[Peace-discuss] My N-G letter of the month

[David Green]

 I read with interest May Berenbaum’s  (5/7) conclusion that the March for Science “wasnot about scientists as a special interest group—it was … in support of scienceas an economic engine for the state and the nation, as a force for fairness andjustice, and as a defining dimension of our community's character.”However, scientific research as such is at best neutral inrelation to these endeavors, and at worst subject to complicity with economicexploitation, social inequality, and resulting effects on community character,including those which result from perpetual aggressive wars.Societies noted for their advanced science and technologyperpetrated the Holocaust, invaded Vietnam, and enforce apartheid in occupied Palestine.In the midst of the Vietnam War, our greatest cognitivescientist and political dissident, Noam Chomsky, wrote “It is theresponsibility of intellectuals to speak the truth and to expose lies. This, atleast, may seem enough of a truism to pass over without comment. Not so,however. For the modern intellectual, it is not at all obvious.”During the subsequent half-century, neoliberal policies supportedby “the best and brightest” have determined that American workers can no longerbe allowed to produce their consumer items; can no longer afford what they doproduce without indebtedness; and can no longer be allowed free higher (includingscientific) education. But scientific research continues apace, especially thatwhich leads reliably to corporate profit, but only randomly to generalprogress.This critique may seem far afield from entomology, butperhaps it shouldn’t be.
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