Aldous Huxley’s Itinerary from Skepticism to Mysticism

Abstract

Aldous Huxley lived in a very particular period of the twentieth century, one in which the debate between rationalists and skeptics marked an entire generation. Indeed, it was the central issue around which his primary literary and philosophical work evolved. It is also in this context that we should frame the crucial role he afforded to biotechnology in individual and social progress. Nevertheless, Huxley warns of the dangers to be derived from biotechnology for failing to reconcile the stance of the objective world with that of the world of life. The author of Brave New World proposed returning that lost unity to the sciences and, ultimately, to mankind as a remedy for that divorce and to prevent the ills that were to come. In this task, the religious factor, far from being excluded, is considered a sine qua non of any interdisciplinary and life project. Accordingly, for Huxley, one who aspires to intellectual unity must be existentially committed. It could not be otherwise. This conclusion is the result of the extraordinary course of his life. Starting from a skeptical position marked by criticism of scientific­technological rationality and religion, Huxley converted in the end to an open and dialo­ guing mysticism for scientific discourse.

Huxley’s attitude with respect to science is not new, at least if we place any value in pre­modern philosophy. Still and all, he presents this ideal – that of perennial philosophy, as it is called – with a new air and as being accessible to a society where the signs of pessi­ mism and confusion were increasingly evident. To the extent these signs are visibly manifest today, reflecting on the life and thinking of one of the most clear­signed, contravening and exasperating intellectuals of the twentieth century is a fruitful exercise, at least for those who have not renounced the interdisciplinary path. Offering substance for that reflection is the ultimate goal of this article.