OH Radicals

Whenever someone says that something is breaking down pollutants faster they always loosen the pollution restrictions. Personally I think they should have swept this under the carpet and told us to pollute less in order to have even cleaner air rather than having air that is no dirtier then what we have now.

I thought about that, too. From an ethical standpoint, are there times when science needs to withhold facts (or at least hypotheses) from non-scientists for the greater good? Or are facts value-neutral?

Science must always put forward results, regardless of the consequences, as long as the method is included so that it may be analyzed. Besides, in the real world, policy is more often set in spite of facts, not because of them.

So are your saying that science exists in a moral vacuum; that facts are facts and moral judgments have no place in the scientific process. I agree that in a perfect world it would be, but biases, preconceived notions and skewed mathematical interpretation are a huge problem in academia today.