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6.14.2003
Science, Secularism and Human Freedom At one point in the history of modern civilization some wise ass had the idea that people, not rulers should determine their own destiny. This was in contrast to what had gone before, monarchs and church power that lorded over people. Next came some other wise ass that decided that we should trust our own selves to discover the truth of the world through our own powers of observation. This made the clergy mad because they had just spent a few hundred ideas pouring over religious tomes trying to decide the nature of everything, only to have the wise asses look through a telescope and tell them they we all wrong. Well, that first group of wise asses met with an untimely fate, but not before they influenced others. People decided that not only could they decide for themselves, using their own brains what kind of government they wanted, they could also learn for themselves the true nature of the world. Science was born. Democracy was born. Education was born. And we rushed into the modern era in which we are literally surrounded day to day with the benefits derived from what the wise asses figured out. Yet despite the obvious benefits we have reaped from this new freedom of human endeavor it is still considered bad form to admit that people, not gods, not rulers should determine their own fates. Somehow as we sit amidst the wonders that science has brought us we still question the very notion that direct observation of reality should be subservient to irrational belief in the supernatural? When we are sick, do we expect doctors or prayers to heal us? If prayers were all that were necessary to keep us all healthy we would not have had to develop medicines and machines to keep us well. We would have been fine hundreds of years ago when all we had were prayers. Did we not benefit from our knowledge of bacteria and disease? Did we not benefit from the discovery of antibiotics? Did we eventually pray our way to a cure for polio? When AIDS is finally eradicated from the Earth will it be because we wished it to be so or will it be because we used our own brains and talents to make it so? We know the answers to these questions. Yet even now we devote such time and energy denying that we have gained from knowledge and learning and self determination. We refuse to pass down the vast amounts of knowledge we have accumulated on to our children. And instead of numerous television channels proclaiming the power of our own hard work and endeavor we still have channel upon channel (4 of 12 public stations in Tulsa) proclaiming that we owe everything to the same powers that we turned away from to get to where we are today. Do we wish to return to those days where the common people, the masses, remained ignorant and powerless and should we give our leaders the power to determine what we know, what we can learn and how we can live our lives? I dont think so. Yesterday, an older man, a machinist came into the store I work at and he was excited. He had just purchased a computer for himself and was saving some money for a webcam for himself and one for his brother who lives in North Carolina so they could see each other over the internet. He had purchased a digital camera to take some pictures and had plans for more computer purchases. Through the wonders of science and technology he was going to experience things that he may have not ever had a chance to had not the pioneers of science renounced the idea that all knowledge was the realm of the king or church and set off for themselves to learn about the world we live in. Our ability to send a picture of a machinist in Oklahoma to his brother in North Carolina is the product, not of divine revelation but of methodical research into the nature of the world we live in. Last night I watched a news show where David Ho and his research team spent hours and hours in a laboratory trying to find a treatment for SARS. They have found what seems to be a promising advance to fend off the virus. There remains more testing to be done. If they succeed they will save thousands of lives. Just like scientists before them have saved thousands of lives. Science works. At our gut level we know this, but we still refuse to accept this fact in our hearts. I am overwhelmed by feelings of deep regret when the evolution/creation debate arises. Creationism represents nothing less than a wholesale rejection of all that science stands for and everything that has come about through the process of scientific inquiry. Anyone that professes that creationsim deserves a place beside real science should have every modern appliance and comfort ripped from their homes. Not seriously of course, but just as an illustration of what scientific thought means to people. If you deny that direct observation of the world is invalid in the face of religious dogma you are living in the wrong time period. | |
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