The Dark Side Of Science

Science, a word that has enough power to change life of every person on this planet. it made our life easy and beautiful. Like a guardian it showed men the path of evolution. Science is mother of technology which enables is to build wonders like skyscrapers, faster transport, fly in sky exploring the space and many other successful and mesmerizing achievements. Every action we do has a scientific explanitation behind it. Influence on science and technology also determines how powerful a person and nation can be. If we follow the rules of science, wonders can be created but if we try to break them whatever was created will be destroyed.

We mostly read about the brighter side of science, now let’s take a tour of its darker side. Misuse of science for personal beneficial purpose in present time is just a common thing. The greed for power made men blind towards humanity and living. For this gain of power, researches were carried out and as a result weapons were created. This began from a simple spear to present day fire breathing cannons and nuclear weapons. Now let us read about some instances when science showed its dark side.

• World Wars:

The first Great War that ever happened in the history of mankind which involved initial scientific advancements was World War I which lasted for almost 4 years from 1914 -1918. This was took lives of 9 million soldiers and 7 million innocent civilians. This war was called mechanical as only mechanically operated weapons were used.

Image of WWI

When science advanced the urge for power developed again and the world got another scar in form of World War II, which was a global war and included majority of world’s countries. This war lasted longer than WWI i.e. from 1939 to 1945. Major participant of this war threw their entire economic, industrial and scientific capabilities behind this war. This cost of this war was life of more than 73 million people in which around 49 million were innocent civilians. This was the first war to see the power of nuclear weapon dropped over Hiroshima and Nagasaki by United States. Death toll from these bombings were around 129,000 – 226,000.

Coming to present scientific era, it is estimated that if World War III occurs then it will be completely nuclear and may cause extinction of mankind.

• Chernobyl:

What happened at Chernobyl was result of lies and arrogance of few people who thought that they are greater than science. In Chernobyl there was an explosion in core of a nuclear reactor while running a test which was violating the rules of science in working of the RBMK reactor on 26 April 1986. According to the official record of Soviet Union death toll was just kept to 31 – 54 where as in actual the death toll cannot be less than 93,000.

Chernobyl Disaster

CONCLUSION:

Science has given us power to an excessive level. And to use that power wisely is our responsibility. So it will not be wrong to say:

“WITH GREAT POWER GOMES GREAT RESPONSIBILITY”