And it is a world that none of us would deny is, in large part, powered by science and technology. It is also a world in which the nonscientific social and ethical questions are frequently much more difficult to grapple with than the scientific ones. I believe that today, more than at any other time in the history of humankind, our values and principles are needed to undergird and guide the increasingly powerful knowledge that flows from science and technology. One has to look no further than the questions presented by our knowledge of genetics and neuroscience to recognize our need for social philosophy, history, law, and every other context of our lives. Murray Gell-Mann, the 1969 Nobel Laureate in physics, portrayed this concept much more concisely than I am doing.
Specialization is important, too.
It's necessary that people study particular fields deeply, simply because our knowledge has become so detailed in those fields. But that shouldn't lead to the exclusion of a concern with the unity of human culture. We are able to do increasingly more complex and challenging scientific and engineering research at the same time that we are experiencing greater societal disparities and problems. Sounds a little bit like the misunderstandings about baseball that Graff's separate rooms could create. I am, however, encouraged by what I sense as the beginning of a dialogue on this issue.