatos disagrees. He admits that the existing methodologies
clash with scientific practice, but he believes that there are standards
which are liberal enough to permit science and yet substantial enough
to let reason survive. The standards apply to research programmes, not
to individual theories; they judge the evolution of a programme over a
period of time, not its shape at a particular time; and they judge this
evolution in comparison with the evolution of rivals, not by itself. A
research programme is called 'progressive' if it makes predictions that
are confirmed by subsequent research and thus lead to the discovery
of new facts. It is called 'degenerating' if it makes no such predictions
but is reduced to absorbing the material discovered with the help of
its rival. The standards judge research programmes, they do not advise
the scientist what to do. For example, there is no rule that tells the scientist to remove a degenerating programme-and rightly so, for a degenerating programme may recover and come out on top. (Such developments occurred in the case of atomism, the temporal finitude of the
world, the moving earth. All these research programmes advanced
and degenerated numerous times, and all of them are now a solid part
of science.) It is 'rational' to pursue a research programme on its
degenerating branch even after it has been overtaken by its rival. There
is therefore no 'rational' difference between the methodology of Lakatos and the 'anything goes' of the anarchist. But there is considerable
difference in rhetorics.
For example, Imre Lakatos criticises research programmes which are
in their degenerating phase and he demands that support be withdrawn
from them. His standards permit the criticism, and they permit the action. However, they do not encourage it, for they also permit the opposite: they permit us to praise such programmes and to support them
Lakatos, Imre, and Paul Feyerabend. For and Against Method : Including Lakatos's Lectures on Scientific Method and the
Lakatos-Feyerabend Correspondence, edited by Matteo Motterlini, University of Chicago Press, 1999. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.c
Created from carleton-ebooks on 2023-09-11 17:53:38.
Copyright © 1999. University of Chicago Press. All rights reserved.
Theses on Anarchism
117
with everything at our disposal. Lakatos often calls such praise 'irrational'. Doing this he uses standards different from his own, for example
he uses commonsense standards. Combining commonsense standards
(which are independent of his standards) with the methodology of research programmes, he utilises the intuitive plausibility of the former to
support the latter and to smuggle the anarchism into the brain of the
most dedicated rationalist. In this he is much more efficient than I, for
rationalists are constitutionally unable to accept anarchism when it is
offered to them undisguised. One day, of course, they will discover that
they have been had. This will be the day when they are ready for anarchism, pure and simple.
Nor has Lakatos succeeded in showing 'rational change' where Kuhn,
according to him, has recourse to 'mob psychology'. Revolutions lead
to quarrels between opposing schools. The one school wants to abandon the orthodox programme, the other school wants to retain it. The
standards recommended by the methodology of research programmes
permit either move, as we have seen. Hence, the fight between the opposing schools is a power struggle, pure and simple. Kuhn, as described
by Lakatos, is right after all.
Finally, Lakatos has not shown that Aristotelian science, magic, witchcraft are inferior to modern science. Criticising Aristotelian science
(and other 'pseudo' subjects) Lakatos uses his standards. How does he
obtain his standards? He obtains them via a rational reconstruction of
modern science 'of the last two centuries'. Measuring Aristotelian science by his standards therefore means comparing Aristotelian science
with modern science 'of the last two centuries'. The comparison leads
to a condemnation only if it has been shown that modern science is better than Aristotelian science, that is, if it has been shown (a) that it has
better aims, and (b) that it reaches its aims more efficiently than its rival.
Nowhere has Lakatos shown that the aims of modern science (progress
with the help of 'anticipations of the mind') are better than the aims of
Aristotelian science (absorption of facts into a stable body of basic
theory; 'saving' of phenomena), and that they are reached more efficiently. Hence, taking Lakatos as our guide, the case of science vs.
witchcraft (for example) is still entirely open.
Conclusion: neither science nor the methodology of research programmes provide arguments against anarchism. Neither Lakatos nor
anybody else has shown that science is better than witchcraft and that
science proceeds in a rational way. Taste, not argument, guides our
choice of science; taste, not argument, makes us carry out certain moves
Lakatos, Imre, and Paul Feyerabend. For and Against Method : Including Lakatos's Lectures on Scientific Method and the
Lakatos-Feyerabend Correspondence, edited by Matteo Motterlini, University of Chicago Press, 1999. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.c
Created from carleton-ebooks on 2023-09-11 17:53:38.
118 Paul Feyerabend
Copyright © 1999. University of Chicago Press. All rights reserved.
within science (which does not mean that decisions on the basis of taste
are not surrounded by and entirely covered by arguments, just as a tasty
piece of meat may be surrounded and entirely covered by flies). There
is no reason to be depressed by this result. Science, after all, is our creature, not our sovereign; ergo, it should be the slave of our whims, and
not the tyrant of our wishes.
Lakatos, Imre, and Paul Feyerabend. For and Against Method : Including Lakatos's Lectures on Scientific Method and the
Lakatos-Feyerabend Correspondence, edited by Matteo Motterlini, University of Chicago Press, 1999. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.c
Created from carleton-ebooks on 2023-09-11 17:53:38.