(3089/898) Diamond, Sagan, Dawkins

643) It ought to be obvious that both reductionist understanding and higher-level understanding are essential, and that it's pointless to berate scientists for failing to do controlled experiments on subjects for which controlled experiments would be immoral, illegal, or impossible.

Jared Diamond
"Portrait of the Biologist as a Young Man"
New York Review of Books (1/12/95)
[review of E.O. Wilson's Naturalist]

644) In July 1991 I visited Arizona's Biosphere II, the controversial effort to build a self-sustaining microcosm, while it was still being de-bugged before being sealed off. One of the organizer's many serious problems was earthworms, which were of course required to aerate the soil and thereby to regulate the atmosphere within Biosphere II. Alas, there was almost no one to whom to turn to for advice, because by 1991 the crusade [by molecular biologists] against "stamp collectors" [naturalists] had reduced the world's number of experts on tropical rainforest earthworms to two, one of whom was already unemployed. The result is now notorious: the Biosphere II organizers failed to solve the problem of soil aeration and failed to attain an atmosphere of constant self-regulating composition; gases had to be pumped into the Biosphere to safeguard the lives of its human residents. That failure in a microcosm can serve as a metaphorical warning to us to be concerned about the current breakdown of self-regulation of the whole Earth's atmosphere.

Jared Diamond
"Portrait of the Biologist as a Young Man"
New York Review of Books (1/12/95)
]review of E.O. Wilson's Naturalist]

645) We have a civilization based on science and technology, and we've cleverly arranged things so that almost nobody understands science and technology. This is as clear a prescription for disaster as you can imagine. While we might get away with this combustible mixture of ignorance and power for a while, sooner or later it's going to blow up in our faces. The powers of modern technology are so formidable that it's insufficient just to say, "Well, those in charge, I'm sure, are doing a good job." This is a democracy, and for us to make sure that the powers of science and technology are used properly and prudently, we ourselves must understand science and technology. We must be involved in the decision-making process.

Carl Sagan
"Wonder and Skepticism"
Skeptical Inquirer (Jan-Feb/95)

646) Science involves a seemingly self-contradictory mix of attitudes: On the one hand, it requires an almost complete openness to all ideas, no matter how bizarre and weird they sound, a propensity to wonder. As I walk along, my time slows down; I shrink in the direction of motion, and I get more massive. That's crazy! On the scale of the very small, the molecule can be in this position, in that position, but it is prohibited from being in any intermediate position. That's wild! But the first is a statement of special relativity, and the second is a consequence of quantum mechanics. Like it or not, that's the way the world is. If you insist that it's ridiculous, you will be forever closed to the major findings of science. But at the same time, science requires the most vigorous and uncompromising skepticism, because the vast majority of ideas are simply wrong, and the only way you can distinguish the right from the wrong, the wheat from the chaff, is by critical experiment and analysis.

Too much openness and you accept every notion, idea and hypothesis - which is tantamount to knowing nothing. Too much skepticism - especially rejection of new ideas before they are adequately tested - and you're not only unpleasantly grumpy, but also closed to the advance of science. A judicious mix is what we need.

Carl Sagan
"Wonder and Skepticism"
Skeptical Inquirer (Jan-Feb/95)

647) Clarke's Third Law doesn't work in reverse. Given that "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic," it does not follow that "any magical claim that anybody may make at any time is indistinguishable from a technological advance that well come some time in the future." [...] [T]here have admittedly been occasions when authoritative, pontificating skeptics have come away with egg on their faces, even within their own lifetimes. But there have been a far greater number of occasions when magical claims have never been vindicated. An apparent magical claim might eventually turn out to be true. In any age there are so many magical claims that are, or could be, made. They can't all be true; many are mutually contradictory; and we have no reason to suppose that, simply by the act of sitting down and dreaming up a magical claim, we shall make it come true in some future technology. Some things that would surprise us today will come true in the future. But lots and lots of things that would surprise us today will not come true ever.

Richard Dawkins
"Putting Away Childish Things"
Skeptical Inquirer (Jan-Feb/95)

[Note: Clarke's Laws - First Law: 110, 111, 751, 752; Second Law: 753; Third Law: 109, 647, 754, 755, 1013, 1057, 1402. Clarke's Law of Revolutionary Ideas: 1853.]

648) In childhood our credulity serves us well. It helps us to pack, with extraordinary rapidity, our skulls full of the wisdom of our parents and our ancestors. But if we don't grow out of it in the fullness of time, our [...] nature makes us a sitting target for astrologers, mediums, gurus, evangelists, and quacks. We need to replace the automatic credulity of childhood with the constructive skepticism of adult science.

Richard Dawkins
"Putting Away Childish Things"
Skeptical Inquirer (Jan-Feb/95)

Note: "3089/898" is the designation I've given to the project of posting all my collected quotes, excerpts and ideas (3089 of them) in the remaining days of the Bush administration (of which there were 898 left when I began).

As of today, there are 695 days remaining in the administration of the worst American President ever.