3 ms·
> human knowledge is only valuable in so far as it improves the human condition in some way, now or in the future. We have no idea how it will improve the huma
by guerrilla 6y ago
> human knowledge is only valuable in so far as it improves the human condition in some way, now or in the future.
We have no idea how it will improve the human condition though. You could have said this to many scientists throughout history. Look at what the (much cheaper) fooling around at Bell Labs got us.
- kd5bjo 6y agoYou’re absolutely right, and those projects were absolutely worth the cost to society in retrospect. It’s why I’m generally in favor of exploratory research. I don’t have much of an opinion one way or the other about building another particle accelerator: the costs are significant, but manageable, and I haven’t followed the science enough to get a good idea of the likely benefit. The question posed, however, was whether the cost could ever be too high. The only answer to that question is “yes,” regardless of the topic.