Do you think people in R&S section have a realistic understanding of the scientific community?

Question

I asked this question in R&S:

"Are their forbidden researches in science?"
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=AjMj7NGpjlJOLgzt52stBODty6IX;_ylv=3?qid=20071109211652AANLqcz


What do you people in S&M think of the responses are they realistic or just opinions of people who don't understand the scientific community?

Answer 1

The people in the R&S section believe in ''magic'' not cold hard facts,religuious fairy tales should have no influence over human advancement

you can go to germany and be cured of canser with stem cells
but not in religous countrys because religouns make a stink over medical science

their afraid if we figue everything out we wount want to believe in the imagionary creatoin theroy

Answer 2

Some do, some don't. Same is true in the science sections. The contributors to the science categories, on average, have a better understanding of the scientific community than the contributors to other categories. That's not surprising.

In the US, serious effort is expended to prevent scientific research from unnecessarily harming living, especially sentient, things. The US readily funds stem cell research, and that is producing results. But for the reason above, the US won't fund embryonic stem cell research because it's likely that this experimenting is done on a human life. The US does not go so far as to make it illegal. It just chooses not to provide funding. Those desiring to do even embryonic stem cell research are free to do so with funding from other sources. Though embryonic stem cell research has so far produced no useful result, if it is so promising, you would think they'd have no trouble finding other sources of funding.

Answer 3

There is a wide array of answers there. It's hard to generalize. Some answers show a good and realistic understanding of the scientific community, others are just rants that show someone who viscerally *hates* scientists and the scientific method.

The question you asked there is a good one, and probes at that gray area between what science *can* do, and what it *should* do.

Science itself is a *method*. A method has no more ethics or morals than calculus does, or the method that wolves use to corner a baby deer.

But it is also a method practiced by *humans*. As such, scientists and non-scientists together have to consider where we *should* tread, as humans. The scientists should be asked to put on their lab coats and give us all some information: What can we learn by this? What are the costs? (E.g. are we inflicting suffering by studying this? Are we risking suffering by *not* studying this?) And it is essential that laypeople can and do *trust* scientists to answer these questions honestly *ESPECIALLY* when the scientists have reached general agreement approaching *consensus* on certain questions. (Too many times I see laypeople second-guessing the *science* itself, not just the implications of that science ... even second-guessing science as accepted by consensus among scientists ... this is the error committed by creationists.)

But after the scientists have filled policy makers in with the *scientific* questions, *then* the scientists take off their lab coats and get one vote like all people.

In short, science provides the *information* (to the best of its ability), but *humans* make the decision.

Answer 4

Of course they are areas which society deems inappropriate for scientific research.

For example the Nazis did what most people would agree were terrible experiments on humans.

Today we generally acknowledge that there is a moral dimension to our activities which may preclude some research.
The stem-cell debate is one such area which is playing out now. Scientists want to keep on doing their stuff. Parliament has vigouous debates on how far they should go.

And then there are the religious/philosphical holy cows.
Evolution has taken such a grip over our thinking that anyone who dares to question it (or point out the glaring refutations http://www.creationontheweb.com/content/view/3302/) is denied research grants.
Scientists risk losing their tenure if they don't toe the evolutionary line.

Global warming is another such holy cow - where is the research money to provide any balance to the one-sided debate?