Redefining the Role of Presidential Science Adviser

A propos of the ScienceDebate2008 project, my latest Seed column has just gone online. It's about how we must reinvent the role of the presidential science adviser for the modern media and political era. An excerpt:

Because formal US science advising was born during the Cold War, the emphasis often lay upon finding someone who intimately grasped nuclear security issues. The tradition lingers up to the present: The past four science advisers, including Marburger, have all been physicists. Yet while nuclear security issues remain vital, the science policy portfolio has dramatically diversified since the Cold War era. Environmental and energy issues like climate change, and biomedical and bioethical ones like embryonic stem cell research, have increasingly come front and center. Even security policy decisions have to encompass concerns about bioterror and biowarfare.

In light of these new realities, the American public might benefit from, say, a leading biomedical researcher or environmental expert serving as adviser to the president. Imagine if the new administration featured a prominent biomedical scientist in the White House--someone like human genome pioneer Francis Collins comes to mind. Everyone would immediately recognize the implication: The president grasps the huge political significance of recent advances in genetics and biotechnology.

And what about the climate field: It's doubtful that any science-based issue will command as much of the next president's time and attention as global warming. So why not pick a top climate researcher as an adviser? NASA's James Hansen, the nation's most famous climate scientist, might be too outspoken even for an administration that accepts the gravity of the climate situation. But what about Sherwood Rowland or Mario Molina, the Nobel laureates who discovered the CFC-ozone link and have since been leaders on the climate issue? In science policy circles, one also sometimes hears mention of Harvard's John Holdren, former American Association for the Advancement of Science president and an energy and climate expert, as a top science adviser candidate. With any of these choices, the nation's "First Scientist" could also serve as the administration's top spokesperson on the climate issue.

Or consider another idea for elevating the science adviser position--and making it relevant to the modern media age: why not name a true science celebrity--a Steven Pinker, say, or an E.O. Wilson? The latter presents an intriguing choice both mediagenically and politically. With his most recent book, The Creation, the Southern-born Harvard biologist has sought to reach out to evangelicals and stoke their nascent concerns about preserving the environment. At a time when the science world finds itself riven over just how far to go in advocating atheism and secularism, Wilson represents a less divisive approach, one with far broader appeal.

What do folks think?