The reliance on science and data to settle ethical and ideological disputes often masks the underlying values and agendas of specific groups and policymakers. Even those who govern under the guise of data are still making subjective judgments. Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben’s observation that the governing principle in Western societies had become the preservation of “bare life,” driven by the fear of losing it, highlighted a political landscape prioritizing survival above all else. While criticized for being extreme, Agamben correctly sensed that expert responses to the pandemic were often shaped by an unspoken understanding of what constitutes a meaningful human life. Officials asserting that the pandemic simply dictated policy responses conveniently ignored fundamental ethical and political disagreements.
In this way, “the pandemic” became a governing tool, much like “the economy” before it. There was an attempt—though not fully successful—to create a seemingly objective, scientific framework to overcome ideological conflicts in American politics. Cost-benefit analyses were presented as a way to achieve specific outcomes—reducing viral spread and preserving life. News outlets prominently displayed COVID dashboards, replacing financial tickers with daily updates on infections, hospitalizations, and deaths. Each morning, citizens could check the pandemic’s progress as if monitoring stock performance. These charts quantified lives and infections, but what about the less tangible costs of anxiety, depression, learning deficits, and social isolation? Furthermore, what value was placed on immeasurable aspects of life like the health of democracy, the simple joy of companionship, or communal spiritual practices? Were these factored into the “Doctors Orders” being issued?
The connection between the pandemic and the long-standing governing concept of the economy was evident. In California, Governor Gavin Newsom prohibited in-person church services during the 2020 lockdown while allowing film studios and other businesses to operate. The justification was that these businesses were “essential” to the economy. Clearly, economic productivity was prioritized over even the preservation of “bare life” in certain contexts. What remained consistent was the tendency of politicians and authorities to mask ethical and ideological goals behind a facade of factual authority.
The implicit message was that certain types of business activity were worth risking illness and even death for, while fundamental human needs like worship or grieving together at funerals were not. “We allowed thousands of people to die alone,” noted Yale sociologist and physician Nicholas Christakis. “We buried people by Zoom.” Yet, movie and television production continued. Later that year, it was revealed that Governor Newsom’s children were attending a private school exempt from the shutdown rules imposed on public schools, while many Californian parents struggled to balance work and online schooling. The following month, Newsom was caught violating his own safety guidelines by hosting a birthday party at the exclusive French Laundry restaurant.
These incidents fueled the public perception that governance in the name of science was a manipulative tactic—a way to control certain groups while granting greater freedoms to others. At the very least, the discrepancies between Newsom’s private and public actions highlighted that personal values inevitably influence difficult ethical and political decisions. Even high-ranking officials governing in the name of “bare life” seemed to experience a conflict of priorities, with the pleasures of normal life, companionship, education, celebration, and friendship outweighing the perceived risk of physical harm, even when “doctors orders” ostensibly dictated otherwise.
To obscure matters of interpretation and significance with a veil of data is to misuse the authority of science, ultimately damaging its credibility. This dynamic helps explain not only the rise in anti-science skepticism during the pandemic but also the spread of dangerous conspiracy theories—such as the idea that COVID-19 vaccines were being used by Bill Gates to implant microchips. Some infected individuals even died denying their illness, clinging to the belief that it must be something else. Ironically, these same individuals often sought medical care from the very scientific establishment they rejected, insisting from their deathbeds that their condition must be something other than COVID-19.
This rejection of science was both personally and politically damaging. However, it prompts us to consider what we can learn from the fact that wealthy governors enjoyed lavish birthday dinners with friends while ordinary citizens attempted to “think” their way out of COVID-19. One clue lies in anti-vaccine conspiracy theories, which often claimed the virus was invented by a political elite seeking power. This echoes Agamben’s argument, albeit in more academic terms, that the state had been overtaken by a “medical religion” resembling “technological-sanitationist despotism.” This perspective suggests that the perceived “doctors orders” were not purely about health, but about control.
Conspiracy theories are flawed, foolish, and sometimes malicious, but they may also contain elements of political resistance. Pandemic-era governance was characterized by top-down directives with minimal public dialogue. Town hall meetings and assemblies, traditionally spaces for public deliberation, were themselves deemed public health risks. This shift away from participatory democracy has been a trend in our technocratic era, but the pandemic dramatically accelerated it. Democracy itself was, with little debate, considered too dangerous. The perceived “doctors orders” effectively silenced democratic processes.
The uncomfortable truth is that scientists, doctors, and public health experts are on equal footing with ordinary citizens when it comes to grappling with ethical and political questions. Science provides no special insight or authority in these areas. No scientific method can determine what is meaningful, nor can experts quantify which values we should prioritize. Similarly, no culture is purely scientific and rational. Instead, a variety of ethical and political viewpoints can utilize scientific findings.
Philosopher Hans-Georg Gadamer argued that the primary tasks of a humanistic approach to politics are, first, to guard against “the idolatry of scientific method,” and second, to restore to ordinary citizens “the noblest task of the citizen—decision-making according to one’s own responsibility.” Scientism promotes a discourse of mere facts, presented as self-evident and requiring no interpretation. Politics and social life are supposedly captured by a single, privileged scientific language, while other moral and ideological viewpoints are marginalized. It is revealing how many conspiracy theories plaguing American life mirror a distorted view of science, imagining complex global phenomena explained by a single, underlying structure. In response to expert overreach, certain segments of the population have created a distorted version of science with their own alternative hypotheses and theories, challenging the imposed “doctors orders.”
Where scientism reinforces hierarchies, a more humanistic and sensitive approach recognizes that all individuals share the same fundamental human condition. We are all seeking clarity on what gives our lives meaning. These meanings cannot be empirically proven and are always subject to debate. No set of facts can definitively dictate the course of political life, even under the guise of “doctors orders.”
Consider the mass protests following the murder of George Floyd during the pandemic’s first wave. After months of social distancing and strict lockdowns, millions marched shoulder to shoulder in the streets. Shortly after, hundreds of medical experts and public health officials signed a letter expressing continued opposition to “protests against stay-home orders” while justifying these particular protests by citing the “lethal” threat of white supremacy to the “health specifically of Black people.” This selective application of “doctors orders” raised questions about the true motivations behind public health pronouncements.
However, these protests were not primarily a public health action; they were an urgent expression of moral outrage. The need for this expression in that moment may well have outweighed the need for social distancing. Regardless, it was not for health authorities to decide. Their attempt to reconcile a political action they supported with the pandemic regime they were tasked with enforcing sent a clear message: rules are selectively applied based on our preferences. The idea of universally applicable “doctors orders” was undermined.
“You are entitled to your own opinion, but not your own facts,” a saying often attributed to Daniel Patrick Moynihan, a prominent technocrat, reminds us. While it’s valid to criticize populist movements for dealing in “alternative facts,” it’s also true that today’s scientistic administrators seem increasingly unwilling to allow people even their own opinions. Instead, they treat “the facts” as the sole determinant of acceptable opinion, effectively dictating acceptable thought as if by “doctors orders.”
One of the most significant failures of pandemic governance was the silencing of ordinary people’s voices. Instead of engaging in dialogue, people were simply informed of scientifically rational policies and, if they protested, lectured into compliance. Total lockdowns, as implemented in the early months of the pandemic, are incompatible with a functioning democracy. Even if discussions need to occur outdoors, deliberating the complex issues raised by a pandemic requires a genuine exchange of ideas within communities, allowing all citizens to participate. Moving away from scientism means returning to this kind of dialogue, moving beyond unilateral “doctors orders.”
Given the diversity of American cities and states, a one-size-fits-all policy narrative for pandemics and other emergencies is unlikely to emerge from such a process. Different communities, allowed to debate how to balance health risks, life, and economic well-being, might reach different conclusions. A younger community with many families and children might prioritize mental health and education. A community with a larger elderly population might emphasize precautions against viral spread. A religiously devout community might accept a wider range of risks for the sake of worship, while a community focused on entrepreneurship or activism might prioritize those values. All Americans would need to grapple with what democracy demands in the face of a plague, and their answers would not be solely determined by scientific experts or dictated by “doctors orders.”
Presumably, such deliberation would also consider infrastructure, strain on regional hospitals, and population density. Again, science would play a crucial advisory role but should not hold absolute authority. Instead, what’s needed for these policy discussions is what social scientists call “local knowledge” and “thick description.” The only way to understand a community’s priorities is to understand the stories its members tell—through words and actions—about how they live and wish to live. This nuanced understanding is far more valuable than simply imposing “doctors orders” from above.
Finally, this dialogue would acknowledge that scientific consensus can be fallible, even in areas where science rightly claims authority. Scientists themselves understand this truth. For example, while most scientists initially supported mask mandates, retrospective data presents a mixed picture of their effectiveness. This is not a failure of science itself. As a society, we faced difficult decisions in real-time with limited information. However, when the authority of science is misused to make complex choices seem simple and presented as unquestionable “doctors orders,” science’s credibility inevitably suffers.
Lacking democratic consensus, Americans largely muddled through the early stages of the pandemic. Some falsely claimed conspiratorial knowledge to challenge scientific expertise. Others presented their preference for preserving “bare life” or promoting economic growth as the inevitable outcome of scientific findings, dismissing all dissent as irrational or immoral. This created a fractured society, unable to agree on even basic principles beyond blindly following or rejecting “doctors orders.”
Many view the pandemic as a precursor to even greater global crises, potentially ecological in nature and far more devastating. Avoiding such crises requires listening to scientists and respecting scientific authority with humility. Science’s role as an advisor, grounding public discourse in reality, is indispensable.
However, American society has, over time, allowed scientism to dominate major institutions. If the technocrats and data enthusiasts are not reined in, the nation risks descending into a conflict over whose values prevail. Such a trajectory would not only signify the end of democracy in America but also the imposition of a foreign concept of life on those who no longer recognize themselves in the government that governs them, a government that increasingly resembles a dispenser of “doctors orders” rather than a representative of the people.
Prioritizing democratic dialogue and moving away from top-down policymaking will be challenging. In a society as vast and diverse as ours, the temptation to delegate contentious decisions to supposedly neutral authorities will always exist. But if we hope to navigate future crises more effectively than this one, we must learn to trust ourselves, our communities, and democratic processes, rather than blindly accepting “doctors orders” from on high.
