Schmidtty

To be honest, the restoration of science was the least of it, but when Barack Obama proclaimed during his Inaugural Address that he would “restore science to its rightful place,” you could feel a dark cloud lifting like a sigh from the shoulders of the scientific community in this country.

When the new president went on vowing to harness the sun, the wind and the soil, and to “wield technology’s wonders,” I felt the glow of a spring sunrise washing my cheeks, and I could almost imagine I heard the music of swords being hammered into plowshares.

Wow. My first reaction was to worry that scientists were now in the awkward position of being expected to save the world. As they say, be careful what you wish for.

My second reaction was to wonder what the “rightful place” of science in our society really is.

The answer, I would argue, is On a Pedestal — but not for the reasons you might think.

Forget about penicillin, digital computers and even the Big Bang, passing fads all of them.

The knock on science from its cultural and religious critics is that it is arrogant and materialistic. It tells us wondrous things about nature and how to manipulate it, but not what we should do with this knowledge and power. The Big Bang doesn’t tell us how to live, or whether God loves us, or whether there is any God at all. It provides scant counsel on same-sex marriage or eating meat. It is silent on the desirability of mutual assured destruction as a strategy for deterring nuclear war.

Einstein seemed to echo this thought when he said, “I have never obtained any ethical values from my scientific work.” Science teaches facts, not values, the story goes.

Worse, not only does it not provide any values of its own, say its detractors, it also undermines the ones we already have, devaluing anything it can’t measure, reducing sunsets to wavelengths and romance to jiggly hormones. It destroys myths and robs the universe of its magic and mystery.

So the story goes.

But this is balderdash. Science is not a monument of received Truth but something that people do to look for truth.

That endeavor, which has transformed the world in the last few centuries, does indeed teach values. Those values, among others, are honesty, doubt, respect for evidence, openness, accountability and tolerance and indeed hunger for opposing points of view. These are the unabashedly pragmatic working principles that guide the buzzing, testing, poking, probing, argumentative, gossiping, gadgety, joking, dreaming and tendentious cloud of activity — the writer and biologist Lewis Thomas once likened it to an anthill — that is slowly and thoroughly penetrating every nook and cranny of the world.

Nobody appeared in a cloud of smoke and taught scientists these virtues. This behavior simply evolved because it worked.

It requires no metaphysical commitment to a God or any conception of human origin or nature to join in this game, just the hypothesis that nature can be interrogated and that nature is the final arbiter. Jews, Catholics, Muslims, atheists, Buddhists and Hindus have all been working side by side building the Large Hadron Collider and its detectors these last few years.

And indeed there is no leader, no grand plan, for this hive. It is in many ways utopian anarchy, a virtual community that lives as much on the Internet and in airport coffee shops as in any one place or time. Or at least it is as utopian as any community largely dependent on government and corporate financing can be.

Arguably science is the most successful human activity of all time. Which is not to say that life within it is always utopian, as several of my colleagues have pointed out in articles about pharmaceutical industry payments to medical researchers.

But nobody was ever sent to prison for espousing the wrong value for the Hubble constant. There is always room for more data to argue over.

So if you’re going to get gooey about something, that’s not so bad.

It is no coincidence that these are the same qualities that make for democracy and that they arose as a collective behavior about the same time that parliamentary democracies were appearing. If there is anything democracy requires and thrives on, it is the willingness to embrace debate and respect one another and the freedom to shun received wisdom. Science and democracy have always been twins.

Today that dynamic is most clearly and perhaps crucially tested in China. As I pondered Mr. Obama’s words, I thought of Xu Liangying, an elderly Chinese physicist and Einstein scholar I met a couple of years ago, who has spent most of his life under house arrest for upholding Einstein’s maxim that there is no science without freedom of speech.

The converse might also be true. The habit of questioning that you learn in physics is invaluable in the rest of society. As Fang Lizhi, Dr. Xu’s fellow dissident whose writings helped spark the 1989 Tiananmen Square demonstrations and who now teaches at the University of Arizona, said in 1985, “Physics is more than a basis for technology; it is a cornerstone of modern thought.”

If we are not practicing good science, we probably aren’t practicing good democracy. And vice versa.

Science and democracy have been the watchwords of Chinese political aspirations for more than a century. When the Communist Party took power it sought to appropriate at least the scientific side of the equation. Here, for example, is what Hu Yaobang, the party’s general secretary, said in 1980. “Science is what it is simply because it can break down fetishes and superstitions and is bold in explorations and because it opposes following the beaten path and dares to destroy outmoded conventions and bad customs.”

Brave words that have yet to be allowed to come true in China. Mr. Hu was purged, and in fact it was to mourn his death that students first began assembling in Tiananmen Square in 1989.

Dr. Fang got in trouble initially because he favored the Big Bang, but that was against Marxist orthodoxy that the universe was infinitely unfolding. Marxism, it might be remembered, was once promoted as a scientific theory, but some subjects were off-limits.

But once you can’t talk about one subject, the origin of the universe, for example, sooner or later other subjects are going to be off-limits, like global warming, birth control and abortion, or evolution, the subject of yet another dustup in Texas last week.

There is no democracy in China, and some would argue that despite that nation’s vast resources and potential, there will not be vigorous science there either until the Chinese leaders take seriously what Mao proclaimed back in 1955 and then cynically withdrew: Let a hundred flowers bloom, let a hundred schools of thought contend.

In the meantime I look forward to Mr. Obama’s cultivation of our own wild and beautiful garden.

via [New York Times]

Interesting Facts about Evansville

• What year did Evansville become a city? 1847
• Name five Indian tribes that lived in Evansville area. Shawnees, Miamis, Pottawattomies, Delawares, and Kickapoos.
• What was the depth of the floodwater at the corner of Washington and Kentucky Avenues on Jan 31, 1937? 7 Feet
• What product kept Sterling brewery profitable during prohibition? Malt Extract
• What was Willard Carpenter’s dream to build on Reitz Hill? A College
• What does Josef Stalin’s daughter, Svetlana, have in common with Evansville? Her former husband was from Evansville
• Evansville is thought to have been the first city in the country to have what in its schools? Telephones
• During World War II what other police force could be found on Evansville’s street? Military Police
• What did truck drivers driving through Evansville call ‘The Chicken Coop’? The Weigh Station
• Why was Evansville’s red light district called ‘ Gear Town ‘? It was located in 1st, 2nd and High Streets
• Why was it necessary to change the wheels on every train coming north from Kentucky or going south to Nashville? The railroad tracks were different sizes
• What new technology became available in Evansville in 1882? The electric light
• What did Willis Copeland build in 1903? The Zentmobile
• What did F.J. Scholz manufacture in one of the most extensive businesses of its kind in the Midwest? A Cemetery Monument company
• What civil war hotel was located at 3rd and Main? The Washington Hotel
• What happened in 1938 to help bring Evansville out of the Depression? The Discovery of Oil
• Who invented and secured a patent for the common bottle cap? Alfred Bernardin
• How many men from Vanderburgh County fought in the Federal Army during the Civil War? 3,761
• Who is best known for beginning his career in the Blue Bar? Boots Randolph
• What engineering feat did L&N Railroad accomplish in 1885? Completion of Railroad Bridge across Ohio River into Henderson.
• Who was the first mayor of Evansville? James G. Jones
• What Evansville Newspaper ceased publication with the issue giving the account of Lincoln’s death? The Evansville Dispatch
• How many time was Arad McCutchan name ICC ‘Coach of the Year?’ 12
• In 1910 what covered 30 acres west of Pigeon Creek on Maryland Street and was the world largest of its kind. Globe-Bosse-World Furniture Company
• Who was the editor of ‘The Evansville Courier’ who promoted improved schools and parks? Howard Roosa
• In what year did Drive-In theaters appear in Evansville? 1946
• Where was Slaughter’s Avenue? The Lloyd Expressway
• In what year did Evansvillians begin playing golf? 1898
• In 1955, what store on the walkway was ‘The Wife Saver’ store? Evansville Electric Service Inc.
• What local figure was the Minster to China? Co. Charles Denby
• How did Evansville lose its Wharf? It was destroyed by an ice jam.
• What high school did fashion designer Halston attend? Benjamin Bosse
• What does Mater Dei mean? Mother of God
• Who was Evansville most famous woman? Albion Fellows Bacon
• In what year did the first student graduate from a high school in Evansville? 1862
• What uncompleted building burned on Christmas Eve 1855? The Courthouse
• In what park were animals first displayed in Evansville? Oak Summit Park
• What was Riverside drive formerly called? Water Street
• What was the Belmont Disaster? A shipwreck that killed 14 people
• What local killer’s trial led to a landmark Supreme Court ruling balancing free-press and fair-trial rights? Leslie ‘Mad Dog’ Irvin
• What was distinctive about Vine St., Clark, Governor and Douglas high schools? They were for black students
• What west side city was annexed by Evansville? Lamasco
• What local sports figure became the announcer of the Kentucky Derby? Chick Anderson
• How many growing days does Evansville have? 185 Days
• How many years did the Wabash Erie Canal operate? 12 Years
• What was unusual about the children’s barber chair in Strouses? The barber chair was a carousel horse
• What vaudeville comedian never failed to mention his old home town Evansville in his act and movies? Joe Cooke
• What was ‘The Pitts?’ A threshing machine
• What is the oldest road in the Evansville city limits? Red Bank Road
• What Evansville golfer won the 1944 PGA? Bob Hamilton
• What was destroyed in a roaring inferno on Jan 31st, 1946? Globe-Bosse-World Furniture Company
• What was the name of the amusement park located on East Morgan Avenue? Yabroudy Park
• What chocolate animals was a Christmas tradition at Hermann’s Candy Store? Chocolate Mice
• What Evansville citizen was the first to attend Indiana State University? James Shanklin
• What was the first brick building in Evansville? The Courthouse
• What local person was the national leader of the Klu Klux Klan? D.C. Stephenson
• When did the first electric generating plant start in Evansville? 1882
• Who was the first woman editor of the Evansville Sunday Courier and Press? Judith Clabes
• What was the first high school west of Alleghenys? Evansville High School near 7th and Main
• What were ‘The Simplicty and the ‘Traveler? Automobiles manufactured in Evansville
• Who was the first school teacher in Evansville? Thomas Truman
• What area was known as ‘The English Settlement? McCutchanville
• Who was Evansville¢s College first All-American basketball player? Gus Doerner
• What television station first broadcast the news in color? WFIE
• What happened to the LST Shipyard? Destroyed in a fire
• Where did Theodore Roosevelt speak in Evansville? 5th and Locust Streets
• Why did gypsies make an annual pilgrimage to Evansville? The Queen is buried in Oak Hill Cemetery
• How many square blocks were under flooded in the 1937 flood? 500
• What was WEHT’s channel prior to 25? 50
• In the 1930’s what did Weinbach Avenue and Barker Avenue have in common? They were the city limits
• What did soap manufacturer Adolph Melzer Jr. leave to the city of Evansville? A thousand dollar gift to collect interest for 200 years
• Who was ISUE’s first basketball coach? John L. Deem
• What did ‘Free the Eagle’ refer to? University of Southern Indiana independence
• Where was Evansville’s only public roller coaster? Yabroudy Amusement Park
• What was Welborn Hospitals first name? Evansville Sanitarium
• When was St. Boniface church on Wabash Avenue built? 1881
• In what decade was ‘Good Times Ahead for Evansville’ made popular? 1930’s
• What year was the Evansville Race Riot? 1903
• Who was Anchor Industries World’s largest flag dedicated to? The Iranian Hostages
• Before Oak Hill cemetery, where was Evansville’s burial ground? 5th and Mulberry
• What pro sport did Central H. S. grad Dr. Ralph Wilson participate in 1930? Professional Wrestling
• What pioneer village to the east, now a ghost town, was an early rival of Evansville? Darlington
• What crime did Hugh McGary’s father commit? He murdered an unarmed Indian.
• How did Jack McLean end his sport show? Good night to all good sports
• What large institution west of Evansville provided treatment for patients with tuberculosis? Boehne Camp
• What Rex Mundi football player went on to national fame? Bob Griese
• What Civil War encampment was located on the old fairground on the riverfront? Camp Wallace
• What man from Evansville was one of the first three Americans killed in WWI and where is he buried? James Bethel Gresham
• Which hotel had ‘The Rose Room? The McCurdy
• What railroad baron was from Evansville? David Mackey
• Evansville is located just north of what famous ‘line’? Mason-Dixon Line
• What was Evansville’s first private hospital? St. Mary’s on the waterfront
• Hoosier Cardinal was a pioneer in the manufacture of what industry? Plastics
• When was a fire department established? 1888
• Who was the first black doctor in Evansville? George Washington Buckner
• What company made the first farm tractors in the United States? Hercules Buggy Company
• Where was the first jail located? 3rd and Main Streets
• How long is the Ohio River? 981 Miles
• What pair of rare animals (the only two in captivity) was at Mesker Zoo? Blue glacier bears
• When was Evansville first museum established? 1904
• What was the name of the hospital for blacks? Welborn Walker Annex
• What year did the Evansville Philharmonic established? 1934
• Why did Evansville schools have recesses? To move the horses to the shade
• What year was the first commercial flight from Evansville to Chicago? 1928
• Where was the Sunshine Coal Mine located? West Maryland Street
• Why was there a riot in 1865? Opposition to increasing black settlement
• What year was the L&N Railroad station built? 1901

As January comes to a close, take a look back at your New Year’s Resolutions, then read this quote from the great Samuel Langhorne Clemens.

“Yesterday, everybody smoked his last cigar, took his last drink and swore his last oath. Today, we are a pious and exemplary community. Thirty days from now, we shall have cast our reformation to the winds and gone to cutting our ancient shortcomings considerably shorter than ever.”

~Mark Twain

Via [Boston.com]