issue40 【today is the day小组】第5次作业 by woyun

woyunUID: 2522051

40"Scholars and researchers should not be concerned with whether their work makes a contribution to the larger society. It is more important that they pursue their individual interests, however unusual or idiosyncratic those interests may seem."

Common sense informs us that interest is the best teacher. However, in an attempt to pursue the interest, should the scholars and researchers ignore the contribution to the society, just as the speaker asserts? In view of personal value and social responsibility, I tend to believe that they should focus more on the contribution to the society and interest should serve as the catalyzer to the contribution.

Admittedly, personal interest and curiosity serve as the huge imputes to the success, without which, those researchers might be weary of their research, let alone making a contribution to the society. It is interest that encourages an individual to pursue the ultimate goal. Without interest in the physic and astronomy, Hawking might be a disabled man forever instead of publish the celebrated book <<A Brief History of Life >>; without interest in the physic, Einstein might teach physic in the middle school instead of put forward famous theory of relativity, without interest in chemistry, Madam Curie would never come as such a respectable woman in the world. In sum, we would be hard-pressed to image a scholar or research devoting oneself assiduously and faithfully to an uninteresting study.


Neverthless, more importantly, the scholars and researchers should take responsibility of human and the larger society. Considering the moral aspect, an individual should own a thanksgiving heart; otherwise he/she will fail the public. It is the society that cultivates those brilliant scholars and researchers; thus it is their obligation and responsibility to repay to the society instead of pursuing their individual interests which have nothing to do with the development and improvement of the society. Besides, unreasonable pursuit of interest may plunge them into a dilemma where they may lose themselves. Regarding the contribution to the society as their ultimate goals, they may tend to achieve more success as ideal is also an encouragement. Although an individual lacks such responsibility, he/she is not supposed to study something that will do harm to the society. Providing that a researcher is interested in making drugs which are a big threat to the society, undoubtedly, it would be forbidden.

However, over pursuit of the contribution to the society is counterproductive to improving the society. Firstly, over pursuit of the contribution is the undoing of utilitarian. On a personal level, as a host of research areas need a long term and diligent study, failing to find any study results in the short term, an utilitarian researcher would give up his/her research, which might be proved to be a great loss in the future. When the English physician Harvey Moreover put forward his theory that blood was circling in our body which refused the authoritative theories of Galen, nobody admitted him and criticized him. On a social level, a multitude of scientific achievements are difficult for people to understand at first, which might great losses to the society if the society over emphasis the long term contribution and prevent the research.

In sum, to the scholars and researchers, interest can facilitate their achievements and they must look upon the contribution to the society as their ultimate aims as it is an basic moral issue. However, the idea of contributing to the society shouldn't evolve into utilitarian. Interest and the responsibility to the society pave the way to the success both in academic and personal value realm.

xu5260711UID: 2465514

还是看附件吧

[ 本帖最后由 xu5260711 于 2008-8-7 16:16 编辑 ]