Today I want to share a publication in which I will not explain a medical topic as such, but one that is intimately related to science and technology, since it is almost impossible to separate them if what is expected is that scientific progress continues to be a reality in the world.

There are great discoveries that have occurred in the history of mankind that have been more by chance than anything else, but there are others that have evidently been the product of a constant and determined effort of researchers.

I would like to give a personal position with respect to the possibility of errors in medical personnel, or even in anyone engaged in science, that can be attributed to ignorance of some specific point of science but for the simple reason that up to that particular moment it is unknown.

Unquestionably, advances in medical science and almost any other area of ​​human knowledge go hand in hand with technological advances. I always like (when I talk about it) to put a very specific example to support this argument, and it is nothing more than the history of the microscope and how it changed the way the world was seen at the time it was first used. .

In the 17th century, at the end of the so-called Middle Ages, everything was governed by religious precepts, which greatly limited medical-scientific progress, but when between 1590 and 1609 the microscope ¹ came to see what which was there but that you couldn't see it due to its tiny size, history changed radically, and what drove this whole revolution was that great technological advance called MICROSCOPE.

^{1. I put a period of time because it is not known exactly if it was created by the Dutchman Zacharias Jansen (1590) or by the Italian Galileo Galilei (1609). Is something
which is still under discussion.}

Could we criticize people who believed only and exclusively in religion as an explanation for everything?

I think not, each era has its particularity, and the reality is that as new realities are discovered, they allow technology to advance, and this in turn will improve and give the possibility that scientifically many more things can be discovered, unknown by the fact that they did not have what was necessary to discover it.

I share this "scientific reflection", to call it somehow, because there are many medical practices that before were well seen and with the passage of time and the possibility of analyzing the effects much better with the passage of time they had to be changed because it was more the damage that in the long term- they did than the good. Is this questionable? It would be very different if, in spite of knowing it, it is still being done.

Pixabay / Author: qimono

I will share an example, that of blood transfusions, something we have all heard or read about a few times. There are records of transfusions from animals to humans since the 1600's, evidently with catastrophic results, the same happened in the 19th century, when transfusions between humans began, some went well, others did not, it was not until 1900 that the Ausstrian pathologist and biologist Karl Landsteine (this is the point I want to highlight) achieved thanks to technological advances in microscopy optics, biochemistry and physics, who discovered and typified the blood groups.

This allowed transfusions to be performed between people of the same blood group and avoided the deaths that were generated by ignorance of these groups, is it questionable and should we judge the doctors prior to this discovery of Karl Landsteine?. This is just a question, but may it serve as a call for reflection on this aspect.

Pixabay / Author: geralt

What I would like to point out even more, is that even though we currently have a lot of technological tools that are allowing great discoveries to be made in many areas, the reality says that this progress will continue, and that it is very likely that within a couple of decades, what is assumed today as a kind of absolute truth, will be totally refuted by future findings, would we as scientists accept to be judged by it?.

I know this is a topic that could be considered for reflection, and that is why, as a scientist I bring it up to share it, because I have even been able to talk to elderly people who criticize very harshly the doctors who treated them 30 or 40 years ago, and the truth is that in that period of time many things have changed in the light of new discoveries, and will continue to be so, history has proven it.

Thank you for your support. I hope this reading has been enjoyable and enriching for you in some way.

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Links consulted:

• Science,technology and society

• History of Microscopes

• A Brief History of Human Blood Groups

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