The Science Gap: Dispelling the Myths and Understanding the Reality of Science.

• Author: Beard, Elliott

Milton Rothman. Prometheus, $24.95. The thrust of The Science Gap is the rebuttal of an alluring fallacy: the assumption that, because the history of scientific progress has witnessed a constant overturning of previously inviolate knowledge, claims made by scientists today will, inevitably, be similarly rejected. What makes this belief so tempting is what also makes it so dangerous: It allows us to continue to assume that science will eventually cure the ills afflicting our planet and threatening its future. One reason we've failed to adequately address the greenhouse effect, toxic dumping, deforestation, destruction of biodiversity, acid rain, ozone depletion, and the like is that the technological triumphs of the past century have given us an idiotic sense of invincibility. Science is not without its limits, Rothman argues--and indeed, many of those limits will soon be reached.

Rothman, a former research physicist at Princeton, points out that vastly improved technology and methodology allow today's scientists to better prove, expand upon, and corroborate their findings, thus they are much more certain of the validity of their theories than scientists of previous centuries could ever be. Much of what we know now, we know with far more certainty than was ever before possible. Furthermore, Rothman asserts, the term "theory" is often misleading, because many of the concepts labeled theories are, instead, well-defined and exhaustively tested principles of nature--they will not be reversed, only refined.

The moral of Rothman's story should be that, because science will not solve all our current or future problems, we will have to rely on a combination of scientific study and smart planning to do the job, so let's get cracking. Instead, he presents a series of chapters, each aimed at debunking a specific contemporary "myth" about science. Unfortunately, most of the "myths" Rothman attacks are better described as "tiresome aphorisms," making the book little more than a long complaint about a bunch of trivial slogans that nobody really believes anyway. Chapter titles include "Nothing is Known for Sure," "All Scientists Are Objective," and "Advanced Civilizations on Other Planets Possess Great Forces Unavailable to Us on Earth." It turns out that Rothman is less irritated by those scientific beliefs that allow us to keep squandering resources and overrunning the globe than he is by our alleged preoccupation with psychic powers and UFOs. These do...