The public believe that science is absolutely true in the ideas it offers. Scientists know this to be untrue ? science can only give a probability of correctness ? but in the main they are happy to allow this public misconception to remain. But are scientists now beginning to believe their own publicity?
Science has been in a constant battle with ideas that cannot be proved. Such ideas usually surround the paranormal and spirituality, best expressed in the modern world with New Age and alternative ideas. Indeed, they are becoming so influential nowadays scientists descend to mockery and other ?debating? forms to ridicule such stances.
MEDIA INFLUENCE
A side effect of this assault is that scientists adopt a far more fundamental stance to their own ideas than is permissible. And fuelled by beliefs in their own publicity, the scientific picture is distorted.
This process is helped by a media that swallows practically every report, survey and finding they make. In medical matters, for instance, hardly a day goes by without new advice from a scientific survey that does not deserve the media coverage it gets.
The result is the idea, among many scientists, that their work is above the norm. In terms of sociology, scientists are taking over the role once reserved for gods in Classical times, with ?cults? making decrees and defining the morality and action of a society.
A MATERIAL WORLD
The end product of this process is a society that is becoming increasingly more material in its lifestyles, spirituality seen as either crack pot or an alternative lifestyle used simply to ease the stresses of material living.
The idea of devotion to a deity is replaced by a self-centredness in all things spiritual, spirituality being a form of self-satisfaction.
As well as having an adverse effect on society, this mentality is dangerous for science itself. There has always been an idea that scientists tend to be eccentric and single-minded. This is an inevitability of working in the abstract. And intriguingly, the mentality has echoes in cultism proper.
ARE SCIENTISTS GURUS?
The defining psychology of a cult guru is an eccentric single-mindedness leading to an absolute belief in his rightness. Many psychologists have realized this link between the spiritual and scientific mind for some time. Living in a world of concepts will inevitability make the person blinkered to normal life, and eventually totally convinced of his rightness.
The divide between the guru and scientist has traditionally come from a peer group within science constantly questioning the scientist and his findings. Such questioning does not occur in cults, with the guru becoming so convinced of his ?truth? that a form of neurosis can occur if he is challenged. But with science now believing its own publicity, can we really be sure the sceptical peer group still does its job?
If we can doubt this, then there is little difference between the guru and scientist. And the mockery and ridicule they now vent upon any form of spirituality hints that the processes of neurosis are beginning to infect the scientific world.
http://beyondtheblog.wordpress.com/2007 ... -neurosis/
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