For a few years, a major hotel chain ran a series of commercials that I thought were both highly amusing and quite brilliant.
A group of tourists were in the control room of a nuclear power plant when suddenly all the warning lights and alarms went off simultaneously. All the engineers froze not knowing what to do.
One of the tourists then spoke up, instructed the engineers what steps to take, and the crisis was averted. The senior engineer then said how lucky they all were that a visitor was such a brilliant nuclear engineer. The tourist replied that he wasn’t an engineer at all, but that he had stayed in one of the hotel chain’s rooms the night before.
Little did I realize how prophetic that commercial was.
Many Americans have turned against experts. They see scientists, holders of graduate degrees, people with years of experience, as somehow part of an intellectual elite spreading political, social and scientific doctrines that they find offensive.
In short, America has turned against the experts and decided, like the fellow in the commercial, that anybody can do expert tasks even if they don’t have relevant education or experience. Television stars now are appointed to serious positions of power and influence because they “played” experts on national television or were on social media.
The problem is that the world is not reality television and even though the United States citizenry may decide that expertise doesn’t matter and that the “common man” can do just as good a job in highly complex and technical fields as an expert, the rest of the world does not agree.
And that is both dangerous and likely to endanger the national security and technological superiority of this nation.
It is easy to forget that the founders of this nation were practical men, many of them scientists and engineers. Benjamin Franklin was an expert printer and one of the greatest scientists of his age. Thomas Jefferson was a brilliant scientist and inventor. Benjamin Rush was a leading physician and clinical researcher. The list could go on.
Indeed, the U.S. Constitution itself reflects the importance the Founders put on science. Our system of intellectual property, patents and copyrights, has its foundation in Article 1, Section 8, Clause 8 of the U.S. Constitution. The purpose of this, in the Constitution’s own words was “ to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries…”
By abandoning government encouragement of research, abandoning support of government science programs in the schools and universities, by pushing young scientists to other safer careers, are we not ignoring the express words and spirit of Article 1, Section 8, Clause 8?
When the government abandons support of scientific principles and research, it not only abandons the spirit of the Founders and the Constitution, but it also means that other countries, who continue to revere expertise and support science and technology will eventually outpace us in science and technology to our disadvantage.
We should not forget the massive contribution of scientists and engineers to the war effort in WWII. When the Soviets beat the U.S. into space in the 1950s, it sparked a massive panic in the U.S. and a push for science and engineering research and development to regain our place in the world.
Must we wait for another massive defeat by our enemies from which we must recover rather than simply maintaining the U.S.’s hard-won position as the greatest scientific and engineering powerhouse in the world? I hope that does not happen.
About the author: Mike Hoeflich is a professor of law at the University of Kansas School of Law.
