Questioning Our Values

It gives me great pleasure to have worked briefly with John McLean (Vanderbilt University) well ahead of finally meeting him in person at Pittcon in New Orleans.  John is a visionary making big strides in data-driven discovery and he is willing to use any tool at his disposal to solve the challenges that he considers most urgent. These include statistical tools like those used by Amazon to recommend our next purchase.

Back in the summer of 2014, John said, “Our potential to understand the answers to [biological] questions may lie directly in our ability to observe and translate complex biological responses as objectively as possible. But purely compartmentalized, hypothesis-driven research tends to suffer from a subjective bias towards what is being asked and how we are listening for the answers.” In other words, our search for the truth can sometimes be clouded by a temptation to focus only on looking for things that we expect or hope to find. And, let’s face it, that isn’t only limited to analytical science.

Like John, Jeremy Nicholson (Imperial College London) is focusing on the (very) big picture. Work done by both groups – and a whole host of unsung heroes – will undoubtedly have a huge impact on the practice of medicine in the coming decades.

Listening to high-level presentations by such icons is inspirational. And subsequent conversations can border on philosophical – as John will testify to. How, I asked, can we (the public) happily support the construction of an Olympic sports doping laboratory in London but find apathy when it comes to solving current and future health hurdles? Jeremy’s MRC-NIHR National Phenome Centre in the UK was made possible by the adoption of advanced equipment ‘left over’ after our celebration of international sport. But shouldn’t we be more willing to support research that has the potential to change everyone’s lives for the better? Of course we should – but humankind’s naturally shortsighted value system means that we sometimes consider that other issues closer at hand (sports doping) are more important or relevant.

And that leads me to the Humanity in Science Award and a winner’s speech that left the audience gasping at the reality of the world in which we live. Peter Seeberger and Andreas Seidel-Morgenstern – the winners who received a standing ovation for their great work – highlighted the terrifying fact that 660,000 people die from malaria each year (WHO). Ninety percent of those are children under five.  Once we understand that it is a disease of poverty, can we (the public and scientists) do nothing? Analytical science is at the heart of solving problems and most of the solutions have great value to humanity – let’s hope humanity reciprocates by facing up to its evident shortcomings.

My personal congratulations to Peter and Andreas – and all of the entrants to the Humanity in Science Award – for making the world a better place.