I have a lot more confidence that there’s been a genuine decline in

important accomplishments in the arts than in the sciences. In the

sciences, a decline in discoveries of basic laws is indisputable. Only

physics seems to have the potential for a next revolution. Even in

genetics and neuroscience, which promise to have incredible new effects

on the species during this century, progress is not occurring because

of breakthroughs in understanding the basics of genes and the workings

of the brain. It’s mostly a matter of new capabilities to do things

(e.g., figure out which genes do what, in breathtaking detail and

scope, and how to manipulate them) that we couldn’t do before.

But decline in discoveries of basic laws is not the same as decline in

effects on daily life. Here I think the magnitude of effect depends on

what aspect of life you’re looking at. The point about Ozzie and

Harriet being at home in a 2000 house while being daunted by a 1900

house is well taken. But, to get personal about it, a social scientist

of 1950 did his work almost indistinguishably from a social scientist

of 1900. The way I work today–living in a town of 200 people, but with

a computer dwarfing the most powerful computer in the world in 1950,

with instant access to data the likes of which didn’t exist anywhere in

the world in 1950 (including government data banks), employing

statistical methods that had never been used at all in 1950–would

baffle a 1950 social scientist. The change in daily professional

functioning is orders of magnitude greater from 1950–2000 than from

1900–1950. The same could be said of many other cognitive professions.

Furthermore, these changes in the applications of science are having

impacts on social structure and social interaction that are still near

the bottoms of their various curves. So I think you have to

disaggregate definitions of scientific accomplishment. Accomplishment

is declining by some important definitions, but is high, or even

rising, by others.

So Mark’s right. Derb is right Jonah is right. I’m feeling downright

wishy-washy today.