An injection of truth

An Injection of Truth, Healing Humanity

Well I’m John Campbell extending a warm welcome from a cold North of England.

Thanks to David Speaker for asking me to give a short message,

not the same as being there in person, but perhaps slightly better than nothing.

Your conference is well named, we need An Injection of Truth.

As scientists we believe in the existence of an external objective reality.

We believe this reality is testable as we strive towards empirical reality.

Sadly, as has been the case so often in human history, truth risks being converted into a narrative.

A stream of suggestions and thoughts that serve the purposes of vested interests.

This often results in a move away from objective truth to little more than propaganda.

People with power and influence have often subjugated those around them to ensure they are incorporated into ideas and systems which would not stand empirical analysis.

Those in powerful positions have multiple modalities by which they promote their influence and narrative.

Carrots are often offered, sticks threatened or actually used to inflict real injuries.

Who knows, maybe some of these historical realities have been repeated over the past five years.

Some meanwhile have stood tall, refused the bribe of a carrot, defied the pain of the stick.

Many more have sadly capitulated to the propagation of the narrative.

Many have simply trusted their overloads and quietly conformed.

I suspect some at this conference are those who have stood tall.

We feel free, (with the Apostle Paul), to test all things.

We do have the body of scientific knowledge,

we do have analytical techniques,

if we find conflict between dictated narrative and the nature of reality,

perhaps this conference if a good place to illuminate those discrepancies.

Your conference is well named, Healing Humanity.

Sadly, we look out on a sea of human pain, suffering and death.

Some of this is innate to the human condition, some is the result of human actions.

Thers is something special about human life.

I think your presence today indicated your belief in this sanctity of life.

We chose to use our skills, knowledge, science, medicine and public policies to identify that which is causing our species to suffer.

We feel free to ask fundamental questions like when does human life begin, when does it end, how should it end?

We use our lifelong learning to construct plans and interventions that can promote health and aid healing.

We use our analytical scientific skills to evaluate the effectiveness of what we do, we then disseminate this knowledge as far as current constrains allow us.

We may not heal all of humanity, but we can bring truth to light, and in doing so, help many, many people.

Have a great conference.