A new field of study, futurology, is emerging. It is an effort to use existing developments to predict the future in an attempt to ease mankind's adjustment to the rapid changes of contemporary society and to foster determination of the future through deliberate, informed choices. Developments such as the routine transplanting of human organs, the widespread breakdown of hierarchical authority, the routine use of drugs to produce desired behavioral changes, and the determination of the sex of unborn babies are foreseen. These prospects are already in various stages of refinement and are considered forerunners of astounding developments that could have momentous impact on the nature of mankind and the physical universe.
Often the choices available are not attractive ones, and humanity seems reluctant to address itself to these hard questions. Some of the alternatives are frightening, and society seems ill-equipped to make wise decisions about the future. In addition, there is concern that society is already too complex and that things are out of control. But we may derive some comfort in recognizing that these predictions are based on empirical evidence—on what can be humanly seen.
Mrs. Eddy emphasizes an important point when she writes "Empirical knowledge is worse than useless: it never has advanced man a single step in the scale of being." Miscellaneous Writings, p. 234; Indeed, Mrs. Eddy presents in Christian Science a revolutionary scientific approach to the explanation of existence and the understanding of man, as, for instance, in this passage: "Material sense does not unfold the facts of existence; but spiritual sense lifts human consciousness into eternal Truth." Science and Health,p. 95;
