Fatal Attractions: The Troubles with Science
Author | Henry H Bauer |
---|---|
Published | 2001 |
Publisher | Paraview Press |
Pages | 240 |
ISBN | 1931044287 |
The modern world has become fatally addicted to science. In the beginning, the natural sciences were simply humankind's storehouse of knowledge about the mechanics of the world. But increasingly, since the late 19th century, science has become a universal role model for how to acquire knowledge. Science-based metaphors pervade our words and thoughts. Science is now our very arbiter of truth, and has even become a surrogate religion. Science now occupies an impossibly demanding cultural role and, inevitably, misconceptions about it are rampant. Therein lies the root of the troubles with science. Curing those troubles requires that we understand what science's manifold faces are and allow each to have only as much influence as it really deserves.