Re:(목동김상철토플전문학원) 고3 김혜빈 독립형 WT #Q Scientists are not responsible for negative impacts of their discoveries

[Haebin Kim]

Scientists are not responsible for negative impacts of their discoveries

Over the past few decades, in terms of all the inventions and discoveries having both positive and negative effects, it has been argued whether scientists are responsible for negative impacts of their discoveries. Some might argue that scientist must be responsible for negative effects of their own inventions or findings, while others might believe differently from that statement. However, I am utterly convinced that the negative results and effects of scientific discoveries do not hold the scientists responsible. Actually, I have a couple of reasons to support my opinion and will explain and develop them in the next following paragraphs. responsibilities of misleading companies and the influence of the intentions of the users

First and foremost much more negative impacts of discoveries hold the companies that sell them responsible. Scientists are just people who provide theories, inventions and data, not the ones who sell things without any warning in the descriptions. Companies that sell dangerous items and products solely for money are one of the main reasons for negative impacts later on. Although some people might say that better products will emerge and accidents will reduce if scientists are responsible for their discoveries, there won’t be any scientific discoveries shared by scientists if they all need to be responsible even for the misleading ways companies sell the products from their inventions. To give an example of this, one company in Korea sold a very popular humidifier a few years ago. It was such a big hit that almost everyone had at least one of the company’s humidifiers. However, this humidifier revealed to have a chemical included in it that could interfere with people’s respiratory system. Since most people slept with their humidifier on through the night, some of them became greatly ill and some of them even lost their lives. The main reason of this happening was because the company did not inform or warn their customers about the humidifiers. They only wrote the positive side about it. The scientists themselves were not mainly responsible for this happening because they never hid the truth about the item. The company was the one that hid the truth from the consumers. Some might argue that accidents will be reduced once scientists take more responsibility, but scientists’ role is to find out the facts in science, and companies’ role is to produce and sell safe products with honesty. Therefore, the negative impacts that come about a product do not hold scientists responsible. 

Moreover, , whether a result of a scientific invention or theory is good or bad mainly depends on the intentions of the users. Discoveries of scientists can result in positive impacts when they’re in good hands and are used the right way, but bad hands that use the discoveries in disorder can turn the tables upside down. Although some people might say that scientists must be responsible because they are the ones that know their own discoveries the most, being very aware of a discovery’s power can be useless when it goes into the wrong hands. To give an example of this, the movie ‘Iron Man’ shows a rich genius man named Stark who used to own a big company that produced and sold nuclear weapons. Stark made a lot of money and got a lot of fame for his inventions because his own creation was one of the most dynamic weapons in the world. However, after time, he experiences what his weapons brought about: war and death. He realizes that the world was moving further away from peace and closer towards destruction by his discoveries and inventions. He later on closes his weapon producing company and starts making devices that could save the people dying in war. He makes a greater impact, but never could he erase the guilt inside his heart because his bad intentions were responsible for all the destruction. When his intentions changed into something good, his weapons were the antidote of destruction. Like this, Stark’s awareness of his weapons and discoveries itself is not responsible of subsequent negative impacts. His next intentions and the intentions for his customers are more responsible.