Does science explain everything?

William Shakespeare

Scientism is the philosophical theory that affirms that science is the only valid source of human knowledge. Taken literally, this statement sometimes leads to absurd conclusions. Perhaps the following case is an example of scientism. I’ve taken it from a recent article by Joseph Pearce entitled Shakespeare and Science.

Kathryn Harkup, British doctor in chemical sciences and science communicator, has published several books analyzing various literary works from the point of view of science. I don’t know if Harkup is a case of scientism, but her emphasis on science makes me think that perhaps she is. She has recently published a book titled Death by Shakespeare, where she criticizes how Shakespeare presents death in his plays, based on what she believes science modern knows about death. Pearce highlights two examples, which show some of the absurd conclusions caused by basing only on science.

Escena de Hamlet
(Delacroix)

• Harkup points out that in Hamlet, which many consider Shakespeare’s masterpiece, Hamlet’s father, King of Denmark, was murdered by his brother, who wanted to supplant him, by inserting poison into his ear. Harkup asserts that Shakespeare knew little about poisons, because this form of murder is ineffective, for the outer ear has few blood vessels and the poison would not have been well absorbed.

Pearce points out that Harkup has missed the point. Probably Shakespeare, like anyone in his time, was aware that this way of administering poison does not ensure the quick death of the poisoned person. But he used it, because the fundamental theme of Hamlet is the poisoning of the ears of the characters by means of lies and deception, what becomes the cause of many of the deaths that take place in the play.

Muerte de Cleopatra
(Reginald Arthur)

Harkup points out that, in Antony and Cleopatra, the queen of Egypt commits suicide by being bitten by an asp (probably an Egyptian cobra). The character Cleopatra in Shakespeare’s play claims that the bite of an asp kills and pains not. Harkup explains that this is not true. A cobra bite causes a slow and painful death. Cleopatra would not have achieved her goal.

But Shakespeare did not invent that form of suicide for the queen, which dates back to the time of the Roman Empire, although some historians don’t agree that this is the way it actually happened. Pearce explains that Shakespeare gave a different meaning to the asp, which represents the serpent that tempted Eve in the Genesis story. Probably, in his day, viewers would have noticed this symbolism, which Harkup misses. But just in case, to make it even clearer, Shakespeare has one of the characters (a guard in Octavian’s entourage) notice that these fig-leaves have slime upon them, such as the aspic leaves upon the caves of Nile. The fig leaves, of course, point again to the Genesis account. And the question whether the bite is painful or not is irrelevant.

In short: Harkup has not seen the true meaning of Shakespeare’s plays. By insisting on analyzing his work at the light of science, she shows that she has not understood the work of the Bard of Avon.

On the one hand, the clarifications that, according to her, modern science makes regarding death were surely well known in Shakespeare’s time, so they are by no means modern discoveries. On the other hand, she misses the symbolism of the plays, the references to the book of Genesis, the meaning barely hidden under transparent representations for Shakespeare’s contemporaries. She forgets that Shakespeare did not write scientific books, but theater plays, whose objective was to entertain the spectators, and by the way teach them permanent truths that those who believe in scientism do not perceive, because their ideology makes them blind to them. And the worst is, that those who act thus don’t even realize that they are making fools of themselves.

The same post in Spanish

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Manuel Alfonseca