Raise the Hammer

Science or technology, their applications to modern life have mucht to do with faith as in any other religion. Yes, scientific discovery is theoretically based upon experimentation and experience, but I do not witness those experiments first hand. They are not my experience. Indeed, I seldom experience the results. Instead I am told about them through increasingly unreliable and culturally biased media. Further, in the same media, I frequently read about manipulation of the experimental process and results reporting within scientific institutions by pharmaceutical companies or other institutions in a position to profit from "science."

In my own life I find the subsequent "scientific" knowledge provides just about the same amount of positive rinforcement given a pigeon in a psychologist's laboratory. So I accept that scientific discoveries are for the general good with the same faith that I might at one time have had in prayer. I begin to believe that a good job in a tech industry, one that pays my health care, will make me happy, or that science will allow me to live forever, or make me whole again after illness or injury. The limitations of workplace safety procedures, public and private insurance and my own doctor's skills may come as faith shattering revelations.

But faith has momentum on its side. Just think of the energy behind the automotive industry: hundreds of thousands employed, millions of miles paved, factories, refineries, gravel pits, traffic cops, on and on. If science made teleportation possible by, say, 2010, would this be good for the economy? Would it be good for me?

I don't like to hear about any "science" that contradicts my notions of what is "good." That makes it hard for me to sustain my faith in science and technology, and might cause me to revert to other religions.