I rather look forward to seeing how completely the science blogs are going to attempt to ignore this aspect of what is actually a very legitimate philosophical question about the extent to which science should be suppressed:
The US government has asked the scientific journals Nature and Science to censor data on a laboratory-made version of bird flu that could spread more easily to humans, fearing it could be used as a potential weapon.
The US National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity asked the two journals to publish redacted versions of studies by two research groups that created forms of the H5N1 avian flu that could easily jump between ferrets – typically considered a sign the virus could spread quickly among humans.
Of course, it should also be interesting to see the contortions that Sam Harris and other science fetishists will perform in an attempt to blame the dangers of science on religion. I not only don’t have a problem with the idea of suppressing science, I think it is entirely obvious that science is going to be increasingly suppressed by governments around the world and that suppression will prove politically popular.
The ironic thing is that scientific progressives have managed to place themselves completely on the wrong side of history while simultaneously believing they are history’s vanguard.