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Stop science from mixing with ideology
The more frightening idea is the tendency of associating science and technology with technocrats considered antireformasi.
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UNESCO recorded that the gross expenditure on R&D (GERD) of Indonesia was as miniscule as 0.08 percent of GDP in 2013. (Shutterstock/File)
R
ecently, the public was shocked when the Home Ministry issued a regulation requiring the supervision of research activity to ward off any negative effects that could endanger the state ideology Pancasila. Following the outrage, the regulation was revoked pending an indefinite period of consultation with various parties, the ministry said.
This incident shows the intersection between ideology and science — which could eventually subordinate science to ideology.
The interesting national trend is not a coincidence, given the global reemergence of the skepticism of science — take United States President Donald Trump who said global warming is a hoax. Indonesia is not alone in its struggle to find the right equilibrium between science and state ideology.
Long before Indonesia and the US were drowning into these ideological dialectics, other nations tried to mix ideology with science, without much success. One infamous example is the Soviet Union. Their leading ideologist once stated that Mendelian genetics manifested “bourgeoisie science”. The Soviets were very suspicious of Mendel’s background as a Catholic priest, while Mendel was conducting the research independently without intervention from the church. The direct effect was clear: Soviet life sciences lagged behind the west for decades.
Similarly, Nazi Germany also tried to devise “Aryan science” to encourage scientific development for Aryans or white Germans. Werner Heisenberg, the famous quantum physicist, was commissioned to build Germany’s atomic bomb to uphold the “superiority of Aryan race” in the world. His project was miscalculated, and the reactor’s meltdown was imminent. Basically, the ideological science of the Soviets and Nazis failed miserably, and their ideas faded into oblivion.
Indonesia took a very different course than those countries. President Sukarno had started developing Indonesian science, mainly for military purposes.
During his tenure, we had already developed the rocket industry, in view of the various threats of separatism as well as confrontation with the Dutch.
