Which C.S. Lewis book presents a philosophical argument that modern society should recover objective value?

The Abolition of Man presents C.S. Lewis’s philosophical argument that modern society should recover objective value.

Published in 1943, The Abolition of Man developed from three lectures Lewis delivered at the University of Durham in 1941. The book responds to ideas about education, morality, and value, especially the suggestion that statements about value are merely expressions of subjective feeling. Lewis argues instead for a shared moral order, which he calls the Tao.

The book is organized into three chapters: “Men Without Chests,” “The Way,” and “The Abolition of Man.” Lewis warns that an education which trains students to debunk values without giving them a moral framework can weaken the very human capacities needed for judgment and responsible action.

The title does not mean that Lewis was advocating humanity’s physical extinction. It refers to the possibility that technological power and value skepticism could produce people who have lost the qualities that make them fully human. The work is an essay in moral philosophy, not a novel.