The title of this article is the modified version of the famous quote “Guns don't kill people, people kill people.” The title clearly emphasizes the difference between science and technology, while the quote smears that difference. This crucial difference is overlooked by the social critics of science, who attack it by attributing (moral) value to it. To see the extent of the damage done to science when it is confused with technology, I quote a paragraph in the introduction of the book, Value-Free Science? by Robert Proctor and published by no less prestigious an academic publisher than Harvard University Press:
Note how the two words “science” and “technology” come together. Although Proctor starts the paragraph with “science” alone, he immediately conjoins “technology” to it, and in the last sentence, he practically equates the two by using the parenthetical phrase “or technology.” This allows the author to shift the attention from science to technology and to cite numerous examples of its destructive (and certainly value-laden) application. The good or bad and use or abuse are already incorporated in technology. Nuclear physics is the science behind both the MRI of medicine and the bomb of the military. The latter two are technologies, and they are by no means “neutral.” MRI is good, bomb is bad. Any attachment of neutrality to technology opens the possibility of looking for something good in a nuclear bomb!
Proctor calls the often quoted sentence, “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people.”, a concrete lie which hides an “abstract truth.” But this sentence is so obvious a tautology that it is pointless. It is as pointless as saying: “Cars don’t drive, people drive cars,” or “Knives don’t cut, people do,” or “Pencils don’t write, people do.” It merely states the simple fact that any gadget needs an operator to operate it. There is no “abstract truth” in this. It is as concrete as one can get! Abstract are the laws of science, and there are no concrete lies in them. There is no concrete lie in the universal law of gravitation, or in the four Maxwell’s equations of electromagnetism, or the Schrödinger equation, or Einstein’s equation of the general theory of relativity. Or the laws of thermodynamics and chemistry used in the construction of a gun. Concrete are the guns and the people who use them. (Please see here for a more complete discussion of science and technology.)
Quote:
Still we often hear that however foul its application, science itself is pure. Science may be political in its application, but not in its origin and structure. And certainly it is true that science and technology alone are hardly a threat to world peace. Politics and moralities stand behind our sciences and give them life; science can be used for good or evil. This is one sense of the “neutrality” of science – that science (or technology) “in itself” is neither good nor bad; that science may be used or it may be abused. |
Note how the two words “science” and “technology” come together. Although Proctor starts the paragraph with “science” alone, he immediately conjoins “technology” to it, and in the last sentence, he practically equates the two by using the parenthetical phrase “or technology.” This allows the author to shift the attention from science to technology and to cite numerous examples of its destructive (and certainly value-laden) application. The good or bad and use or abuse are already incorporated in technology. Nuclear physics is the science behind both the MRI of medicine and the bomb of the military. The latter two are technologies, and they are by no means “neutral.” MRI is good, bomb is bad. Any attachment of neutrality to technology opens the possibility of looking for something good in a nuclear bomb!
Proctor calls the often quoted sentence, “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people.”, a concrete lie which hides an “abstract truth.” But this sentence is so obvious a tautology that it is pointless. It is as pointless as saying: “Cars don’t drive, people drive cars,” or “Knives don’t cut, people do,” or “Pencils don’t write, people do.” It merely states the simple fact that any gadget needs an operator to operate it. There is no “abstract truth” in this. It is as concrete as one can get! Abstract are the laws of science, and there are no concrete lies in them. There is no concrete lie in the universal law of gravitation, or in the four Maxwell’s equations of electromagnetism, or the Schrödinger equation, or Einstein’s equation of the general theory of relativity. Or the laws of thermodynamics and chemistry used in the construction of a gun. Concrete are the guns and the people who use them. (Please see here for a more complete discussion of science and technology.)
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