Element Collection

Element Collection

Friday, March 9, 2012

Chemophobia: An Era of Discouraging Scientific Curiosity

In doing research for my experiments, I often run across articles in the news about police raiding suspected "home meth labs" or "amateur bomb making facilities." These are very often people's homes, which the authorities, for one reason or another, suspect are conducting illicit activity. Now I'm not against the police taking down such operations, on the contrary it's a good thing that these people get taken off the streets. However, in many cases they go overboard and barge in on amateur scientists like myself, who have no intention or capability of producing drugs or explosives at all, let alone in any sizable or dangerous quantity. If such search and seizures are to be conducted, those responsible need to have a damn good reason for doing so! It's quite clear if someone is engaging in drug production or explosives manufacturing vs someone who simply has an interest in science.