by Steve Skutnik
A recent column by Daniel Sarewitz in
Nature on
bridging the "partisan divide" with respect to public perception of science inspired some spirited debate over on
my twitter feed
yesterday. The short version goes something like this: scientists are
often perceived as being in the thrall of Democrats, exposing the
greater scientific enterprise to being undermined as simply another
partisan front (or, alternatively factionalizing, wherein partisan camps
each bring in their own "experts" an accuse the other side of "junk
science). None of this is helped by scientists who go out of their way
to bring on their antagonism - see, for example,
the letter signed by 68 Nobel laureates
endorsing President Obama over Mitt Romney in the last election (in
which Sarewitz notes that of the 68, 43 have a record of public
donations to candidates, and of these, only five have ever donated to
Republican candidates, and none in the last election cycle). It goes
without saying that, well-meaning as it may be, openly partisan
activities like this
aren't helping with the whole "not being perceived as a lockstep Democratic constituency" thing. (Note that I am explicitly
not advocating
mass abdication of scientists from the political discourse, which a
genuinely terrible idea - but rather, a caution that lending one's
scientific credibility to openly partisan ventures may
not be in the best strategic interests of science...) More at: http://neutroneconomy.blogspot.com/2013/01/scientagonism-problem-of-antagonistic.html
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