When grand plans for scientific and defence technologies are made, do the people in power think about the sacrifices the people in the laboratories and fields have to make?
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Individual scientists cannot do much on their own. Heads of nations, corporates, and economic giants should recognise the criticality of it.
Scientists surely have a special responsibility. It is their ideas that form the basis of new technology. They should not be indifferent to the fruits of their ideas. They should forgo experiments that are risky or unethical.
Others think it the responsibility of scientists to coerce the rest of society, because they have the power that derives from special knowledge.
The impression sometimes created among the public is that scientists are working away in their labs, and maybe they're not always thinking about the implications of their work. But we are.
I think there is value in having practising scientists as leaders of research institutions.
I think, however, that so long as our present economic and national systems continue, scientific research has little to fear.
I think we are always right to worry about damaging consequences of new technologies even as we are empowered by them. History suggests we should not panic nor be too sanguine about cool new gizmos. There's a delicate balance.
Scientists are being portrayed by much of the power structure in politics and business as having a vested interest - that they're just out to get more grant money by exaggerating the threats.
Scientists tend to be unappreciated in the world at large, but you can hardly overstate the importance of the work they do.
Great wealth could make an enormous difference over the next decade if they sensibly support the scientific elite. Just the elite. Because the elite makes most of the progress. You should worry about people who produce really novel inventions, not pedantic hacks.
No opposing quotes found.