Science
Throughout human history, those who have proposed new and different ways of understanding the world and all its pieces have been shunned - or worse.
In the 16th century, Copernicus waited until he was dying to publish his ideas, for fear he would be imprisoned for saying that the earth was not the center of the universe. In the 17th century, Galileo saw that fear manifest, as he was tried by the Inquisition for defending heliocentrism and sentenced to house arrest for the rest of his life.
Not much has changed over four centuries, as cutting-edge sciences and ideas have consistently been met with ridicule, condescension, and dismissal, often just before being embraced and claimed as being the ideas of those who offered the ridicule.
Even within the scientific community itself, curiosity and skepticism are too often confused, and advances are delayed not because of process but because of an allegiance to a way of thought that provides comfort even as it proves limiting.
The goal of the Institute’s scientific efforts is to explore scientific theories that have emerged in the past century+ in order to understand their implications, supportive research, and critiques. Our approach is to consider before accepting or denying, and to embrace uncertainty with a focus on questions as much as on answers. This guides our daily work and our support of the work of our Fellows and Interns.
