A column in the Washington Post today by two people who are supposed to be smarter than I am (yet it takes two of them to write a column) contained a rather startling quote: “We also share the view that throughout history, our most difficult problems have found scientific solutions.”
The column itself is about an approach to the high cost of health care that includes the input of various experts, which is supposed to curtail health care’s cost while delivering high-quality care. The authors, Jim Yong Kim (president of Dartmouth College) and James N. Weinstein (president of the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Clinic) noted the above quote as part of the basis for their theory.
“We also share the view that throughout history, our most difficult problems have found scientific solutions.”
Really? This comment is simultaneously sweeping and ridiculously narrow. Was there a scientific solution to the Revolutionary War? What about the Civil War? What about any war? Slavery, segregation, women’s suffrage were all tackled and resolved by means that were anything but scientific. I might be able to understand (while still disagreeing) how the authors could conclude that our most difficult medical problems have found scientific solutions. But all of our problems? I really hope I have misunderstood these two men who are supposed to be smarter than I.
