Capital imposes on science the task of revolutionizing capitalist production. Freed from this science would be able to pursue the development of socially necessary technologies. Compare the "Son of Star Wars" plan for Nuclear Missile Defense with proposals for solar energy generators in space, the capitalist class would choose to develop further its destructive military technology. Given the choice between developing clean energy technology and oil drilling in the Arctic Wildlife Refuge in Alaska, the capitalists choose to drill for oil. Freed from the bourgeoisie’s cannibalistic drive to destroy everything and turn it into wealth, science could be put to work reversing the damage caused by capitalist barbarism. The chasm between what is possible under capitalism and what is within our grasp technologically grows ever greater. If there is any argument truly compelling for the overthrow of the capitalist class it can be seen in the freeing of human endeavor that can only occur once the world is free from capitalism.

Recently scientists have developed a genetically modified rice designed to contain Beta Carotene. Developers say that it will help prevent blindness that comes from a lack of this key nutrient in the diets of the world’s poor, most of whom rely almost solely on staple crops like rice for the vast bulk of their nutritional needs. Again the problems of malnutrition and starvation under capitalism aren’t meant to be solved, rather they are meant to be adapted to and more importantly profited from.

Over-irrigation has caused arable land under use by capitalist agribusiness to start becoming more salty, and thus less fertile, as water deposits trace amounts of dissolved minerals over great periods of time. Salt in the soil threatens agribusinesses in places like California that heavily rely on irrigation. Do the capitalists think even for a second that their agricultural methods need to be changed in order to avoid this problem - no. Their scientists go to work developing tomatoes that can grow in salty soil. Science here is applied to solve the problems caused by capitalist agribusiness. Instead of finding a better way to grow crops, scientists at greenhouses in the University of Toronto and the University of California-Davis worked to genetically engineer tomatoes that could be grown in salty soil. In reality much of California should be arid or semi-arid desert. Under capitalist agribusiness it is irrigated and turned into the source for a great deal of agricultural produce. Capitalism doesn’t need to think about consequences. In agriculture, instead of developing biopesticides they constrain science to develop more chemical pesticides amounting to chemical warfare against the environment.

In the realm of medicine, President Bush’s solomonic decision to severely limit embryonic stem cell research early last August will have the effect of almost killing off this research in the US. Under capitalism it is the state that marshals the funding necessary for the bulk of scientific advance - not capital in the private sphere. As our comrades wrote in Internationalist Communist 19, 95% of spending on the development of new technologies in the US comes from the Department of Defense, the Department of Energy and NASA. Even more incredibly as late as the mid-eighties the US government was funding, either directly or indirectly up to two thirds of all scientific research in the US. Austerity and budget cuts have reduced some of this funding to Universities but it is still of key importance to the bulk of all scientific research in the US today.

This Summer there was a cross country solar car race where single seated solar cars averaged 40 miles an hour in their trek across the US. Solar power has several key limitations. It requires large surfaces in order to collect relatively small amounts of energy. Solar radiation loses some 25-50% of its energy in passing through the earth’s atmosphere. Most solar energy falls upon the more remote parts of the globe. The highest levels of solar radiation fall on the area of the Red Sea. The daily and seasonal cycles of the Sun further limit this technology. Once solar power is collected it must be stored. All this can come at a relatively high cost. Nonetheless, given the cost of weapons technology that will either be used to kill or will slowly fall apart it still represents a more favorable expenditure of effort.

Under capitalism we see the destruction of mass transit. A potential technology such a cold fusion is dismissed as a hoax after only one major preliminary test while "Star Wars" Nuclear Missile Defense research, which scientists criticized from its very inception under the Reagan administration is now resurrected by the son of Bush, is accepted.

Technologically the human race has the capacity to produce for need without destroying the planet. Clean water and clean energy are not illusions out of a science fiction novel, they are possible. Under capitalism however, clean air, clean water and clean energy will always be an impossibility. The obstacle between what is possible and what exists is the capitalist class, it is an obstacle that can only be overcome by the proletariat.