Force vs Reason

In my post The Science Establisnment II I wrote:

"The essence of government is to maintain a monopoly on the retaliatory use of force. The essence of science is to maintain a pursuit of truth through a processes of experimentation and verification. In short, the essence of one is reason and the essence of the other is force. It seems obvious to me that to mix these two in terms of fundmental principles can only have the result of reason being slowly forced out."

Some pretty good supporting evidence comes from George Reisman's blog in an article I highly recommend. A key quote:

"State control of science is the attempt to combine opposites. In essence, science is mind; the state is physical force. Science makes its way by means of the voluntary assent of the individual human mind to its recognition of truth. In contrast, the state and what the state sponsors makes its way by means of the use of physical force and the threat of physical force."

Did the congressmen and pundits who advocated the creation of government science know they were creating an establishment? Probably not. Pragmatism has taught them to consider only what is immediately in front of their noses and to disregard consequences because they are not knowable anyway. Oh but they are knowable, and thinking in terms of principles will give them that knowledge.