Science Fights Back

Richard Zurawski is a very angry man. He is also deeply concerned. How concerned? Here is his statement a few pages into this blistering book:

Science has been systematically attacked, both from within and from without. And the attack has overwhelmed our society in a matter of decades and undermined centuries of progress and enlightenment … It is not an overstatement to say we are on the threshold of losing five centuries of progress and regressing backwards to a time when fear, superstition and vested interests, instead of science and scientific facts, dominate.

He goes on to say that while we are not quite at the point of burning scientists at the stake, there are ongoing witch hunts against scientists.

You get the picture and, on the surface and in general, one cannot disagree. There is, in contemporary North American society, a blithe disregard for accepted scientific facts. One only has to...