Resisting the Totalitarian Imagination: Scientism, Natural Law, and the Eclipse of Moral Order in C. S. Lewis’ That Hideous Strength

C.S. Lewis’ That Hideous Strength serves as a multifaceted philosophical critique of the encroachment of scientism on human agency and moral reasoning, navigating the intricate terrain where epistemological overreach intersects with metaphysical nihilism. This paper advances a novel interpretation, arguing that Lewis’ narrative functions as a robust counter-response to mid-20th-century technocratic rationalism, proposing not merely an allegorical denouncement of totalitarianism but a philosophical redress rooted in natural law theory, moral imagination, and the critique of epistemic objectivism. Through a rigorous analysis of the National Institute of Coordinated Experiments (N.I.C.E.), the paper positions the institution as emblematic of the pernicious effects of a pure instrumentalist worldview. This worldview reduces human dignity to mere procedural and erodes the transcendence inherent in natural law. Drawing extensively from Michael Polanyi’s critique of scientism, T.S. Eliot’s insights on moral imagination, and the Thomistic tradition of natural law, this study situates That Hideous Strength within a broader epistemological and ethical framework that critiques the disembodiment of reason from the moral and metaphysical realities it must serve. Moreover, by weaving together these theoretical strands, the article offers an original contribution to the ongoing discourse on the limits of scientific authority, the fragility of the moral imagination, and the importance of recovering a transcendent moral order as a means of resisting the moral nihilism fostered by unchecked technocracy. Through this lens, Lewis emerges not only as a theologian and novelist but as a prescient philosopher whose critique remains strikingly relevant to contemporary debates surrounding the ethical boundaries of scientific and technological power.