Food for Thought: Science: Can\u2019t Live with it; Can\u2019t Live Without it.<\/u><\/b><\/p>\n
As you begin your journey toward your MBA I would like to present a few critical ideas for people who aspire to leadership positions. The goal of academe is not or should not be delivering \u201ctruth.\u201d The reason: Nothing can be proved to be absolutely, incontrovertibly true. At best, theories or models move use closer to the truth but theorizing is a process in which we often take a step back, if not scrap a theory completely, in order to move marginally forward. This is the nature of science. Because of that step back, regrettably, many people question the value of science or lose faith in it entirely. <\/p>\n
This was on display during the Covid pandemic. Although scientists came up with solutions that saved millions of lives in an astonishingly short amount of time, those solutions were not perfect and many people died. Scientists did not know, for example, the exact strength the vaccine should be or how often it should be administered or whether it would be effective in children or how the disease is transmitted (these questions typically get resolved only with years of research involving progressively larer numbers of research subjects). You may recall the political battleground provided by the issue of the quarantine. Does this mean that the value of science is questionable? The short answer is \u201cno, anyone who questions science should consider all the people who are alive because of science; the increase in longevity (historically, people had a number of children because of the high mortality rate in early childhood); the immense increase in economic productivity; our ability to travel to the moon and see 46 billion light years into space.<\/p>\n
The following article which appeared in the NY Times on August 6, 2023 about the wonders and limitations of Xrays and Cat Scans nicely captures the very same wonders and limitations of all scientific inquiry.<\/p>\n
What I Saw When I Looked Inside My Own Body<\/p>\n