David L. Sackett's commentary on preventive medicine1 is a breath of fresh air which should become a hurricane in this world where life is becoming increasingly “medicalized.” His last paragraph is particularly apt: “Experts refuse to learn from history until they make it themselves, and the price for their arrogance is paid by the innocent. Preventive medicine is too important to be led by them.”
One might add a remark from an essay by Lancelot Hogben, a British scientist and economist, born in Portsmouth in 1895: “No society is safe in the hands of its clever people.”2
References
- 1.Sackett DL. The arrogance of preventive medicine [editorial]. CMAJ 2002;167(4):363-4. [PMC free article] [PubMed]
- 2.Hogben L. Mathematics, the mirror of civilization. In: Hutchins RM, Adler MJ, editors. Gateway to the great books. Vol 9: Mathematics. Chicago: Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc.; 1963. p. 3-25.