Is There Really A War on Science?
People who oppose vaccines, GMOs and climate change evidence may be more anxious than antagonistichttp://www.scientificamerican.com/article/is-there-really-a-war-on-science/
"For several years now the popular media has run headlines about “a war on science.” Reporters note that federal funding for research is down, campaigns to undermine climate science attract hundreds of millions of dollars and politicians routinely reject findings that are uniformly accepted by scientists. But a panel of scholars last weekend argued for the most part against calling these aversive movements a war, with two historians even scolding scientists who embrace the idea as out of touch with public concerns.
Certainly, opponents of genetically modified crops, vaccinations that are required for children and climate science have become louder and more organized in recent times. But opponents typically live in separate camps and protest single issues, not science as a whole, said science historian and philosopher Roberta Millstein of the University of California, Davis. She spoke at a standing-room only panel session at the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s annual meeting, held in Washington, D.C. All the speakers advocated for a scientifically informed citizenry and public policy, and most discouraged broadly applied battle-themed rhetoric.
Millstein was the pacifist. “There is no war on science, is what I’m claiming.” Or maybe there is a war on science, she said, but calling it such is “counterproductive.”
Co-panelist Mark Largent of Michigan State University, a science historian who has interviewed many parents who refuse to fully vaccinate their children, took the argument further. Scientists should shift away from an embattled position, he said, and acknowledge that they have tremendous power over various social arenas. Scientists today are an “intensely privileged group of people,” Largent said. “You are revered. You have more cultural and social authority than any other group, other than very wealthy people.” A defensive stance misrepresents science’s influence and can alienate people already mistrustful of vaccines or other socially relevant findings, he argued.
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A fair enough article that downplays possible damage done by the anxiety that leads to science denialism, nevermind that it ignores some of the causes, such as outlandish, fear-based marketing and media personalities. Nonethless, a worthy read.
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I'm going from this:
To 55 Degrees in just 2 days!
... more likely to buy whatever shit is being sold.
That's why certain politicians, businesses, and anti-intellectual religions promote ignorance.
The U.S.A. is a paradise for grifters and many powerful people, grifters themselves, want to keep it that way.
Of course any modern nation needs technical people, but many of those are trained in such a narrow way that they never see the forest for the trees. That's how we get electrical engineers who "don't believe in evolution" or prominent surgeons who believe all sorts of crazy stuff.
In computer programming circles you encounter all sorts who are brilliant in that single art, and then they write about something outside their specialty and it's...
A solid Liberal Arts education strong in the Sciences, the Arts, Language, Maths, and History is a very good thing.
