20th Century Transformations: Science, Society, and Cultural Shifts
The Impact of Science and Technology
The Technoscientific Revolution: Sound and Image
The experimental method advanced rapidly, yielding specialized knowledge about reality and matter in organic chemistry, physics, biology, and medicine. Technology improved alimentation and health, profoundly modifying daily life. By 1920, wireless telegraphy allowed communication across borders via radio stations and private receivers. Through sound, fast news and entertainment programs began arriving in homes. By 1930, politicians used radio for electoral proposals. The first films appeared, and the Golden Age of cinema became a powerful medium. Warner Bros. introduced sound film, transforming the industry.
The Impact of Science on the Mind
A progressive, permanently optimistic myth emerged, believing science could solve all human problems; this was named scientism. For positivists, metaphysics and religion no longer served to explain humanity’s enigmas. In physics, the determinism previously attributed to science was questioned, giving way to concepts of relativism and probability.
Religions and the New Society
Simultaneously with the gradual secularization of society, secularism advocated for the separation of church and state, the ideological neutrality of the state, and the recognition of freedom of conscience for individuals.
The Catholic Church
The Church hierarchy expressed strong opposition to new philosophical, political, and scientific ideas. The papacy strongly condemned liberalism, nationalism, socialism, communism, and the autonomy of civil society. The First Vatican Council was convened, defining the dogma of papal infallibility.
The successor of Pius IX, Leo XIII, in his encyclical, denounced the excesses of capitalism and defended the need for new social relations. After his election, Pope Benedict XV promoted lay religious movements such as Catholic Action to give prominence and a degree of autonomy to Christians, aiming for the re-Christianization of society. Within Catholic Action, the Young Christian Workers (JOC) movement gained importance. While anticlericalism remained very lively in traditionally Catholic countries, Protestantism gained adherents.
Orthodox and Protestant Churches
Protestant churches also had to cope with the progress of science and the rise of secularism. Thus, while traditionalists insisted on a literal interpretation of the Bible, others accepted new challenges, including different interpretations of biblical texts. In the United States, where Protestant Christian denominations were numerous, the dynamic Episcopal Church, Methodist, and Baptist churches prevailed. The Orthodox Churches evolved little doctrinally in the countries of Eastern Europe, where scientific advancements and the Industrial Revolution had less impact.
The Cultural Crisis
The Onset of the Crisis of Conscience in Europe
The changes in the economy and society, the advances in science and technology, and the devastation of the First World War led to a profound crisis of conscience in Europe.
The secure and proud bourgeoisie had a clear global hegemony, but intellectuals and artists of this period began to doubt this apparent solidity. Albert Einstein questioned the existence of absolute laws and the certainties of common sense. Ivan Pavlov demonstrated conditioned reflexes, challenging individual freedom. Sigmund Freud undermined traditional morality. Concurrently, the pictorial arts saw a proliferation of various styles characterized by a break from traditional norms.