This Earth Day morning, thousands are taking to the streets to march. Americans everywhere are foregoing their Saturday brunch to congregate, parade, and shout because they are frustrated, and they want to DO something about it! Today’s march brings people out for a variety of reasons: support for climate control measures frustration with the current administration, connection and activism for one’s community, widespread advocacy for science.
In fact globally, Earth Day has evolved to be more than just a platform for earth science – it’s become a diffuse global podium for people to march show support for science – innovation, education, funding, adaption – all of these pillars of science that are being attacked. In the US, there’s been top-down rejection of evidence and reason, and it is downright terrifying.
We need science. Science is not a little niche interest that we can de-fund, seal off, and draw lines around as if it’s a detached little accessory field. Look at the world around us - pacemakers, super computers, optical correction, space exploration, chemotherapy – we are surrounded by technological innovations that give us jobs, keep us alive, and make our lives better – and it is because of science. I’ve heard the argument that industry drives innovation, but I vehemently disagree. If we take away the curiosity, problem-solving, collaboration, and pursuit of knowledge for knowledge’s sake, than we will starve innovation and cripple our society’s ability to evolve, solve, and learn.
This is not just a fight for scientists, for scientific organizations, for university professors and elementary school science teachers. This is everyone’s fight, whether they acknowledge it or not. What’s at stake is our future. If we abandon everything that we have learned, forgo the process of science, then we will be unable to solve tomorrow’s problems. Science is for everyone. I beg that we set aside political views, protected opinions, biases and the like, and that we embrace the central core of scientific investigation: the open pursuit of facts – not just about the world that we live in, but ourselves.
In fact globally, Earth Day has evolved to be more than just a platform for earth science – it’s become a diffuse global podium for people to march show support for science – innovation, education, funding, adaption – all of these pillars of science that are being attacked. In the US, there’s been top-down rejection of evidence and reason, and it is downright terrifying.
We need science. Science is not a little niche interest that we can de-fund, seal off, and draw lines around as if it’s a detached little accessory field. Look at the world around us - pacemakers, super computers, optical correction, space exploration, chemotherapy – we are surrounded by technological innovations that give us jobs, keep us alive, and make our lives better – and it is because of science. I’ve heard the argument that industry drives innovation, but I vehemently disagree. If we take away the curiosity, problem-solving, collaboration, and pursuit of knowledge for knowledge’s sake, than we will starve innovation and cripple our society’s ability to evolve, solve, and learn.
This is not just a fight for scientists, for scientific organizations, for university professors and elementary school science teachers. This is everyone’s fight, whether they acknowledge it or not. What’s at stake is our future. If we abandon everything that we have learned, forgo the process of science, then we will be unable to solve tomorrow’s problems. Science is for everyone. I beg that we set aside political views, protected opinions, biases and the like, and that we embrace the central core of scientific investigation: the open pursuit of facts – not just about the world that we live in, but ourselves.
At the Sea vs Space debate at the American Museum of Natural Science, there was one issue that the astronauts and aquanauts agreed upon: we've got to advocate more funding, awareness, and support for science as a whole.
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