Growing up in the 1970s, I had a
healthy skepticism about the awesome power of science. I lived in a city in
Texas that was, at the time, developing the B-1 stealth bomber at the nearby
air force base. It’s common knowledge now, but obviously, no one knew anything
about it at the time. They just had all of the elementary schools practice
“disaster drills.” Yeah.
So, thanks to The Cold War and my
fear of a Nuclear Holocaust, watching old monster movies from the fifties with
mad scientists made perfect sense. Here’s what happens when you fully fund a
guy for his research without doing your due diligence. Pretty soon, they are
teleporting their own head onto insects and unleashing giant insects on an
unsuspecting public. And for what, I ask you?
Science is still scary to people.
Instead of irradiated mutants, we’re concerned about genetically-modified
organisms. Science keeps trying (at least, in our fevered imaginations) to
improve upon nature, and in doing so, usually bungs it up so badly that
dinosaurs get loose in San Diego, or people come back to life as whackjob
zombies, or any number of Worst Case Scenarios.
