carlos escobar: Topic 7: Are There Limits to Science?

The Limits of Science


	This weeks presentation exploring the possible 
limits of science provided a fitting conclusion to 
the finale of the speaker's corners.  Every 
presentation had been preoccupied with providing 
images of the case studies that often times not much 
attention was placed on the future of that particular 
science.  This groups task was just that to focus on 
the possibility of science being limited.  Through 
the use of multiple medias the group attemped to 
convey a complex them in an understandable manner and 
were for the most part successfus as exemplified by 
"Seth's Ray Analogy."  The groups greatest enemy was 
neither lack of preparation nor lack of knowledge but 
rather lack of time.  Perhaps ironically there was 
only a limited amount of knowledge that the group 
could have crammed into a fifty minute timeslot.    
	
	My favorite part of the presentation was the 
final slide show which tied all the previous 
presentations in with the topic of limits.  My topic 
was science as it relates to war and peace and as 
group seven pointed out it is hard to imagine a more 
efficient way of killing humans than the atomic bomb.  
Millions of people can be killed with the detonation 
of a single warhead.  However since there exists a 
strong belief in Mutally Assured Destruction, many 
nations are looking towards science to develop new 
forms of wartime technology that no one else will 
have in order to swing the pendulum of power in their 
direction.  It almost seems to be a type of race in 
which the prize for second place is death.  
	
	Straying from this morbid thought, I would like 
to reitterate that effectivness of groups sevens 
presentation was not that they enlightened me in the 
subjects of Anthropology and Archeology, but rather 
that they took something that I was familiar with and 
made me think about a new aspect of topic that I had 
not thought of before.  They were successful in 
ignitining a spark of interest that will hopefully 
carry me through Horgan's book.