Scientists and other researchers should focus their research on areas that are likely to benefit the greatest number of people. Science is the study of the nature and behavior of natural things and the knowledge that we obtain about them.
And scientists are people who are keen to discover the undefined phenomena and are willing to devote themselves to their studies. Therefore, science is not born for the benefits of human kind and it will be profaned by the motivation of benefiting the greatest number of people.Admittedly, there are a lot of contributions that made by scientists have changed our lives in many respects, such as medical service, health care and manufacture region. For example the communication between remote friends become a easy task by using the mobile devices, and the microwave oven simplifies our culinary a lot, and these convenience and benifit may enable us to mistake science for a tool to make our life easier or a counterpart of commercial that you invest the so-called research grant into it and then money and patents come out.While, science field is full of coincidences and sometimes scientists have to wait for decades to be generally accepted.
On the other hand, some research did not shows their impact until years past, so we will never know which one will benefit the greatest number of people. Many scientific discoveries, which have played and still playing a significant role in our life, such as the discovery of penicillin and gravity are serendipities, if the apple didn’t fall on Newton’s head, the great laws of physics maybe delayed hundreds of years to be come up with.Thus, if scientists just focus their research on areas are likely to benefit the greatest number of people instead of studying in the fields of they most curious about, there might be a counterproductive result. Scientists and other researchers should put their attention into the area where they are really interest in not to benefit most of people deliberately. Just as McClintock, a women geneticist who had insisted on her study ignoring the disapprove and mocking of others, won the 1983 Nobel Prize in medicine.
Maybe ordinary people won’t get any good from the thesis of McClintock, but that is real science, and that is the real scientist. As a student major in biology, I don’t know whether it is a lampoon that every apply form for a research grant must be enunciate the interest it can bring out instead of “I apply this study because I am curious about the mechanism of it. ” I fundamentally disagree with this idea, because it’s government’s responsibility to benefit the populace. Science is sacred, and we shouldn’t intervene the direction of science study.
