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I've heard that cancer bullshit since I was a college kid. Now I've lost friends to the disease and I'm married to a medical researcher. The race is to find t

by dhimes 10y ago

I've heard that cancer bullshit since I was a college kid. Now I've lost friends to the disease and I'm married to a medical researcher. The race is to find the cure- not to let people keep dying. Same with the climate scientists. You would mske your name by proving all was ok, not by saying the same thing the others are saying. I don't get why that isn't obvious. They may be out there but I've never met a scientist who didn't want to solve the problem they were working on.

schoen 10y ago
I didn't mean to suggest that cancer researchers are insincere or want people to die, just that some people hypothesize that there is no "cure for cancer" even though researchers are looking for one. The possible implication about the researchers is more that they're too optimistic that their current research avenues will be fruitful, rather that they are deliberately deceiving someone or don't want to succeed. If that turned out to be true, some of the research might ultimately need a reorientation. I'm sorry for appearing to conflate the notion of researchers in some field being too committed to their field's approach or tradition with the idea of researchers being intentionally deceptive or wishing not to succeed. I started out trying to describe ways that people envision the latter could be true, but in fact I ended up thinking that it's the former that's particularly plausible. I have no specific reason to think either form is the case today for either climate or cancer research. The basic challenge is that people, including me, have a wide range of incentives to want to believe and even convince others that what we do for a living is worthwhile. Hopefully most people are right about this most of the time.
- dhimes 10y ago
  I totally get your point, and I recall from my past in my naïveté I used to think like that. But now I realize that, for example, with cancer they can cure some of it, but there is not "one root cause" to the problem yet- every problem is different. Like solving physics problems not using equations but just putting in numbers. That's a tough road. But these climate scientists were employed before this issue. Having a theory that God created the universe doesn't mean we can't try to understand how. But I'm not trying to argue with you. I know you understand. I'm just rhetorically lamenting the state of humankind. :)

by dhimes 10y ago

schoen 10y ago

I didn't mean to suggest that cancer researchers are insincere or want people to die, just that some people hypothesize that there is no "cure for cancer" even though researchers are looking for one. The possible implication about the researchers is more that they're too optimistic that their current research avenues will be fruitful, rather that they are deliberately deceiving someone or don't want to succeed. If that turned out to be true, some of the research might ultimately need a reorientation. I'm sorry for appearing to conflate the notion of researchers in some field being too committed to their field's approach or tradition with the idea of researchers being intentionally deceptive or wishing not to succeed. I started out trying to describe ways that people envision the latter could be true, but in fact I ended up thinking that it's the former that's particularly plausible. I have no specific reason to think either form is the case today for either climate or cancer research. The basic challenge is that people, including me, have a wide range of incentives to want to believe and even convince others that what we do for a living is worthwhile. Hopefully most people are right about this most of the time.

dhimes 10y ago
I totally get your point, and I recall from my past in my naïveté I used to think like that. But now I realize that, for example, with cancer they can cure some of it, but there is not "one root cause" to the problem yet- every problem is different. Like solving physics problems not using equations but just putting in numbers. That's a tough road. But these climate scientists were employed before this issue. Having a theory that God created the universe doesn't mean we can't try to understand how. But I'm not trying to argue with you. I know you understand. I'm just rhetorically lamenting the state of humankind. :)