Michael Crichton on Scientism

Reposting a quote shared by my friend, Matt:
 

“The ultimate lesson is that science isn’t special – at least not anymore. Maybe back when Einstein talked to Niels Bohr, and there were only a few dozen important workers in every field. But there are now three million researchers in America. It’s no longer a calling, it’s a career. Science is as corruptible a human activity as any other. Its practitioners aren’t saints, they’re human beings, and they do what human beings do – lie, cheat, steal from one another, sue, hide data, fake data, overstate their own importance and denigrate opposing views unfairly. That’s human nature. It isn’t going to change”

― Michael Crichton, Next

Paging Dr. Moreau

There's​ absolutely no way this isn't abused in the future.  The concern is not with the advancement or research and and knowledge, per se, but with the dissolution of absolute moral boundaries that is continuing in parallel.  We are increasingly a world where "might makes right", and in which the only constraint on our action is the imposed will of others.

This combination does not bode well for the reduced suffering and increased flourishing of humanity.
http://www.foxnews.com/science/2017/03/16/chinese-researchers-announce-designer-baby-breakthrough.html

It's Settled

A new discovery about the fundamental complexity of water?

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/scientists-have-discovered-new-state-matter-water-180961546/

On the one hand, very cool.

On the other hand, this is what makes me a skeptic of scientific determinism. "The Science is Settled!"... "Uh, no, wait a sec, you know that sort of fundamental substance that we've known everything about for, like, well, all of your life? Turns out..."