Policy
nisbetmc | December 6, 2009
ClimateGate: A now ubiquitous tagline that conveys a preferred storyline.
In a paper published earlier this year at the journal Environment, I explained how claims and arguments relative to the climate change debate can be classified and tracked using a typology of frames that are common to science-related issues.
With the recent controversy over the East Anglia stolen emails, one of these common frames has come to dominate discussion leading up to Copenhagen. What's different this time around is that climate skeptics and conservatives are applying the frame, rather than liberals and…
stoat | December 5, 2009Somewhat against my will, I find myself obliged to post about Hulme, if only to stop people arguing on other talk pages. Come and argue here, folks :-(.
Anyway, KK pointed me to two Hulme pieces, and I'll take those as my texts:
* http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8388485.stm
* http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704107104574571613215771336.html
My immeadiate reaction is that these are both about science-n-politics. Which immeadiately says the the hacking incident has told us nothing interesting or new about the actual science. Which in turn is one in the eye for the septics, who…
clock | December 4, 2009If you follow @ScienceBlogs on Twitter, you may have seen a cryptic tweet yesterday, just saying:
ScienceBlogs will soon be making a very exciting announcement - so stay tuned!
SciBlings (who by then knew what the news was going to be, but were asked to keep it under the wraps until the official announcement) had some fun teasing everyone else - here are some examples:
RT @ScienceBlogs: ScienceBlogs will soon be making a very exciting announcement - so stay tuned! (We are ALL Belle de Jour)
RT @ScienceBlogs: ScienceBlogs will soon be making a very exciting announcement - stay tuned! (We plan…
oracknows | November 30, 2009I've been writing about the attempts of proponents of various pseudoscience, quackery, and faith-based religious "healing" modalities to slip provisions friendly to their interests into the health care reform bill that will be debated in the Senate beginning today. If you want to know what's at stake, check out the first press release of a newly formed institute designed to promote science-based medicine in academia and public policy, the Institute for Science in Medicine.
It's an embryonic institute, only recently formed by 42 physicians and scientists, but it's jumping right into the fray.…
pontiff | November 23, 2009@EricRWeinstein is at it again in twitterland, this time on the subject of the funding of science. For an intriguing read about the glut of Ph.D.s versus science funding, he links to his (circa 1998?) article titled: "How and Why Government, Universities, and Industry Create Domestic Labor Shortages of Scientists and High-Tech Workers." An interesting read, to say the least. Then @michael_nielsen points to Science, Money, and Politics: Political Triumph and Ethical Erosion by Daniel Greenberg which I now have to go out and buy. Damn you internet for pointing me to things I should read!…
oracknows | November 21, 2009Before I try to leave this topic for a while (which, like so may topics in the past, has temporarily taken over the blog for the last few days), one of the comments I've kept hearing since I started blogging about the new USPSTF mammography guidelines is something along the lines of, "Well, if the government runs health care, naturally politics will impact any attempts at science-based guidelines. That may be true, but in fact excessive politicization has always been a problem in that area, particularly for breast cancer. There's a good interview with to Dr. Barron Lerner, associate professor…
oracknows | November 17, 2009Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in again.
Yes, I know I've used this clip before at least twice and the line in it several more times over the last couple of years. However, sometimes it's just so completely appropriate to how I'm feeling about a topic I'm about to write about that I just don't care and have to use it again. This is one of those times. The 2009 recipient of the Richard Dawkins Award bestowed upon him by the Atheist Alliance International (a.k.a. Bill Maher, anti-vaccine comedian and host of Real Time With Bill Maher, has decided, after an all too brief…
pharyngula | November 16, 2009That seems to be the idea behind forming a council of key policy advisors, whose qualifications seem to be the fervency of their obeisance to an invisible man in the sky.
The move has been criticised by secularists who warned that it represented a worrying development.
However, Mr Denham argued that Christians and Muslims can contribute significant insights on key issues, such as the economy, parenting and tackling climate change.
Oh, really? How? I suppose tithing and refusing to allow money to be lent at interest are a kind of economic strategy…just not a very productive one. And I don't…
scientificactivist | November 11, 2009Yesterday, the influential AMA (American Medical Association) announced that it would cease its opposition to the concept of medical marijuana and instead advocate for a change in federal classification of the drug. From the LA Times:
The American Medical Assn. on Tuesday urged the federal government to reconsider its classification of marijuana as a dangerous drug with no accepted medical use, a significant shift that puts the prestigious group behind calls for more research.
The nation's largest physicians organization, with about 250,000 member doctors, the AMA has maintained since 1997…
awild | November 10, 2009
An oversized tyrannosaur photo-bombs the Global Ant Project group portrait, November 5-7 2009 at the Chicago Field Museum (photo by Darolyn Striley).
Last week I attended a conference ambitiously titled "Global Ant Project synthesis meeting II". Partly, I went out of curiosity about what this "Global Ant Project" might be. But mostly, I went for the chance to catch up with old myrmecological friends, eavesdrop on the latest ant gossip, and visit Chicago's fabulous Field Museum of Natural History. How'd it go? Mission accomplished on all counts. You can see my photos of the event…
mikethemadbiologist | November 8, 2009
(from here)
Needless to say, I'm disgusted by the amendment introduced by Democratic Congressvermin Bart Stupak which would effectively make most abortions not covered by health insurance, even though many are now. Given the tremendous numbers of women who have had an abortion, it's not like he's going to put a dent in the 'problem'--women will still become pregnant, still want to become unpregnant, and still have abortions. It's just some will have to go into debt. So I suggest, if you can afford it, hopping on over to Planet Parenthood, and making a donation in honor of Bart Stupak (…
bioephemera | November 4, 2009Since I posted last night, DrugMonkey, Dr. Free-Ride, and the Intersection have also checked in with their POVs on this issue. I particularly liked this comment from Dr. Free-Ride:
We get to foot the bill for the effects of other people's "moral failings" here as it is. Why, then, should it be so objectionable to consider spending some public money to figure out how to help people stop? Is it so important that people be punished for their moral failings that we're willing to sustain large-scale societal collateral damage just to enact that punishment?
DrugMonkey linked to a list of talking…
nisbetmc | November 4, 2009For their upcoming annual meetings in San Francisco, the American Geophysical Union is sponsoring a pre-conference workshop introducing scientists, public information officers, journalists, and other attendees to several areas of social science research that examine dimensions of climate change communication and public engagement.
Below the fold are the details and the conference page is here. You can sign up for the workshop by visiting this page. It promises to be a great event and I am looking forward to the ideas, connections, and discussion that it generates.
Re-Starting the…
bioephemera | November 3, 2009My mom, like millions of others in the U.S., has been a smoker for decades. She's tried to quit a few times, but it's been hard for her. The thing that's helped the most so far? The nicotine patch.
While the patch is not a universal cure - see the Mayo Clinic's analysis here - physicians back them because, well, the long-term cost of remaining a smoker is too high (for the smoker, the smoker's family, and society). We all know smokers, and love them, and want to help them quit. Right?
But there's a huge double standard in the media, and in society in general, when it comes to drug abuse…
emjohnson | November 2, 2009As Jawaharlal Nehru wrote of his native land but as a stranger in the process of discovery, "India is a geographical and economic entity, a cultural unity amidst diversity, a bundle of contradictions held together by invisible threads." These invisible threads were the spiritual beliefs of the people, the Vedas, the Bhagavad Gita and the Manu Smriti. The sacred Ganges was a symbol of India's life blood, as much for the Indian people as for the British colonialists, that, as Rudyard Kipling described in his story "The Bridge Builders," was a natural force that needed to be conquered if the…
emjohnson | October 26, 2009In a new understanding of the term power grab, researchers have shown that the supporters of a political candidate literally have their power taken from them after they lose an election. In a new study by Steven J. Stanton and colleagues in the open-access journal PLoS ONE, researchers asked 163 Republican and Democratic voters (57 of whom were men) to provide saliva samples both before and after the 2008 election between John McCain and Barack Obama. What the researchers determined was that Republican men showed significant reductions in testosterone after they learned that their candidate…
mikethemadbiologist | October 24, 2009Links for a rainy weekend. Science:
The arc of evolutionary genetics is long
An Epidemic of Fear: How Panicked Parents Skipping Shots Endangers Us All
McCain's Male Voters Suffered Testosterone Drop
Breaking the Link - Darwinius revealed as ancestor of nothing
The arcs of evolutionary genetics always cross back
CBS News on swine flu testing: Fail!
Other:
Feminists get married?!
Gang Mentality
Post's Rein thinks she knows your dreams
Where Will the Jobs Come From?
JOHN KERRY DELIVERS IN AFGHANISTAN....
A New Civil Rights Movement is Afoot for the Middle Class
Nobel prize-winning economist…
pronald | October 24, 2009"We will restore science to its rightful place". Oh what sweet words. Has Obama lived up to his vows? A recent story suggests that a change of administration at the White House does not necessarily mean that the best science will be of high priority when informing the public.
Karl Haro von Mogel recently posted that a USDA Report by Cyndi Barmore, The Unexplored Potential of Organic-Biotech Production, has been pulled from the USDA website after complaints from the organic industry.
An excerpt from the report: "The divide between organics and biotechnology is an artificial construction…
illconsidered | October 21, 2009Let's continue the Hockey Stick Open thread, as suggested by skip, under a new title.
A great place to pick it up is skip's most excellent response to a comment from crakar. He totally nailed all of crakar's various diversions and strawmen.
This thread is about how and why people choose their positions in the faux climate debate.
Skip said:
I would be prepared to bet all the tea in China that every study I produce that supports my views would be rejected by you in an attempt to support your own views of AGW
If you keep citing weak, partisan crap like Inhoffe and Singer (see below), you will…
ddobbs | October 21, 2009
1. The tireless, and occasionally tiresome, advocacy on behalf of liberal bloggers and interest groups for the public option. Whatever you think of their tactics -- I haven't always agreed with them -- the sheer amount of focus and energy expended on their behalf has been very important, keeping the issue alive in the public debate.
2. The fact that the CBO thinks it will save money.
3. The seeming inevitability of health care reform, which neuters the voices of those who aren't opposed to the public option per se so much as the entire project of health care reform.
4. The fact that the…