A World of Scientists

Seed Magazine ("Science is Culture") sponsored an essay contest, asking the question: "What is the most significant force acting against science in society today?" Here is the beginning of my essay, which I didn't finish:

The most significant force acting against science in society today is confusion between the nature of science as a worldview, on the one hand, and on the other, science as an explicit, disciplined, rule-governed, deliberate and self-conscious activity. Science has yet to come to terms with the fact that what was once a disciplined way of looking at the world practiced only by a few, is now, in its general aspects, the intuitive inheritance of everyone.

Very few people can purify DNA or identify asbestos fibers under a microscope, but everyone senses, if not sees, the curvature of the earth, and knows, if not believes as well, that cause and effect follow one another blindly and with iron certainty. Everyone feels gravity pulling their mass toward the center of the earth. Everyone sees the highway recede into the distance as an effect of perspective. Everyone in this sense is a scientist.