Science is said to be the pursuit of objective truth, yet the process by which its findings are returned to society is anything but neutral.
At every stage — the allocation of research funding, the publication of results, the commercialisation of a technology — political and economic calculations inevitably intrude.
Take gene editing: for all that it is a landmark achievement opening the way to treating intractable diseases, fierce debate continues over whether it is right to alter the blueprint of life by human design.
Scientists must strive to foresee the consequences their work may bring, yet leaving such judgements to experts alone is dangerous in its own way.
How to connect specialist knowledge with democratic decision-making is one of the fundamental problems confronting modern society.
If citizens are to take part in scientific debate, the cultivation of a basic grounding is essential, and education and journalism have a large part to play.
Researchers, for their part, must make the effort to speak in plain language, reaching over the wall of technical jargon.
To convey findings that carry uncertainty honestly, without overstating them — and, on the receiving end, not to demand a clear black-and-white answer too hastily.
Without building such a mature relationship, no healthy coexistence of science and society is possible.
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