My career as a scientist has been a passionate pursuit of knowledge,objective knowledge devoid of ideology,that could prove useful in understanding and transforming the world.As an engineer,I aimed to produce planning...My career as a scientist has been a passionate pursuit of knowledge,objective knowledge devoid of ideology,that could prove useful in understanding and transforming the world.As an engineer,I aimed to produce planning solutions which would be economically feasible,technically viable,and socially acceptable.Disappointed by the ineffectiveness of methodology and planning initiatives to attain sustainability,I turned to the history of science to find answers,and finally to physics,searching for an explanation of gravity.I traced a path from social to natural sciences.My attachment to my values and ideals,my commitment to my goals costed me dearly.It led me to quit applied research,to move to a desert island in the Atlantic Ocean,to be consumed for years by a Galileo-like obsession.“I must create a system,or be enslaved by another man’s.I will not reason and compare:my business is to create”(Blake,2002,p.210),has been my life’s motto.Have I succeeded in my self-appointed task or have I just wasted valuable years of creative research building sand castles?I don’t have the answer to this question.What I know for sure is that I do not regret hanging to what I thought to be right.展开更多
文摘My career as a scientist has been a passionate pursuit of knowledge,objective knowledge devoid of ideology,that could prove useful in understanding and transforming the world.As an engineer,I aimed to produce planning solutions which would be economically feasible,technically viable,and socially acceptable.Disappointed by the ineffectiveness of methodology and planning initiatives to attain sustainability,I turned to the history of science to find answers,and finally to physics,searching for an explanation of gravity.I traced a path from social to natural sciences.My attachment to my values and ideals,my commitment to my goals costed me dearly.It led me to quit applied research,to move to a desert island in the Atlantic Ocean,to be consumed for years by a Galileo-like obsession.“I must create a system,or be enslaved by another man’s.I will not reason and compare:my business is to create”(Blake,2002,p.210),has been my life’s motto.Have I succeeded in my self-appointed task or have I just wasted valuable years of creative research building sand castles?I don’t have the answer to this question.What I know for sure is that I do not regret hanging to what I thought to be right.