Science as an end in itself

Worth reading just for this :

The President’s budget reflects a consistent and fundamental vision about American strength that is fundamentally at odds with a vision presented by almost 50 years ago by the physicist Robert Wilson, the first director of the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory near Chicago at which a large particle accelerator was being built. When testifying before Congress about the machine and its cost, Wilson was asked if it completion would aid in the defence of the nation. His answer is striking.

"No Sir…I don’t believe so…. It has only to do with the respect with which we regard one another, the dignity of men, our love of culture... It has to do with are we good painters, good sculptors, great poets? I mean all the things we really venerate in our country and are patriotic about. It has nothing to do directly with defending our country except to make it worth defending."

And yet...

Whether future historians will view the United States as a truly great nation will not depend upon our military strength or our ability to successfully assimilate immigrants, any more than we celebrate the greatness of ancient Greece or Rome by counting their military victories.

I suppose strictly speaking no, not by counting their military victories, that would be silly. But without military victories there would have been no Greece or Rome in the first place.

https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/killing-science-and-culture-doesnt-make-the-nation-stronger/