> The argument is, basically, “I believe in science, but not during a crisis”. I guess that saying about foxholes and atheists isn’t entirely wrong.
An important factor here is also the unfettered, obnoxious arrogance that seems to be ubiquitous in tech culture. It's not so much "I don't believe in science" so much as "I'm above science, and therefore already understand all of it."
It's the idea that if you have a sufficient mastery of software engineering then, by extension, you have a mastery of the technical aspects of literally every other field, whether it's medicine, science, psychology, law, or even art. (Or, at least can easily master it after reading a few Wikipedia articles on the topic.) And if only the experts in that unrelated field would listen to the ingenious ideas that you thought of just now, then the crisis would be averted.
But, I'm being uncharitable here. It also comes from a place of genuinely wanting to help during an unprecedented global crisis when we're all frightened, isolated, and feeling helpless.
On the one hand, you are imagining that arrogant thoughts you came up with are happening in the heads of these unnamed tech leaders. (Probably not the case. My guess is they do things from a humble bottom-up “let’s learn the fundamentals and go from there” kind of approach.)
On the other hand, sometimes they do upend industries by remaking things, usually by finding and banishing some devastatingly huge false assumption the legacy players have built everything around, and exploiting the opportunity that this opens up.
An important factor here is also the unfettered, obnoxious arrogance that seems to be ubiquitous in tech culture. It's not so much "I don't believe in science" so much as "I'm above science, and therefore already understand all of it."
It's the idea that if you have a sufficient mastery of software engineering then, by extension, you have a mastery of the technical aspects of literally every other field, whether it's medicine, science, psychology, law, or even art. (Or, at least can easily master it after reading a few Wikipedia articles on the topic.) And if only the experts in that unrelated field would listen to the ingenious ideas that you thought of just now, then the crisis would be averted.
But, I'm being uncharitable here. It also comes from a place of genuinely wanting to help during an unprecedented global crisis when we're all frightened, isolated, and feeling helpless.