The Trouble With Science…
The trouble with science
The trouble with science
 
 
Monday 5 November 2007. It was appropriate that the meeting was held on Bonfire Night, as Jack Gold was sending up a few rockets of his own when he launched his review of the history of science since the beginning of time.

It would be impossible to condense into a few words the ideas of science to which we were introduced, but it may mean something to those with a science background to say that we met, among others, scientists Alan Turing, Jim Lovelock , Einstein and John Wheeler in our very personalised tour through science discovery.  Jack had produced an attractive, colourful set of slides to go with his presentation.  Not to mention a cartoon character, Doctor Quantum, who explained to us in a short DVD the difficulties of quantum physics and the possibility that consciousness through observation actively builds or alters the universe.  It was this dilemma which had led Jack to question whether science could be the support we could rest upon as Humanists.
 
Edinburgh Group
 
In the discussion which followed, there seemed to be a consensus that while we had to accept that science did not have all the answers, it is, to quote Humanist member John Wiltshire, ‘the best model of reality we have’.   There is still much more to be learned, and in the meantime, the philosophy which underlies Humanist ideals was not too drastically undermined by this fact.  In fact there is not such a lot of trouble with science and we can look forward to all manner of new, useful scientific discovery.

Cathy Crawford
 


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