And the problem
Over this past year, I have heard the expression “Follow the science and data” more than in all the rest of my years combined. I am a man of science. I have studied all branches of science since I was a kid. When I was in middle school, I would read college textbooks on Chemistry, Biology, Physics, Astronomy and any other sciences for my fun reading. On my high school graduation, I stayed up late talking about quarks with my dad and his brother. Yep, I was a real nerd, and I still am. But I realize that science does not have all the answers. And more importantly, science can bring both good and bad results.
One of the most obvious science discoveries to use as an example of science bringing bad results is the nuclear bomb. Impressive science, but the potential to do more harm than good is pretty obvious with this technology. While this science is one that seems obvious on the risks, many other science discoveries have risks that we miss, or at least do not discover for ages. Asbestos was a great building material used since the stone age, but it wasn’t until the 1970’s that we realized its harm and banned it in the United States. The internal combustion engine has provided tremendous benefits, but may also be a major cause in climate change that is predicted to cause tremendous harm. Science has a long history of making discoveries that later prove to be at least as bad as they are good.
I study the paths of scientific discoveries. And for that reason, I always look at new discoveries with an eye towards the unexpected consequences. I have seen science and technology explode during my lifetime. I grew up without computers, or even calculators. I grew up without microwave ovens. Many technologies have come and gone. VCRs and DVDs have both come and pretty much gone during my lifetime. Birth control was still fairly new when I was born. Organ transplants were still rare. Artificial sweeteners were just being developed. I grew up in a world without Google, Apple, Facebook or even the internet. Arpanet was around, but not publicly available. TV was the three networks, ABC CBS and NBC, and those went off the air at midnight. Yes, life for humans on this third big rock from the sun has changed drastically over the decades of my life. And I am not sure those changes have all been for the better.
I look at the world I live in now, and I see lots of problems that I did not see 40 years ago. With all the medical advancements we have had, I feel we are less healthy than we were back then. There is more obesity, more diabetes, more hypertension, more digestion problems. Sure we have drugs to “fix” the symptoms, but that does not make us healthy. Granted, we have increased life expectancy, but that does not mean we are healthier. I really think this health gap is the reason we have seen so many deaths in the United States during this current pandemic. We have utilized science to try to overcome the law of survival of the fittest, and now it is catching up to us. We seem to have much more mental health problems. Maybe we just advertise them more, probably to sell more scientific discoveries to fix the problems, but I don’t remember nearly the mental health issues growing up that I see now.
I do not feel that we are happier either. We spend so much of our lives complaining. Complaining about the actions of others. Complaining about politics. Complaining that life is not fair. Complaining about our jobs, our health, our lack of time or money. Complaining that we are too busy. Too busy to find happiness, except for that short vacation, where we push to do as much to make us happy as possible, only to realize that we have now returned to our busy lives even more exhausted than we were when we left for vacation.
I definitely do not feel that we are wiser. The very few who will get this far in this article are probably the exception. This article is too long for our current attention spans. There are no quick memes or quotes in big text to pull out. There is no pictures or video to grab your fleeting attention. And that is the problem. We are now bombarded with so much information, that the quick sound bite is all we pay attention to. Deep reading to truly learn is a lost art. The ability to understand complex arguments is lost in the flood of information we are drowning in every day. Critical thinking has been replaced with following the latest group think fad.
I of course do not blame science for these problems. Rather I blame the use of science to gain money and power. The ability to create nuclear weapons would not be a problem if people did not want to control other people. The existence of drugs to reduce high blood pressure is only a problem when we are more concerned about sales numbers than we are with high blood pressure. Otherwise, we would emphasize diet and exercise changes first, and then utilize medicines only as a last resort, rather than the way we actually treat patients. Better access to media would not be a problem if it were not for the desire to monetize that data stream. Science has been taken over by political and commercial interests, who are more concerned with the bottom line and how they can get more money and power than with making life better for all people.
So forgive me if I do not bow down to a quick 180 in science research to believe that masks have suddenly been proven effective against virus transmission, when over 100 years of scientific studies have shown just the opposite. Forgive me for not buying into the idea that putting something over my nose and mouth, blocking the natural flow of vital oxygen, with no training on sanitary practices, can cause no problems for me. Also forgive me for not jumping on the bandwagon of taking a vaccine whose long term effects have yet to be discovered. A vaccine that is being pushed as more effective than natural immunity when science must admit that is not proven, or even scientifically likely. Imitations rarely work better than the real thing to trigger immunity. But it will make a lot of money for some companies. I can see the hands of politics and commerce in action here. I will take a wait and see approach to the vaccine. The science and data already have shown that the mask requirements are not effective. I will watch the science and data, and decide over time whether the vaccine is right for me. In the meantime, I will trust in the law of the survival of the fittest. Now it is time for me to put down this computer, and get up and be active. Do things that really work to improve my health.