about the love affair Bakunin had with Science (capital S) in its role as a rational counterpart to religion, and a potential governor of human progress.

He wants no parts of the abstractions of Science mixed with the business of governing men. Because it is abstract, and is a specialized field of knowledge, it will inherently be corrupt, or can be corrupted. He puts the actions of man above Science, Science above religion. To sacrifice even the lamb of the architecture of systematized, rational human investigation into the natural world for Peter and John (or whatever names he uses as examples of the figurative ‘guys next door’), shows you what a humanist this guy is. He props up Science in the face of religions only to cut it down at length, with some qualifications.

What I do like is his proposition on HOW science can be made useful to humans collectively. It has to be democratized and spread to every individual. It has to become the object and tool of the people, not of experts or ‘doctrinaires’ as he puts it. This is where he can be applicable to modern Social Democrats and the stance that Science should remain free of superstition (religion) and that learning should be for all, with the collective progress of humans tied inextricably to every individual’s progress.

But then, out of nowhere in his rants against abstraction and symbols and idealism, he props up Art (capital A) as greater even than Science in its connection to human endeavor in the true, meaningful material world. He doesn’t go on very long in making sense of this, probably because it would be hard to justify the historical and I would say inevitable worship of art, commercialization of art, or sanctification of artists (a select few who hold a ‘special vision’ that others are to adopt as their own in popular culture), and hold to his distaste for abstraction.

I love art more than religion and science too, but this is another case where imperfection is easier spotted in black and white than in full color. Bakunin’s very absolute, two-sided framework in looking at everything works against him at times.