Joseph Norman Pincus: Scientific advances must not end

Regarding the April 16 Point of View “Why I’m marching for science”: There is reason to be “as mad as hell and not take it anymore.”

There is much to be saddened and dismayed about regarding science and climate control and how they are viewed now. Respect for scientific inquiry and the advances that have enhanced our lives is absent because with the inauguration of Donald Trump as president of these United States and his Republican majority in both houses of Congress we are about to take a giant leap backward in time.

We should all be frightened that President Trump has ordered a media blackout on the EPA, the Interior Department and the U.S. Department of Agriculture and what this entails for our environment and future survival.

It is incredible in our age, everything we have learned and all the breakthroughs in the human genome, and our ability to fight diseases before never considered curable. Let us return to those questioning days of the 1960s when we truly believed that nothing was impossible and our mission, as students of life was to “boldly go where no man has gone before.”

All those who care about the natural world in which we live need to support the April 22 March for Science and all that it implies for our nation.

This story was originally published April 20, 2017 at 8:34 PM with the headline "Joseph Norman Pincus: Scientific advances must not end."