American Expat in The Philippines, Cagayan de Oro City

This is a question that had me thinking most of the time this week. I find it so controversial in the sense that the two subjects are virtually involved in every action that we take on a daily basis. Such a simple question to ask yet it’s something that most people do not even care to think about most of the time.

Science is a systematized study of knowledge. This is as basic as it can get as I got this definition way back in my elementary years. It evolved from man’s unending hunger to understand the things that surround him. For instance, man’s discovery of fire is arguably the most important discovery in prehistoric times as the discovery of electricity is to us. Prehistoric men rubbed two pieces of wood or two flint stones together to produce enough heat to start a fire. They didn’t know anything about the consequences that might have been associated with their discovery, all they cared about was getting warmed up during cold winters and cooking to stop eating raw meat.

Morality, on the other hand, is the rightness or wrongness of an action or thought in reference to a distinct social group with a distinct social norm. In about the same time as the discovery of fire, man saw the importance of living together in larger groups to ensure survival. They formed bands which consisted of 10-100 individuals. As they did, some moral sentiments were formed. They saw the need to cooperate to be able to compete with other hominid groups for food, shelter, and basically all other commodities that today’s nation fight for, only simpler in form. Thus, in this scenario, morality was born.

To be able to shed light unto this question, I am going to refer to an article entitled “Scientist at Work, Moralist of Science Ponders Its Power” published in New York Times. It is about a certain Dr. Leon Kass, who have been appointed by President Bush to be the chairman of the President’s Council of Bioethics, a physician and biochemist in training but chose to teach philosophy and ethics at the University of Chicago.

He claimed that “Science has become so dangerous, because it is a powerful force, yet one that has been deliberately stripped of moral values by scientists who are trained to pursue the truth objectively.”

I completely go the other way on this notion made by Dr. Kass. A scientist as he is, he should be among the first ones to advocate advancements in knowledge much like a modern equivalent of a prehistoric hominid who first discovered fire. For one thing, the pursuit of knowledge has been a medium of offering a better life for man. And for another, scientists cannot, as of the time of their invention, judge the rightness or wrongness of their outcome.

Its not the invention itself that causes immorality (in reference to the majority) but its how people use them to pursue an intention that might not correlate to most people’s interest.

Albert Einstein did not intend to split an atom apart to destroy the cities of Nagasaki and Hiroshima in Japan years later, Alfred Nobel did not intend to make a nitroglycerine explosive (later known as dynamite) to tear nations apart, and certainly, the Wright brothers did not intend to invent a flying machine so a nation can have selfish dominion over those who aren’t able to afford them.

In similar way, some inventions lead to a more eventful output than what it was really meant for. A concrete example would be Finasteride, a drug that has been originally projected as a preventive measure for Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia (BPH) which was supposed to further decrease the risk of prostate cancer in middle aged male patients has been recalled for further studies after FDA received reports of its liver damaging properties. It has been found out a few years after the recall that, the drug actually is a more effective hair growth agent for individuals who are having alopecia (pattern baldness). Thus, it found its way again to the market but this time for another less toxic but more productive purpose.

To go back to the question posed, I am convinced that morality and science are much like oil and water. Surely, they can be contained together as long as they are not in any way forced to mix together. Water is always much denser than the oil. As the question on which one is oil and which one is water, it depends on how one weighs them.