Science/Problematic notions
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Better article name needed + better structure |
| Science/Problematic notions (Ideology) | |
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| Science is sometimes used as thought stopping cliché and/or tied to grants to predetermine desired outcomes for businesses as well as education curriculums |
Science as ideology
According to many authors, including Jeff Schmidt and Richard Lewontin science is a social institution which serves to legitimize the existing social order or status quo - beginning with Plato who favored a state run by wise-guys and not ending with Malthus who, as a spokesperson for landowners opposing the old English poor law, claimed that overpopulation will result from the poor procreating too quickly.
On the other hand scientists expressing opinions which contradict the ruling classes' world view have been sanctioned harshly, like Galileo who was found guilty of heresy or burned (today: symbolically) at the stake. Scientists do remember these consequences.
Malthus' claimed "overpopulation" of "amoral, hostile and aggressive masses" (Hobbes) resulted in the scarcity meme which inspired Adam Smith and others to formulate early capitalist theories (the invisible hand). Competition for scarce resources was later the foundation of Darwinism as well as social Darwinism, the idea that human races compete against each other for scarce resources (Nazi ideology, Eugenics).
In Not in our genes and the biology as ideology lecture author Richard Lewontin questions the doctrine of biological determinism which is at the core of technologies as:
- the human genome project
- the various gene therapies, including COVID jabs
- terminator technology for seeds by Monsanto
