Why not start with the assumption that everyone is an activist? If I am a scientist, an I have a choice of paths to explore but cannot explore them all at the

Why not start with the assumption that everyone is an activist? If I am a scientist, an I have a choice of paths to explore but cannot explore them all at the same time, then there are many things which may guide my decision making, including expectations of recognition and better employment. That is personal activism, yes? And that's because several hundred years ago scientists decided that "first to publish" was the best way to couple scientific advancement with the desire for personal advancement. If I submit a proposal to a funding source, or a rare resource like the HST, I need to convince them that the science I'm doing is worthwhile. That's activism, yes? Even then, you've left out "passivism", which might not be a word but I think it gives the intent. If Exxon scientists do research in the 1980s which concludes that fossil fuel use leads to global warming, and decide to not publish, is that activism? For another real-world example, if a scientist wants to study "Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male", and doesn't tell the participants that penicillin could now treat the disease, and those men end up suffering and dying though the willful passivism of the scientist, who is more interested in the science of what happens than the morality, is that "activism"? On the flip side, how do I conduct research to test if advertisement for flu shots is an effective way to reduce flu deaths without some sort of "activism"? I also don't like your use of the term "politics". I prefer "ethics", where politics is an applied form of ethics. That's why I don't like your majoritarian definition of what "government" means. Ethics can lead someone to break the law, and later even be praised for doing so. See Thoreau's "Civil Disobedience" and the many people who followed that principle. Or even further back in time, and to quote de Tocqueville's "Tyranny of the Majority": > "If it be admitted that a man possessing absolute power may misuse that power by wronging his adversaries, why should not a majority be liable to the same reproach? Men do not change their characters by uniting with one another; nor does their patience in the presence of obstacles increase with their strength. For my own part, I cannot believe it; the power to do everything, which I should refuse to one of my equals, I will never grant to any number of them." You correctly point out "we don't have a priestly class to make wise decisions" but you uncoupled that from the military. Even in the military, some orders and laws must not be followed, as Nuremburg Priniciple IV: > "The fact that a person acted pursuant to order of his Government or of a superior does not relieve him from responsibility under international law, provided a moral choice was in fact possible to him". An Earth-killing asteroid will lead to genocide as a side-effect. The moral choice, if possible, is to prevent genocide. Even if 51.9% of the U.S. votes to die. One's right to commit suicide does not justify genocide.