In order to understand why science is necessary, one needs to understand the history of humanity and the universe we inhabit.
In the beginning, dust clouds existed in a vast cosmic ocean. This dust occasionally condensed and formed stars and planets. After millions and millions of years, some exploded. They died, but not wastefully: atoms fundamental to life were formed in these high-energy explosions, including carbon, oxygen, and sulfur. The clouds resulting from millions of similar explosions all over the universe condensed again, forming other stars and planets. The sun was created out of this material along with our little blue planet, Earth.
If we wanted to fit all of these events in a calendar year with Jan. 1 representing the first dust cloud appearing in the cosmos and 11:59:59 p.m., Dec. 31 representing the present, the formation of the earth would occur in mid-August. Life soon emerged, its origins unknown. At the beginning of November, the first multi-cellular organisms appeared. On Dec. 17, the first vertebrates emerged, and the first dinosaurs appeared on Dec. 24, just in time for Christmas. They lived for six days of our hypothetical calendar. The first humans arrived on December 31 at 9:24 p.m. In the grand scheme of things, the ancient Egyptians built their great pyramids at 11:59:50 p.m., ten seconds ago. Columbus discovered America only one second ago.
Everything we know about humanity—every civilization, war, and historical event—makes up just the last 15 seconds of this condensed calendar. Dinosaurs lived on earth for six full days, yet we’ve been living here for only 15 seconds. However, there is a critical difference between us and the dinosaurs—as agents of change, we are way more powerful than any other species that ever existed on this planet. We have the power to conceivably destroy all life on earth within hours by using atomic weapons. We have the ability to change the climate of this planet within milliseconds on this calendar. This stems from our ability to think, reason, and figure things out. We discovered that the Earth is not flat, that the sun does not rotate around the Earth, and that the natural forces that exist on this planet are universal—gravity exists throughout the universe. In light of these revelations came a startling realization: we are not unique in the eye of the cosmos. Our mighty sun is a tiny grain of sand in a vast cosmic beach.
With time came a tool that helped humanity describe the natural world. This tool allowed us to understand life systematically, and draw conclusions based on evidence and observations. This tool is the scientific method.
As an educated society, dedicated to passing knowledge on to our young, we have this great tool firmly in hand. Not only can we make new discoveries about our awesome universe, but we can sustain our environment and the myriad life forms it contains. Looking at our calendar, one thing is clear: we have no time to waste. The rate of destruction of our planet is way more rapid than any species, including us, can adapt to. Within decades we are destroying this unique planet that has flourished with life for over billions of years.
We can still change the fate of our planet, and hope to experience a second year on our cosmic calendar. We can use the power of science to fix our mess. It is a job of special concern to current science students that will become future scientists—but only if we believe that it is up to us to change our fate by applying our accumulated knowledge. Society must not allow a minority of corporations to distract us from this mission. It may require investing in a plan that takes thousands of years to restore things as they once were—affected ecosystems need evolutionary timescales to regenerate themselves. The principle concern is that we have to foresee the benefit of doing this for the next generations, rather than continuing the shortsighted path humanity has been on up until now. We are running out of time to make things right.
