Today, a post is up at Meme Therapy on the ethical aspects of techological and scientific advances. It is an interview with a lot of different people with diverse backgrounds. Jose Garcia asks:
We seem to be awash in technological/scientific issues that raise serious ethical questions nowadays. Of these which concern/interest you the most?
You can find my answer down the line, probably the most lengthy of the replies (duh?). Basically, I’m pointing to two major points: 1) the technical advancements that have already occur and will continue to happen, will challenge our current views of humanism, law and morale, volition and other aspects of human affairs. However, 2) how this knowledge is communicated, understood and misunderstood due to everything from bad explanation to religious beliefs, is just as important an issue.
I’d say that today we have a vast majority of academics that accept the Modern Synthesis of the theory of evolution, while a large part of the population as such a) do not believe in evolution; b) think evolution may be correct, but that humans are still “spiritual beings”; c) think that all is right and do not acknowledge that there are any inconsistencies between religion and science; d) think science is “bad” and that it should be discarded altogether.
So where does that put us today? Indeed, if I claimed that I really believed that Santa Claus existed, I’d be able to make use of all the same arguments that those proposing an intelligent design theory rathern than evolutionary theory of human (and anima) evolution. Yes, I believe that Santa exists, living at the North Pole (or was it Greenland, Norway or Finland, or what?). Just because we can’t see him, doesn’t mean he doesn’t exist, does it? He’s giving you the presents at X-mas, not your parents (just a cover-up). You want me to prove it? No, I don’t believe in science, you can’t measure everything, right? There is more between heaven and earth than that!
-Thomas
