Science and Politics
razib | December 30, 2009Several readers have pointed me to this development at Berkeley High School:
Berkeley High School is considering a controversial proposal to eliminate science labs and the five science teachers who teach them to free up more resources to help struggling students.
The proposal to put the science-lab cuts on the table was approved recently by Berkeley High's School Governance Council, a body of teachers, parents, and students who oversee a plan to change the structure of the high school to address Berkeley's dismal racial achievement gap, where white students are doing far better than the state…
tqa | December 9, 2009
The Democratic Party will not be traveling to Copenhagen to negotiate an international climate change treaty.
Surprised? Then you might not have as good an understanding of the Constitution of the United States as you thought. But don't feel bad - that puts you on par with Jake Sherman, and he's got a nice job as a reporter for Politico:
House Republicans are preparing for a trip to Copenhagen and looking to derail Democratic efforts to negotiate an international climate agreement.
There is no doubt that the Republicans are going to Copenhagen, and there is no doubt that they plan to…
razib | October 8, 2009Copenhagen dreaming: In defense of the scientific method:
As the Copenhagen conference on the successor to the Kyoto Protocol draws near, I want to lay some meta-thoughts out about the scientific method which I think are important, as a context for my general support of the theory of global warrming and the need for decisive action by our own nation to reduce carbon emissions and embrace alternative forms of energy (including nuclear). The next post in this series will then lay out my position on global warming specifically.
razib | September 27, 2009A geologist, Suvrat Kher, has a very good post on the recent paper on Indian genetics. He concludes:
The Indian Press has made a hash of the finding. For example they have only reported those parts of the study that deal with the kinship among Indians and have stressed that castes and tribes cannot be differentiated or that there is no divide between the Aryans (roughly north Indians) and Dravidians (south Indians). That is all true for average relatedness. But the study also clearly points out that there are genetic differences between north and south Indians and between upper and lower…
tqa | April 17, 2009
According to Matt Nisbet, the third ethical imperative when framing science is accuracy. Accuracy is important, he argues, because those who fail to accurately convey what's known about a subject risk losing the trust of their audience.
Also according to Matt Nisbet, a new Pew survey shows that Evangelicals are "little different from [the] rest of [the] public" when it comes to acceptance of manmade climate change. Evangelicals are 13% less likely to accept that humans are causing global warming as the population as a whole, no other group is less likely to accept manmade warming than they…
tqa | April 16, 2009
I just finished reading the torture memos that were released today. I cannot remember ever in my life being as ashamed of my country as I am at this moment. The contents of the memos are so insanely wrong that I'd like to believe that they're fiction, but they're clearly not. While I understand President Obama's desire to move forward, I am appalled by his decision to rule out prosecutions for anyone who relied on the excuse that these memos said that what they were doing was OK.
Of course, prosecutions aren't the only possible consequences, and there are some disciplinary options that the…
tqa | March 30, 2009
Last night, Matt Nisbet posted a section from the first draft of a new book chapter he's working on. In this particular chapter, he says he's trying to "lay out a detailed ethical framework" for science communications. At least in theory, that's an interesting concept. Are there ethical responsibilities involved in communicating science?
The material that Matt self-quotes is a bit light when it comes to explaining just why we should think there are ethical responsibilities involved in science communication. About the closest he comes is this brief passage:
Surveys indicate that Americans…
tqa | March 23, 2009
Back in 2005 and 2006, I wrote a few posts about the insanely arbitrary decision making process that the FDA was pretending to use to justify its obviously pre-determined conclusion to restrict the availability of the Plan B "morning after" pill as much as they thought they could get away with. The FDA ultimately decided to deny applications to fully move Plan B to over-the-counter status, but finally accepted a request to waive the prescription requirement for patients 18 years old or older. That was in August of 2006, and that's been the status quo ever since. Until this morning.
Earlier…
tqa | March 21, 2009
If you're looking for a good read this morning, I suggest you pop over to the Washington Post's Opinion pages. Scibling Chris Mooney has an excellent op-ed in there today, in response to George Will's recent climate change denial escapades.
tqa | March 19, 2009
Those of you who followed the recent (and prolonged) saga involving thed anonymous holds that were blocking confirmation of John Holdren (the President's nominee for Science Adviser) and Jane Lubchenco (the NOAA Administrator nominee) will no doubt be relieved to learn that the drama has officially come to an end. The New York Times is reporting that both nominees were confirmed by unanimous consent of the Senate this evening.
Thanks again to everyone who stepped forward to help when politics got in the way.
tqa | March 16, 2009
A couple of weeks ago, Interior Secretary Ken "Cowboy Hat" Salazar went ahead with a decision to remove endangered species protections from grey wolves in several western states. The decision in question was first proposed by the Bush Administration, and was extremely controversial. Needless to say, there are quite a few people who are unhappy with Salazar's decision to approve the delisting.
To be honest, I'm not thrilled with it myself. I looked at the issue last year, and there certainly seemed to be some very good reasons to think that the delisting is not a good idea. Salazar's…
tqa | March 10, 2009
As of this morning, the situation surrounding the Senate confirmations of John Holdren as head of the Office of Science and Technology Policy and Jane Lubchenco as NOAA Administrator is somewhat confused. A number of new news articles and blog posts have appeared over the last couple of days. Unfortunately, some of them seem to be presenting new information, while others are several days behind the current situation. In the interest of trying to inject a bit of clarity, I'm going to review the full chronology, not just the latest information.
20 December 2008: President-elect Obama names…
tqa | March 9, 2009
As many of you know, I've been closely following the complex situation involving President Obama's nominees for Science Advisor and NOAA Administrator. Early last week, we learned that both John Holdren (the Science Advisor designate) and Jane Lubchenco (the NOAA Administrator nominee) were stuck in Senate limbo, with no confirmation votes scheduled as a result of one or more "anonymous holds" that were placed on the nominations.
Initial reports indicated that holds had been placed by Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ), in an attempt to gain leverage for an unrelated issue. Later in the week,…
tqa | March 5, 2009
As of this morning, it appears that the nominations of both John Holdren and Jane Lubchenco (the President's picks for Science Advisor and NOAA Administrator, respectively) are still stalled in the Senate. If we don't raise more hell over this issue - and keep raising hell - it's likely that these nominees will remain stuck in limbo for quite some time, and the Administration's efforts to forge a new science and environmental policy will be hampered as a result. Do you want that to happen?
The issue is receiving relatively little attention from the traditional press, but one report…
tqa | March 4, 2009
It appears that yesterday's reports that New Jersey Democrat Robert Menendez was holding up the confirmation of both the Science Advisor and the NOAA administrator were not entirely correct. He may well be delaying these confirmations, but he's apparently not the only one. CQ Politics is now reporting that the nominations are being held by multiple members of the Senate. Due to the holds, there is currently no confirmation vote scheduled on the floor.
This is a very reliable report. CQ Politics is not basing this on anonymous sources. They are quoting Commerce Committee Chairman John…
tqa | March 3, 2009
UPDATE: 4 Mar 09 There are now reports that Senator Menendez is not the only Senator holding up these nominations. I've got a new post up with the updated information and new suggestions for ways you can help.
The Washington Post is reporting that Senate votes to confirm Jane Lubchenco as NOAA Administrator and John Holdren as Science Advisor are currently being obstructed by a Democratic Senator. Quoting multiple unnamed sources, the Post says that New Jersey Democrat Robert Menendez has placed an "anonymous hold" on the nominations in order to try to gain leverage for some issues related…
tqa | February 26, 2009
Matt "Framing Science" Nisbet has some more advice for scientists on things we shouldn't be saying:
Another frame to avoid is the same type of "war on science" and "restoring science to its rightful place" rhetoric that was used on the campaign trail and in the early days of Obama's administration.
While during the Bush era this public accountability frame justifiably mobilized liberals and many scientists, now that Obama is in office the same message likely alienates Republican segments of the public that the president desperately needs to rally around climate action. The frame provides…
tqa | February 24, 2009As some of you may be aware, over the last couple of weeks Timothy Sandefur and I had a debate on our blogs on the topic of government funding for scientific research. He argued against it; I argued for it. We wrapped up the debate yesterday. If you're interested in taking a look at the whole thing, I've put links to all of the posts in the debate (in chronological order) below the fold.
Sandefur's opening post
Sandefur's reply to some of the comments about his opening post
My reply
Sandefur's second post
My reply
Sandefur's third post
My reply
Sandefur's final post
My concluding thoughts
tqa | February 23, 2009
What Government - at least as we know it - Is.
Timothy Sandefur and I have been debating the proper role of government in funding scientific research for a couple of weeks now. Over the course of the debate, it's become clear to me that he and I do not have a common understanding about what our government actually is, or what the right relationship between the government and the citizens actually is.
Over the years, we humans have tried out more forms of government than you can shake a stick at. In the context of this particular debate, though, whenever we've used the term "government",…
tqa | February 20, 2009
In his opening remarks for the latest entry in our ongoing debate about public financing for science, Timothy Sandefur suggests that after this post, we move on to concluding remarks. That strikes me as a reasonably good idea (and not just because he's generously offered me the last word). We may not have yet reached a point where we're talking past each other, but we're definitely getting dangerously close to that point.
After reading through Tim's latest post, I'm going to respond to his points out of order. I'm going to start out by looking at the more concrete examples that we've been…