Is Science Good Or Bad?

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When we look at science we give it credit for saving lives but we seem to view this with rose tinted glasses and ignore the millions of lives lost as a direct or indirect result of scientific invention.

Science has claimed itself as being involved in almost every area or subject known to man, and therefore has become involved in and blamed for more deaths contributed to scientific invention then we have ever known. From deaths associated from motor related accidents to deaths associated from war disease and famine. Covid is a perfect example of science being involved in manipulataing a natural disease and causing it to be much more destructive. Biological weapons either intentionally or accide tally released are a small element of an example of a scientific destructive force. There seems like no area today where science has not been involved in killing people either directly or indirectly.

So why does science claim that it is responsible for more lives saved while it ignores the countless lives it has claimed over many years?

Why is it that science say that religion is responsible for mass deaths and yet it ignores the years of work by many religious people who have saved lives over many thousands of years? Why do hypocritical advocates of science point the finger and blame religion when they refuse to even think about the negatives that science has done to the human race in recent centuaries.

Global warming... They shift the blame from science and claim science as some sort of miracle tool to combat the enemy of global warming, when all the time scientific invention caused the entire global warming senario to take place! Religion has hardly played a part in global warming.

So on the one hand we can blame religion to hide the fact that the most detructive force to man that has ever been known is science! And science claims to have the answers to the senarios it has caused? Really? Should we really put our faith and our trust in science as a whole to provide us with the answers? Or should we rather get on our knees and pray?

To paraphrase another political debate: Science doesn't kill people - scientists kill people.

Again, religion doesn't kill people - religious followers kill people.

Religion can be a substitute for or explanation for science. It can also be a powerful way to ignore science in favor of single minded superstition.

Science is just systematic knowledge on natural world.
It can be used for good things. It can be used for bad things. It's just a tool.
A screw driver is neither good nor evil - it's useful or useless for a given purpose.
Knowledge, including science, is just another tool - useful or useless for a given task.

Science doesnt kill people, people kill people
Religion ditto, ditto.

But ScienTISTS rarely directly kill people (though that has happened- in rare hideous experiments ). Usually its others, usually politicians, who misuse the fruits of science to kill people. Usually weapons tech.

Scientists split the atom. But it was a president who dropped the first ones on cities (justified or not).

Folks commit atrocities in the name of creeds (including US Democracy), including in the name of religions.

A small group of men used the products of aviation science (jet passenger airliners) as weapons to bring down the Twin Towers and kill thousands in the name of Islam. They used science, but they did it in the name of religion. So which do you blame it on? Science or religion?

Why does the answer need to be so black and white? Why the binary "good" or "bad".

We are always learning, reassessing and correcting course.

To say science is bad because things need refining and improving is like saying a baby is bad because they can't walk straight away and they have to crawl and toddle and fall over to get there.

There are consequences for everything one does. Some are good choices, some are bad choices. Overall which do you try to choose? The same can be said in science. With every advance, there are good and bad consequences. I am keenly aware of both when I develop research. Some factors greatly outweigh the other side.

Are there truly evil scientists? Yes, but they are few and far between. They are usually weeded out by their colleagues when they do something evil. I have an dark side that I can control, but it is there for certain situations. I developed as a young kid for self defense when needed. Would I use it without a good reason? No, that serves no purpose to do so.

You have to approach it with a balance. For example, almost eradicating Polio with vaccines in the 1950s can be considered a good thing overall. The catch is some were allergic to the shot and suffered because of it. Unfortunately, some opted out of the vaccine and the virus adapted over time. Is the original vaccine condemned today because Polio still exists now? It did greatly change the outcomes of many lives by preventing them from an early death or a lifetime of being crippled by the disease. The balance is tipped toward the side of the general good of society.

One thing to consider on this topic is that humans do eventually die, be it naturally or by other means. Scientists try to improve overall life quality for the most part in between.

Good so long as it keeps an open and curious mind.
Bad if it is rigid and wants to prove the unprovable, that which can only be proved by instinct.

Science itself is neither good nor evil; but the politicians who decide how to apply science can be either.

To add on to both of these - the military kills people, the military funds science to keep up with the arms races with other countries, so scientists on military payroll indirectly kill people, and while inventing technologies to kill people they also find technologies that - hopefully in a more active capacity - revolutionize commerce, medicine, energy, information technology, space travel, etc..

---

The Scientific Method As Basic As it is; is an Outgrowth
of Our Systemizing Mind to Predict the Future Based

On What We Observe In Nature to Work in the Past;

With Or Without the 'Trademark Scientific Method',

Humans to Some Degree;

Most All of Us, Are

Scientists This Way;

As Little 'Professors', The Problems
That Come Are When We May Limit Our
Human Potentials Based on Observable Measurements,
Largely Impacted By the Culture We Co-Create And Measurably

Observe in Attempting

to Predict the Future

By the Same Restraints

We Co-Create Before;

This Is Common Sense,

For Anyone Who Pays Attention

to More than One 'Cultural Case Study

Way of Life'; Of Course, By Very Human Nature;

Some Human Beings Are More Closed Minded And Conservative;

Other Human Beings Are More Open Minded And Liberal; And of course

What This Means is the First, Respectively, is More Likely to Stick to the 'Science

Of Old Tradition'; And The Second, Respectively, Named Again And Labeled Open
Minded And Liberal, Are More Likely to Break Out of Tradition Through Imagination
And Creativity; And Co-Create Originally For What is Not Observed Before; Wanna Make

A Very Closed

Minded, Conservative

Person's 'Head Explode';

Create Originally What Their

Systemizing, Very Closed Mind,
Has Not Observed And Measured Before;

For Those Who are More Neurotic and Fear Change;

Original Creativity And New Frontiers Are Harder to Explore...

It's Worth Noting That The Word smART is Comprised of 60 Percent
Art; Of course that's Just a Metaphor; Not Everyone Uses 60 Percent

Of that Human

Potential intelligence
of Imagination and

Creativity in

Making

What Has

Not Been Observed
And Measured Before Real...

None of this is Set in Stone With
Epigenetic and Neuroplastic Potentials
of Human Adaptation in Increasing Human
Potential Unpacking Human DNA; And the Negative

of Epigenetics and Neuroplasticity Is Just as Real

Sticking With Observing And Measuring That Same
Old Traditional Thing; Might Keep Boats in A Safe Harbor
During A Storm; Yet on the Other Hand, That Anchor Might Lead to Death

When Ya Only

Observe and

Measure Conspiracy

Theories to Guide Your

Life Others Spoon-Feed

You in Their Science of Ignorance in Life...

Meanwhile, Those With Greater Sails Get New Vaccines

And Survive, Moving Out of the Harbor of Conspiracy Theories

As Ironically, And Deadly As those Traditions May come to Harbor...

Indeed, "Science" Will Be Way too Rigid; It's Only as Good As What it is

Able to Observe and Measure Now...

Some Folks

Only Measure

And Observe

Faux News; Go Figure: The Human
Condition; There is Good Science And

Bad Science too.. per

Affect

And

Effect For Real...

Or It's Like the Marine Dude i knew
When He Was 31 Years Old; Him and
All Of His Friends Observing Each Other
No Longer Getting Stronger; Believing

He Would Never Increase His

Bench Press Strength again;

As He Believed in Couch
Potato Averages Based

On Couch Potato CuLTuRE...

Yawn, i Looked/LOOK at the Outliers...

i Looked/LOOK beyond the Science Averages...

Therefore, i am 3 Times Stronger at 61 than 21 And 53;

Yet, on the Other Hand, i am 100 Percent Open Minded;
And 100 Percent Extraverted; And Just about 0 Percent Neurotic;

(To Be Clear, i surely always wasn't this way; Yet open to change, TG)

And Only Conscientious on what i am Currently 100 Percent Laser
Focused on in Autotelic Flow of Task (my Wife Takes Care of the rest)

And i am Only Agreeable For What Makes Sense in Life to me; In Other (O.C.E.A.N., Big Five, Personality)
Words; Results Vary, Depending on Make of Vehicle And Vessel of Human Essence for Real As 'Model' too...

A Final Note,

60 Percent
of heART

Is Art too...

Without Art

Life will be a
Bit More Gray Scale

And Even Toxic Still Now
in Patriarchal ways of HE as well...

As The Entire EartH, EH, Will (DOES) Suffer Without Art too...

In Conclusion, Science Works Okay, As Long As WE Balance the Art in Smart...

And That's A Practice of
Life That Takes

A Great

Work

oF LiFE iNDeeD, OVERALL.

---

Oy! Less of this "we" and "they" all over the place - you'd better not be including me in that "we", or I'll be very cross!

Most of your arguments simply don't stand up to scrutiny. Your "we" and "they" are most likely a small minority of extremists, the kind of pro-science people who maybe take their every idea from self-important "fundamentalist atheist" humbugs, but you tar the rest of us with the same brush. My experience is that most scientists, and most people who believe in science, have no problem admitting that nasty people who lust for fame, power, or wealth will use scientific discoveries to create destructive tools or to justify immoral acts. For example, many scientists involved in the Manhatten project later became activists in the nuclear disarmament movement, and Orville Wright regretted that airplanes, which he had hoped would bring about world peace, got used for dropping bombs on people (it's worth noting, however, that the proportion of humans killed by other humans is actually at its lowest level in the entire existence of humanity, so far as historical and archaeological evidence can tell).

A great many scientists and believers in science also profess religious faith, and don't see any contradiction in having a foot in both camps. And the canon of most major world religions is not in conflict with science either. For example: most Christian denominations are officially cool with the idea of a billions-of-years old universe which began at the big bang - they reason that the big bang was God saying "let there be light", and the difference between days and billions of years is meaningless to such a powerful being, but the Bible had to use metaphors that mere humans would understand easily (taking every word of scripture literally is the strict meaning of the word "fundamentalist", and those tend to be the religious people whom even other religious people think are a bit dodgy).

It is also pretty hard to deny that religion has been used to justify many immoral acts and still is. For our entire lifetime, tensions between Christians, Jews, and Shia/Sunni Muslims have been exploited by powerful people to ensure a steady supply of people willing to kill others across the whole Middle East, and in isolated terrorist acts elsewhere. But, just as for science, this isn't because religion is inherently evil, it's because the same nasty, greedy people who use science unethically will also twist the words of religious texts so that they appear to support their perverted causes.

In fact, you are doing something similar yourself - your post seems to insist that people make a black-and-white choice between science or religion, and must choose to fight for one side and demean the other. That's exactly the kind of thing which politicians do to stoke up wars!* In reality, there is no reason to make any such stark choice, we can take the best from both and reject the worst from both, or at least hold to our own beliefs without having to devalue the lives of people who's beliefs are different but benign. We should condemn immoral acts, for sure, but to say that "science" is to blame for them makes no more sense than saying that "numbers", "words", or "atoms" are to blame - it is just a kind of knowledge, just as scripture is a kind of knowledge.

[*: Of course, I don't really think you're trying to start a fight, MG! - and it is a good idea to talk about these things that that "opposing" sides can understand each other better and we can work together to solve the world's problems.]


...God! He drowned all of the people and most of the animals, all except for Noah's family and menagerie, didn't He? (OK, I realise I'm being a bit cheeky now, and I'll shut up! )

Last edited by Trogluddite on 26 Jul 2021, 11:15 am, edited 1 time in total.

Global warming is caused by certain capitalistic industries more than anything, such as the oil industry..It is capitalistic greed more than science that is the problem here. See the thing is science showed that fossil fuel pollution very much harms the environment...the oil industry hid that knowledge from the public to avoid losing money on their toxic product. Science did nothing wrong there. I realize fossil fuel pollution is not the only cause of global warming, there is of course that methane from excessive cow farming particularly in south America where swaths of the amazon are disappearing as we speak to make more room for cattle. It is not the scientists who are doing this.

Also, though science is not a force, and does not claim anything...science is simply knowledge of how the world and things in it function and how it can be applied to life. How people use scientific knowledge can vary and be good, bad or even neutral...but science itself is not good or bad. I certainly find looking at things form a more scientific perspective seems a lot more useful than praying.

You seem to be equating the scientific method, scientists themselves, and scientific knowledge. Most of the technology you complain about is from governments and corporations using scientific knowledge, often developed by engineers rather than the scientists who did the initial research. This isn't to say that scientists or scientific institutions can't do bad things, but there isn't some monolithic entity called "science", rather different groups doing different things. We only know that global warming is happening because of climate science, and its results are being contested by fundamentalists that think global warming can't be real because god promised not to flood the earth. Religious people are disproportionately likely to deny global warming and vote for politicians that oppose environmental regulation.

The question shows a lack of understanding of what science is.
It is neither good nor bad it is a process by which we discover things about the world around us.

Did you know that the petrochemical industries were either second or third on the list of pollution in the USA as a study was done when Obama was president. I believe that car manufacturing and steel production may have been second or third? I can't remember which was which.
What came first by a very large margin on the list was the White House. It did not specify just how the White House was known as the worlds number one polluter, but it is.
The polution caused by the use of motor vehicles had quite a low carbon footprint in this study. I think it ranked about 22nd with home heating system pollution being 25th on the list? (This is all the cars, lorries busses etc on the road listed as one group and all the homes also being listed as one group for the sake of the study).
I maybe wrong in my recollection of the figures by a little as I do not know where I saw the figures as it is a while back, but I was quite puzzled and a bit shocked to see the White House in the lead! This fact I recall with clarity because it had me wondering what they had been doing in there, and also who do they pay their carbon taxes to? Themselves?

What have you been smoking?

How does "the White House" cause pollution?

The White House doesnt have smoke stacks.

Does that house at Number Ten Downing Street (where your prime ministers live) "cause pollution", and do so a bigger scale than does every other industry in Britain?