ABSTRACT
Modern science has us enthralled. We believe in its perceived promise. It provides a pathway of hope towards a better future. Today the individual can partake of the benefits science offers in an immediate and personal manner: do I have a pacemaker? do I engage in IVF? are there any alternatives?—these choices touch each close to hand as never before. Furthermore, we have come to think scientifically in our everyday life, accepting scientific criteria as those of authentic value. Today, only that which is evidence-based and quantifiable is accepted as real. And, given the state of current medical technology, why would we consider it to be otherwise? As avid consumers in the marketplace we believe we benefit from medication, procedures, implants, and transplants all of a quality that was unimaginable not so very long ago. With the mapping of the human genome at our fingertips, we hope for more and better medical science and more control over life and death. We have confidence in the notion of unabated progress and are unwilling to take into account more sobering findings such as that, contrary to earlier understandings, ‘junk’ DNA is in fact of vital importance— a matter of huge consequence in the field of genetics where so much 2is at stake. Regardless, we of the 21st century have unmitigated trust that science will allow humankind to survive.
