Questioning the hope in science and schooling

Abstract

The succession of extraordinary traumatic events, such as the poles defrosting, the fires in Australia and Amazon, the COVID19 pandemic, the financial global crises revival, the Black Lives Matter movement, seems to call for science (to solve problems) and schooling (to make time to the unemployed) for help. Science and schooling are some of the big successes of post-modern culture and states. But even given these successes, questions remain. Such as: Why they do not deliver what one hopes from them? What kinds of changes need to take place within both science and the academe that will foster hope and tangible results? We are left to ponder why: a) these extreme events take us by surprise; b) why this generation, who have been afforded the best education of any previous one, is so anxious, so stressed, and so worried; c) why is it that our best policies, science, and minds continue to fail us when it comes to solving the problems associated with the environment, this pandemic, capitalism, and racism; d) why given the promise of science in particular, and social science, in particular, are we so in need of solutions? Put differently, why in the midst of these crises are answers not a priority in the various disciplines that came into being to provide such?