Science Is The Engine Of Prosperity

“Science is the engine of prosperity” - Dr. Michio Kaku.

The full quote is available here via Dr. Michio Kaku’s channel on Youtube. link If you are ready this, then I encourage you to listen in and pay attention to these words by Dr. Kaku.

Building up on this quote and if I may. Often times, I worry that we may be developing tunnel vision at the expense of.

It’s continually wrangling with a seemingly contradictory set of realities, now and in the future. For me, on one hand I do suspect that for the next couple of decades, growth is mostly going to be driven by verticals across the GANRSSM spectrum. (Genetics, Artificial Intelligence or modelling intelligence that is substrat independent, safe nanotechnology, robotics, synthethic biology, Medicine). But, there are going to be breakthroughs along a lot of different areas. Often, seemingly unrelated areas. And that is the only effective way of powering growth.

Going back to the tunnel vision aspect relates to investing too deeply or too much and as it relates to specific verticals. We often hear and you can pick your favourites: * Blockchain * Finance, crypto and fin-tech * Artificial Intelligence * Space * Robotics * Nanotechnology

The herd mentality that may be leading to this tunnel vision of sorts, may be coming at the expense of powering basic research.

I guess there would be less of an inclination to classify a set of problems as something that could lead to potentially chronic conditions, if: * There were means to be able to continually power the middle class in a radically sustainable sense and with zero net regressive impact on the ecology. * Next, a portion of the middle class continues to work towards powering basic research across many different disciplines of science, social sciences, arts (including liberal arts). * In parallel, there were many different agents working towards taking research in a specific vertical over to the next level.

I believe the enablement of the middle class is a given. I feel like this is a topic that I should expand upon. But, perhaps this is a sub-topic, something I should reserve for another point in time.

Regarding basic research across the board and as it relates to specific verticals. Advancements in both of these arenas happens rather slowly. Here, I am reminded of the Planck’s principle:

“Science progresses one funeral at a time” (Paraphrased)

“A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it. . . . An important scientific innovation rarely makes its way by gradually winning over and converting its opponents: it rarely happens that Saul becomes Paul. What does happen is that its opponents gradually die out, and that the growing generation is familiarized with the ideas from the beginning: another instance of the fact that the future lies with the youth.” — Max Planck, Scientific autobiography, 1950 (Source : Wikipedia. Link above)

To a non-scientist like me. Indeed, it does seem like scientific discovery is a slow evolutionary process. The two of the many examples that come to my mind. * Leucippus (if Leucippus did exist) is accredited with being the originator of the atomic theory. Leucippus’s student, Democritus is accredited as taking the atomic theory and building up on it. As I peer into this topic further and judging by the timelines and on the topic of ancient atomism, indeed it does appear that a number of players were involved in different slices of time. Moving along, it seems quite evident that the baton had been passed on throughout the generations. 1800+ years were to pass, for humans to officially enter the era of the modern atomic theory. And then from the 1800’s to now and the work continues. * To paraphrase from Wikipedia: Humans had known for a long time that crossbreeding animals and plants could favor certain desirable traits. The experiments that Gregor Johann Mendel had conducted on pea plants were the first scientific study of recessive and dominant genes. The term ‘gene’ was yet to be coined. That being said, the experiments that Mendel conducted were repeatable. The experiments that Mendel conducted, were going to set the foundation for genetics. Others continued working on and further developing this new branch of science. Enter the 1950’s, here Francis and Crick were not the first to discover DNA Source. But the work that Francis and Crick did appears to be instrumental towards laying the foundations for modern genetics. Rosland Franklin (who shared the 1962 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Francis and Crick) was the first individual to take a picture of DNA (Deoxyribo nucleic acid). I guess when there is evidence in the form of an image, that is when a topic can really begins to resonate with a wider (public) audience.

So as one would appreciate, it can take hundreds, if not thousands of years in order to be able to build upon certain hypothesis. Provided, there is some mathematical evidence that posits that there is something there and as it relates to the actual theory to be further evaluated.

What’s important to highlight is that it takes a lot of trial and error, often over an extended time period in order to either unearth a new discovery or to build up on the work that has been done in the past. It’s also possible that certain models from the past may be refuted, in light of new evidence that helps us demystify and better our understanding in a particular domain.

Overall, civilizations rise and fall. The one thing that is constant is that it takes a couple of core ingredients in order to power prosperity and as Dr. Michio Kaku has identified. Science is one of these very pillars. If not the foundational pillar.