MatthewF

Poor choice of terms. An assassination is the killing of a world leader for political purposes. The term does not apply to an armed fugitive hiding out in an secret compound. It is particularly inappropriate for an individual who is a self-proclaimed enemy of a nation and has acted on those claims with a private army. In the latter situation, the U.S. would be justified in using military force to eliminate bin Laden. If he had the slightest inclination to exercise rights to due process, then he could have turned himself in years ago.

A lot of topics seem to get mixed up in this debate. Science is an iterative process of observation and hypothesis, that seeks answers to questions about the natural world. Depending on the topic and the state of the art, it may be more productive to engage in either exploratory, experimental, or theoretical activities. Landing on the moon was obviously much more than just a scientific activity. Indeed, Kennedy launched the moon program as a cultural, political and technological race with the Soviet Union. Science was not the primary consideration, other than the science of sustaining human flight to the moon. To be sure Astronauts have conducted a lot of scientific experiments on the moon and in space, so their activities have always been a mixture of scientific and non-scientific activities. The more pragmatic question usually boils down to whether a particular activity is the best use of scientific funding. Indeed, the debate of the merits of exploratory or hypothesis driven work can be most strident in the funding arena. Areas which have recently experienced a technological breakthrough often benefit from exploratory science since there is an abundance of "low hanging fruit". Scientists can be like a bunch of kids at an easter egg hunt. Once the easy to find eggs have been snapped up, then shifting to a more thoughtful or analytical approach is likely to be more productive. It isn't really possible to separate science from other cultural phenomenon. Support for scientific studies, or determining their significance usually involves value judgements. For example, biologists frequently justify their work based on the implications for human health.