Science is Human Power, Needing Guidance

It is against the background of conflict and confusion in the relations of science and society that we find ourselves confronted with a crisis in the history of mankind, and particularly in the history of human government. It is a crisis arising from the rapidly increasing power given to man by science. It is a crisis such as we are accustomed to leave to the arbitrement of sectional interests supported by shouts and cries. But it is one to which scientific inquiry can provide a solution. For the fundamental problem of government is one that can be treated by exact biological methods. It is the problem of the character and the causation of the differences that exist among men, among the races, classes, and individuals which compose mankind. The little passions and prejudices we have been discussing so far fade into nothingness in face of the gigantic errors and illusions that can be, and are being, mobilized to defeat or pervert scientific truth in this field.

Cyril Dean Darlington, The Conflict of Science and Society (1948)

• biology
• government
• politics
• power
• science