Introduction
In his essay "The Abolition of Man," C.S. Lewis offers a diagnosis that remains remarkably relevant. By analyzing a seemingly innocuous school textbook, he unmasks a process in which education reduces values to subjective feelings. He argues that such an approach creates "men without chests" – beings devoid of a moral backbone. This article explains this concept, its philosophical roots, and its prophetic relevance to contemporary challenges, from biopolitics to artificial intelligence.
Education: Creating Men Without Chests
Lewis's critique begins with modern education, which teaches that value judgments ("the waterfall is sublime") are merely expressions of personal emotions. Such a model, instead of initiating young people into an objective order of values, becomes a form of conditioning. Upbringing ceases to be character formation (Greek paideia) and instead becomes the training of specific reactions. In this way, people are produced who are torn between pure intellect and blind instinct.
The metaphor of the chest becomes crucial here. It symbolizes the heart – the realm of emotions shaped by reason, which connects the head (intellect) with the belly (instinct). The chest is the seat of virtue, courage, and righteousness. Its removal leads to the creation of moral cripples, incapable of heroism or loyalty, because they lack the organ that experiences value as something real.
'Tao': The Immutable Foundation of Morality
As an antidote to relativism, Lewis presents the concept of the Tao. This is not a borrowing from Eastern philosophy, but a universal, transcultural order of values, which he also calls natural law. It is the common denominator of human moral intuitions, present in all great civilizations. It constitutes the source of all judgments about good and evil, being to ethics what axioms are to geometry.
Attempts to create morality outside the Tao are doomed to failure. Any critique of a traditional value (e.g., justice) must appeal to another value (e.g., mercy) that itself originates from the Tao. Rejecting it entirely leads to nihilism and opens the way for the "Conditioners" – an elite that gains technological power over shaping future generations according to their own arbitrary preferences.
Dominion Over Nature: The Paradox of Self-Annihilation
Humanity's ultimate victory over nature, Lewis warns, will prove to be the abolition of man himself. Dominion over human nature (through eugenics or propaganda) is, in essence, the power of some people over others. Deprived of the compass of the Tao, the "Conditioners" themselves are guided only by irrational impulses. In this way, nature triumphs over man through the arbitrary decisions of the elite.
Lewis's diagnosis anticipates later postmodern critique and Michel Foucault's reflections on biopolitics – the mechanisms of power that manage life. Today, its relevance is evident in the digital age, where humans become raw data, and the problem of "men without chests" resurfaces in the debate about artificial intelligence. We are creating powerful intellects, but we face the challenge of instilling values in them to avoid soulless optimization.
Conclusion: Education, Technology, and Politics
Lewis warns that the path from education that reduces values to a civilization that abolishes humanity is terrifyingly short. His analysis is a call to return to the sources. In practice, this means education that initiates into the world of values, technology designed with an ethical horizon of responsibility, and politics rooted in the conviction of the existence of non-negotiable goods. Saving even one objective value means saving the foundation upon which humanity can be rebuilt.
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