The Death Of Science As We Know It

The "March for Science"

http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-march-for-science-la-20170422-story.html

Thousands of scientists, students and activists gathered Saturday in downtown Los Angeles for the March for Science, one of more than 500 such events being held around the world.

After a rally in Pershing Square, the march began at 11 a.m. with participants walking about seven blocks to City Hall, where several speakers were to address the crowd. Afterward, demonstrators will return to Pershing Square for presentations on air quality, dinosaurs and how to spot “alternative facts” on the Internet.

Today is a sad day in modern human history. We are witnessing the death of science as a field of research. Gone are the times of Galileo Galilei when the modern scientific method was developed, when science served the expansion of human knowledge.

Today's "March of Science" has  finally turned Science into a political ideology. Science (from lat. scientia = knowledge) is openly advocating for left-wing politics. It is not about knowledge anymore, not about research, it is about ideology.

We could have seen it coming with more and more pseudo-sciences like climatology, gender studies, dubious "social sciences" and theoretical physics with its unfalsifiable theories claiming their place in Western universities. Many professorships and positions in scientific institutions had become a comfortable source of income without the need of ever coming up with independently verifiable results. Fifty years ago science produced practical applications, today science produces theories, paper and colorful computer animations.

And these self-declared experts who have become so comfortable in their  professors' chairs suddenly feel the pressure to produce tangible results or lose funding in the "Trump era". Of course this can be a scaring experience, especially if someone has never actually worked in the private sector and lived  on  the public budget throughout his lifetime. So it is no surprise that these people are now mobilizing to support a leftist ideology, which was far more sympathetic towards them.

But these "scientists" marching for a leftist cause do not understand that they destroy every last bit of credibility that science has enjoyed until know.

Climatology for example has always been suspected to be politically motivated and funded only with the condition of a predetermined result of the research. If there had been the need of any further proof that it was based on politics rather than facts, then this "March for Science" just provided it by revealing the political motivation of these scientists to the public.

But the negative consequences for human progress are far worse. By turning science into an ideology and bringing all scientific knowledge into discredit, they have now provided the enemies of science with a perfect argument. Now every creationist can rightfully say that science is nothing but an ideological belief and that evolution was just as questionable as climatology or gender studies. It has now become impossible to distinguish what is based on facts and what is based on ideology, because scientists have revealed themselves as political activists.

The proponents of "intelligent design", homoeopathy, astrology, parapsychology, theology, "hollow earth theory" and whatever superstitious belief may exist, can now claim that all justified scientific criticism of their pseudo-science was politically motivated, since science is nothing but an ideology to begin with.

We have now entered an age of absolute relativism. There is no truth anymore, no facts, nothing is certain, everything is just a belief. And all beliefs are equal and unverifiable. This is the result of turning science into just another political ideology.

Now I have to admit that I hold a scientific decree myself (graduate biologist = Master of Science), which would also make me a scientist. However from today on I cannot help but feeling embarrassed by this designation. I do not want to be placed into the same category as those political activists who call themselves "scientists".

Therefore I think, we who are interested in expanding our knowledge by research, experiments and observation as well as logical deduction cannot continue to use the discredited term "science" for what we do. Maybe it is better to call it "natural philosophy" again, as it was called centuries ago.

Science is now about ideology and beliefs, only natural philosophy is still about knowledge and research.