Dethroning Science: Why the Sacred Cow Has Become a Tyrant, By Brian Simpson
Once upon a time, science was a liberator.
It freed us from the grip of superstition, gave us clean water, antibiotics, electric lights, and countless tools that made life less brutal and short. For this, it was honoured, elevated, even revered. But somewhere along the line, the servant became the master, and now demands loyalty, obedience, and faith.
It's time to dethrone science.
That might sound heretical. But heresy is often the beginning of renewal. And the truth is, modern science is no longer what it pretends to be: a humble search for truth. It has become a regime, with dogmas, priesthoods, excommunications, and inquisitions. We should not confuse its achievements in engineering and medicine with its authority over truth itself. It must be put back in its place.
Thomas Kuhn, in his landmark book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, argued that science proceeds not by slow, steady accumulation of knowledge, but by paradigm shifts, regime changes in worldview. In each era, scientists operate within a shared set of assumptions, and what counts as "truth" is what fits within that framework. When the data no longer fit, the paradigm eventually collapses and a new one takes over.
But here's the catch: within a paradigm, conformity rules. Scientists must publish, fundraise, and survive within the existing framework. Dissent is punished. Careers are ended. Entire fields become intellectually stagnant. In this way, science begins to look less like open inquiry and more like a guild, or worse, a state religion in a lab coat.
Now add corporate funding, government grants, and global pharmaceutical profits to the mix, and you get something even more dangerous: a captured system, where money, not truth, dictates the agenda.
Markus Mutscheller, in his widely shared post Dethrone Science, makes a searing observation: modern science excels at simple technical problems (smartphones, satellites), but flounders when confronted with the messy complexity of health, society, and the human spirit. It pretends the body is a machine, the mind a circuit board, the soul an illusion.
This leads to disastrous results: mRNA shots mandated across populations with wildly different bodies, cancer "cures" that treat symptoms but not causes, food pyramids that fuel epidemics of obesity and diabetes, all while the "experts" assure us they are following the science.
But this isn't science, it's scientism. It's the belief that only measurable, repeatable phenomena count, and that human life should be reduced to data, molecules, and algorithms. It's a worldview with no room for mystery, intuition, tradition, or spiritual experience. And it's failing us.
The phrase "science is a sacred cow" goes back decades. But now it's not just sacred, it's subsidised, weaponised, and marketed. The STEM fields, once devoted to discovery, are increasingly shaped by corporate agendas, patent profits, and tech monopolies of Big Pharma.
The result is a kind of technocratic feudalism: a small elite of lab-coated overlords, backed by billion-dollar companies, who issue decrees about what is true and safe and permissible. Dissenters, whether scientists, doctors, or ordinary citizens, are labelled "anti-science," deplatformed, or ridiculed. This is not the spirit of Galileo. It's the spirit of the Inquisition, just with better branding. This doesn't mean we abandon science. But we must redefine its role. Science must once again be a tool, not a throne. It must serve higher values, truth, wisdom, and the common good, not power, money, or ideology.
As Mutscheller puts it, science is a good slave, but a terrible master. It should build bridges, not dictate how we live. It should develop medicines, but not mandate them. It should inform medicine, but not erase the wisdom of traditional healing. It should contribute to education, but not displace the humanities.
Above all, it must be humble. "I know that I don't know," said Socrates. That is the beginning of real wisdom. When science forgets that, it becomes dangerous.
The Western world is in crisis, not because of science per se, but because science has become our ruling myth. Like all idols, it promises salvation and delivers control. The pandemic response, with its surveillance, censorship, and lockdown theology, was not an anomaly, it was the inevitable outcome of unquestioned scientific authority married to state power, creating technocratic rule.
If we want to recover our humanity, we must start by dethroning science in our minds and hearts. That means rejecting the trance that tells us only experts can think, only data can guide, only consensus can speak.
Let science return to its rightful role: the sharp, useful tool of a wise society. But never again its ruler.
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