Walt Disney’s Views on Science and Its Dangers

Intelligent Design the Future

Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture

Science, Philosophy, Astronomy, Society & Culture, Life Sciences

4 • 993 Ratings

🗓️ 3 January 2025

⏱️ 14 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

On this episode of ID The Future from the archive, John West, Associate Director of the Center for Science & Culture and author of Walt Disney and Live Action, talks about how science is portrayed in Walt Disney’s films and theme parks. Disney’s worldview was an interesting blend of 19th century morals with a 21st century vision for science and technology. A futurist, Disney was given to techno-utopianism and his works tended to reflect this, but they have also offered warning messages about the dangers posed by both science and technology. John West explores these interests both in Disney’s exhibits and his film works. Dig Deeper Source

Transcript

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0:00.0	Walt Disney was fascinated by the wonders of science, but did his passion for new technologies
0:12.7	eventually lead him to champion scientism and the rule of a technological elite?
0:18.4	In today's episode of I Do the Future, we're going to explore Walt Disney's
0:22.5	multifaceted view of science and how it was expressed in his films and attractions.
0:43.2	This is John West, Associate Director of Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture.
0:49.3	I'm also author of the new book, Walt Disney and Live Action, which explores the themes and making of Walt Disney's many live action films and television features. If you're interested in Walt Disney and his impact on popular culture, I hope you'll consider getting my book.
0:59.7	Someone once quit that Walt Disney harbored 19th-century emotions in conflict with a 21st century brain.
1:07.0	The characterization was apt. Disney was known for championing traditional morality and promoting nostalgia for the past.
1:15.2	At the same time, he was widely recognized as a visionary futurist
1:19.2	who enthusiastically embraced the new horizons offered by science and technology.
1:25.1	Disney's idiosyncratic mixture of moral traditionalism and techno-optimism
1:29.9	didn't always seem to cohere, and it led people to admire him for vastly different reasons.
1:36.0	Conservatives embraced Disney for his defense of Judeo-Christian morality, his unrepentant
1:41.3	support for the American founding, his love of free enterprise and entrepreneurship,
1:46.5	and his distrust of big government and the welfare state. By contrast, fellow futurists
1:52.4	were attracted to Disney's modernist ideas about urban planning, his exalted view of science
1:57.7	and technology, and his utopian visions of human progress.
2:02.3	Although I have a keen appreciation for Disney and his achievements, I admit I'm not one of those
2:07.2	who is especially enamored with his techno-optimism.
2:10.7	During the last century, we've seen far too much destruction arising from the abuse of science
2:15.9	for me to believe that science can fundamentally reform the human
2:18.5	heart or usher in a utopia. For me, scientific and technological progress is bittersweet.
	...

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