Finding Scientific Solutions to Country’s Problems Possible

Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei said addressing the country’s problems is an important responsibility of the scientific community, calling on the elite to focus on current issues.   
“One can find scientific solutions to all the problems of the country,” he said in an address to a group of young scientists on Wednesday, Leader.ir reported. 
He pointed to the water crisis, environmental issues, traffic, social maladies, inefficiencies of the monetary, financial, tax and banking systems as examples of problems that can be tackled by the scientific elite. 
“In past and present governments, I have always advised the use of young science elite in middle-rank and even high-ranking management positions, but you should prepare yourselves and identify your role in managing the country as well,” he told the attendants.   
Talent and mental capacity are not enough to become a man of science, but hard work and perseverance are also needed, according to the Leader.
He instructed the authorities to fulfil their duties toward this group, but added that it is also essential for the young science elite to have a sense of responsibility and not allow obstacles and difficulties, or occasional unkind behavior in some organizations, to discourage them.
Ayatollah Khamenei said this group must also focus on the targets set for future of the country and move in a direction that can make the country a source of science in a reasonable time frame. 
Scientific work that is being carried out in the country today is chiefly in branches founded by others, he said, stressing the importance of innovation and creativity by Iranians in the production of science.

Ignorance and Pillage 

The Leader also said those who make young scientists disappointed of the future and encourage them to leave the country are obviously betraying and the country and showing hostility, while it is no kindness to that young person either.   
“A scientist’s tendency to move to another country with a view that they owe to the country and will return after graduation has no problem,” he said.
The Iranian nation are potentially scientific elites, Ayatollah Khamenei said, and that is why they have been the targets of a belittling soft war by colonialists throughout history so that they forsake and even deny their capacities and accept the great lie of “we cannot”. 
“In the recent 200-year history of Iran, colonialists and rulers of the time unanimously promoted the inability of the Iranian nation until the [1979 Islamic] Revolution ended this trend,” he said.
By inducing that a nation is incapable, colonialists seek to promote ignorance and loot their country, according to the Leader.
“When a nation is ignorant about their capabilities, it would be easy to plunder it,” he said, adding that ignorance is prelude to pillage, which in turn increases a nation’s unawareness of their capacities.