Science, Scientists, And Society‪.‬

I am passionate about the civilizing effects of science. That does not make me insensible to the dangers of science, but they pale beside the dangers of pseudoscience. Think of the fascist and the communist movements, so much intertwined. One claimed the authority of science because it had a theory of race, the other because it had a theory of class. Yet neither was science, both pseudoscience. They did not celebrate inquiry; they suppressed it. They were the enemies of science and, not coincidentally, of humanity. REAL science is different. It never gives up searching for truth, since it never claims to have achieved it. And it is civilizing because it puts the truth ahead of all else, including personal interests. These are grand claims, but so is the enterprise in which scientists share. How do we encourage the civilizing effects of science? First, we have to understand science.