Book: Science, Faith and Society

Overview
Michael Polanyi presents a forceful defence of intellectual freedom and a nuanced reconciliation between scientific inquiry and religious faith. He rejects the idea that science can be reduced to a purely mechanical or purely objective procedure divorced from human commitment. Knowledge, for Polanyi, is rooted not only in impersonal procedures and data but in personal judgment, trust in a community of peers, and a moral framework that science alone cannot supply.
Polanyi treats science and faith as complementary sources of orientation for human life. Both require acts of commitment and rely on a network of shared convictions and institutions. Rather than setting them in opposition, he insists that a healthy society must protect the autonomy of scientific inquiry while also recognizing the moral and cultural roles that religious and ethical traditions play in sustaining a free intellectual life.

Main Arguments
A central line of argument contests both scientism, the belief that science can answer all meaningful questions, and authoritarian planning that seeks to control the direction of inquiry. Polanyi argues that scientific discovery depends on a free, competitive, and self-correcting community of inquirers. Centralized direction suppresses the spontaneous order by which science progresses: individual initiative, risk-taking, and the tacit, judgmental skills that cannot be fully formalized.
Polanyi stresses that knowing is an act of personal commitment. Scientists rely on trust, reputations, and shared standards to decide which results to accept and which to reject. This "fiduciary" element of knowledge means that conclusions are always held tentatively, judged by communal standards rather than reduced to absolute mechanical procedures. He draws parallels between the provisional, passionate trust exercised by the scientist and the trust exercised in religious and moral convictions, while maintaining important methodological differences between them.

Science and Faith
Polanyi rejects the sharp separation that pits science against religion as antagonistic enterprises. He insists that religion contributes moral guidance and a framework of meaning that science, focused on explanation and prediction, cannot supply. Conversely, science offers disciplined methods for understanding the natural world and correcting error. Both domains therefore have distinctive but mutually reinforcing roles within a humane society.
Faith, properly understood, does not demand the suppression of inquiry; science, properly understood, does not abolish the need for ethical and spiritual orientation. Polanyi cautions against forms of secular dogmatism that attempt to derive moral prescriptions solely from empirical facts, and against religious dogmatism that rejects critical scrutiny. He proposes a pluralistic culture in which the autonomy of different spheres is respected and dialogue is fostered.

Implications for Society
Polanyi's defence of intellectual and institutional freedom extends to political concerns. He warns that centralized bureaucratic control, whether driven by ideological zeal or managerial rationality, undermines the creativity and responsibility essential to science and to civic life. A free society requires decentralized institutions that can nurture independent judgment and sustained commitments, as well as legal and cultural protections for dissent and debate.
Democratic freedoms, a lively civil society, and traditions that inculcate responsibility are therefore vital not only for religion or ethics but for the growth of scientific knowledge. Polanyi sees the health of culture as a network of interdependent liberties and loyalties; losing any of these threatens the vitality of the others.

Legacy and Relevance
Polanyi's reflections influenced later debates about the philosophy of science, the role of tacit knowing, and the limits of reductionism. His insistence on the personal dimension of knowledge and the social structures that sustain it resonates with contemporary concerns about expert authority, public trust in science, and the politicization of expertise. The argument that science and faith can coexist without collapsing into relativism or coercive orthodoxy continues to offer a resource for thinking about pluralism, education, and public policy.