Continuing an almost five-century old British tradition of mixing Church and State, the Prince of Wales has again tried to reverse the tide of scientific inquiry and exploration a move many will equate with King Canute's futile attempt to hold back the ocean tides 1,000 or so years ago.
In a radio address last week, Prince Charles called for a return to spirituality as a guiding philosophy for human endeavors, with an associated downplaying of technology and science. He warned of the dangers of unrestrained scientific research and the perils of "tampering" with nature. He was inspired to pen these thoughts during a recent pilgrimage to a remote Greek monastery.
Besides calling for a restoration of the "essential unity" between the living and the spiritual world, he attacked old bugaboos of his, biotechnology (genetic modification, GM) and GM food. He decided to ignore the fact that both his own government, as well as the leader of the Roman Catholic Church, Pope John Paul ll, have come out in support of this technology as a potential means to help alleviate malnutrition and starvation in the developing world. The British population has taken his warnings, as well as those of other environmental extremists, more seriously than scientists or the American public GM food is shunned throughout the U.K. and many areas of Europe. But they still benefit from drugs produced through the same methods no one has yet called for the removal of biopharmaceuticals such as insulin, and many other GM-drugs.
In his speech, he supported the "precautionary principle," which advocates the elimination of any substance or technique which cannot be proven to be absolutely safe. However, it is well known scientifically that proving something 100% safe is often impossible, and essentially meaningless anyway. Is driving completely safe? Are medications completely safe? Of course not even crossing the street can be dangerous, yet we go about our daily activities anyway. If hundreds, or thousands, of useful products were banned because proving them "safe" would be impossible, take years, or be too expensive, what would replace them?
By calling "excessive" scientific rationalism an affront to "the creator," and stating that science should be used to "understand how nature works, but not to change what it is," he seemed to be calling for a reversal of all the accomplishments of mankind, dating back....who knows how far? He assumes that there must be an inherent conflict between spirituality and science never mind that scientific discoveries and technical innovations have made our lives so much better, both in quality and quantity, over the centuries. Thanks to these discoveries, those of us in the developed world are no longer at the whim of a fickle nature, hoping for adequate rain, sun, etc., to eke out a subsistence living.
These benefits are, unfortunately, still not commonplace in the poor areas of Asia and Africa. Yet "environmentalists" in well-off areas, who have never been hungry or coaxed a crop out of an unforgiving field, try to cut off new methods that show great promise for easing their lives. They are against science, and seem to be against humans in favor of forests. Yet their favorite agricultural approach, "organic" farming, is so inefficient it would force much more forest acreage into cultivation than using modern methods.
After reading the text of Prince Charles' speech, Dr. James Watson, Nobel Prize winning co-discoverer of the structure of DNA, stated, "He is one of the people who are worried that the world is moving too fast. But the world is really rather wretched for a lot of people and science and technology can improve their lives....We will be able to improve the quality of food."
These miracle will occur in any event, but they will be here sooner if science is allowed to overcome fear and superstition in high places. It is as foolish to try to turn back the hands of time, as it is to try to reverse the tides.
