Yes, Virginia

[George Haberberger]

At 07:52 AM 11/8/96 -0600, Diana York Blaine wrote:
>Critiquing the "hard" sciences is not the same thing as saying we cannot
>manipulate nature (whatever you mean by that term--perhaps a discussion of
>the famous nature/culture dichotomy could be interesting with this group).
>But to ask intuitively is not the same thing, IMHO, as saying "CAN we
>split the atom?" The intuitive question could be, SHOULD we?  Y'all are
>re-reading Gravity's Rainbow, for crying out loud. Isn't this an issue?
>Before they can manifest vast environmental changes some Native American
>tribes hold a "Children's Circle" in which they must sit down and ask each
>other, how will this affect the children and (hence) the future?
>Intuitive thinking?  Sure.  A boon for progress? Not. Isn't one of
>Pynchon's favorite themes the effect of multi-national corporate
>capitalism on all aspects of culture, including science?  Can we really be
>sure there's such a thing as "pure" science, in other words, when the
>first question asked is often "who will reimburse my research?"  Diana
>

"Splitting the atom, "poison gas" all bringing up the stereotype of the
amoral scientist and technologist, seeking knowledge blindly, with no heed
to the consequences. This stereotype was old when Frankenstein and Faust
were written, probably old when the 13th century clergy tried to ban the
crossbow, saying it inflicted wounds to grevious to use against Christians,
though infidels were fair targets (it's more Pynchonian to explain this as
them trying to control a weapon that gave even the most ill trained peasant
the ability to safely kill a mounted nobleman,  who had up till then been
safely ensconsed in his armor). But let us take the ethically decrepit
scientist as a given.

If we are to teach ethics to our scientists, whose ethics? There is a large
segment of the American populace who wished that the first scientists to
observe decreased fertility among Mexican peasants eating large quantities
of yams had the foresight to consider the consequences of pursuing this line
of research. If female oral contraceptives had never been developed, and sex
never decoupled from procreation, and females never being given the chance
to decide if and when they have children, perhaps the Sexual Revolution
would never had occurred, women in the workplace would have far fewer
chances for a career, and there would be a lot more children in the world. A
world of scientists working under fundamentalist ethics would be a world of
women at home, with 5 kids, men at work, and a severe overpopulation problem.

Lets examine the archetypical unethical scientific developement, splitting
the atom.As I recall, the American impetus for researching fission and
developing it into a weapon came when Einstein and Fermi realized the Nazis
were also researching fission, and petitioned Roosevelt into funding the
Manhattan project. Given the choice between Europe controlled by the Nazis
and the existence of nuclear weapons, I think most people would chose
nuclear weapons.

As far as nuclear proliferation after World War II, defense planners for the
western world felt the most ethical and most economical way to contain
Soviet aggression was with nuclear weapons, the number of conventional arms
required would have bankrupted the western economies, instead of straining
them. I'm not rationalizing nuclear weapons, just saying that many people
honestly believed the best way to protect humanity was to develope the
capability to destroy humanity many times over.

But even if fundamentalists, conservatives, greens, liberals, hawks, doves
and feminists could all agree on one set of ethics, the more basic problem
is that too often, no one can foresee all the effects of a new technology.

If only the tinkerers inventing the automobile at the end of the 19th
century had forseen what their creation would have done to the environment.
Of course, when automobiles became more prevalent, they were heralded as a
environmental saviours, as they replaced teams of horses which, although
organic and natural, produced copious amounts of manure ( classicists can
check Hercules and his stable cleaning gig), and then, dead horses. One
wonders what Los Angeles would be like with several million horses running
about.

The scientist who may have created the most environmental side effects may
have been the one, 3-4000 years ago, who invented indoor plumbing. Indoor
plumbing raised standards of hygeine, thus decreasing the frequency of
disease and epidemics and greatly increasing the average lifespan,  and was
probably the enabler that allowed the human race to proliferate and become
the 5 billion population infesting the Earth today.

George