4 ms·

Politicizing science will make science less scientific and more political. It will not work the other way.

by octaveguin 6y ago

0d9eooo 6y ago
It's already too political. I agree with you; just saying that everything bad in that regard will get even worse.
- azinman2 6y ago
  Anything becomes political as soon as a second person gets added.
domnomnom 6y ago
Exactly. There is just no simple solution, only likely applied optimizations in certain contexts that those in the trenches will be able to discover.
jp555 6y ago
“When you mix politics and science, you get politics.” — John M. Barry from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Influenza https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Influenza
- vixen99 6y ago
  As with mixing ice cream with 1% of s
- btrettel 6y ago
  As far as I can tell, that quote does not appear in the cited book. https://books.google.com/books?id=BYsW6qTP0pMC&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22When+you+mix+politics+and+science,+you+get+politics.%22&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0#v=onepage&q=politics&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=BYsW6qTP0pMC&printsec=fron... A nearly identical quote appears in this editorial by the same author: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/opinion/coronavirus-shutdown.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/opinion/coronavirus-shutd...
  - jp555 6y ago
    Ah nice thx!
btrettel 6y ago
This Atlantic article cites a study which indicates that scientists don't lose credibility when advocating for political positions: https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/02/when-scientists-become-advocates-do-they-lose-credibility/518157/ https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/02/when-sci... Now, this is different from what you've claimed, which is about the effect on science itself rather than the credibility of scientists to the public. But I believe the study only showed short-term effects. In my view, long-term political advocacy is likely to make people view scientists differently than they view them now.
munificent 6y ago
The counter-argument is that there is no value in doing scientific research if you don't use the results to influence human choices.
- bhupy 6y ago
  The counter-counter-argument is that if you don't decouple the "doing of the scientific research" from "influencing human choices", you might compromise the endeavor of scientific research altogether. The same institutions don't need to do both, and that they are separate is usually because "is" questions and "ought" questions are answered via different mechanisms.
  - munificent 6y ago
    > The counter-counter-argument is that if you don't decouple the "doing of the scientific research" from "influencing human choices", you might compromise the endeavor of scientific research altogether. I don't disagree with you. Put more concretely, I think we need a blend of: 1. Allowing scientific concensus to influence the choices we make today. We should act on our current best knowledge of the world. 2. Allowing politics and our understanding of what humans need today to influence the way we allocate scientific resources. Critical problems and promising solutions should be given some priority because they have the greatest chance of improving people's lives. 3. Funding "pure" scientific research where we have no idea if it will pan out or not. 2 is biased because we don't have a perfect understanding of what research will pan out. Without some random resource allocation we will only hill-climb to the nearest local maxima of things we know are improvements. Sprinkling some fraction of our resources outside of obvious priorities allows paradigm shifts and serendipity, which are vital for progress on longer timescales. I think a lot of science nerds, especially here, focus on 3, and I agree that it's important and undervalued. But I think it's highly inefficient to only do that. Smart resource allocation does give greater weight to areas with greater probability of success, and to areas that provide the most benefit.
baddox 6y ago
Pretending that something which is unavoidably political is not political will not make that thing less political.

Politicizing science will make science less scientific and more political. It will not work the other way.

0d9eooo 6y ago

It's already too political. I agree with you; just saying that everything bad in that regard will get even worse.

azinman2 6y ago
Anything becomes political as soon as a second person gets added.

domnomnom 6y ago

Exactly. There is just no simple solution, only likely applied optimizations in certain contexts that those in the trenches will be able to discover.

jp555 6y ago

“When you mix politics and science, you get politics.” — John M. Barry from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Influenza https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Influenza

vixen99 6y ago
As with mixing ice cream with 1% of s
btrettel 6y ago
As far as I can tell, that quote does not appear in the cited book. https://books.google.com/books?id=BYsW6qTP0pMC&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22When+you+mix+politics+and+science,+you+get+politics.%22&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0#v=onepage&q=politics&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=BYsW6qTP0pMC&printsec=fron... A nearly identical quote appears in this editorial by the same author: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/opinion/coronavirus-shutdown.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/opinion/coronavirus-shutd...
- jp555 6y ago
  Ah nice thx!

btrettel 6y ago

This Atlantic article cites a study which indicates that scientists don't lose credibility when advocating for political positions: https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/02/when-scientists-become-advocates-do-they-lose-credibility/518157/ https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/02/when-sci... Now, this is different from what you've claimed, which is about the effect on science itself rather than the credibility of scientists to the public. But I believe the study only showed short-term effects. In my view, long-term political advocacy is likely to make people view scientists differently than they view them now.

munificent 6y ago

The counter-argument is that there is no value in doing scientific research if you don't use the results to influence human choices.

bhupy 6y ago
The counter-counter-argument is that if you don't decouple the "doing of the scientific research" from "influencing human choices", you might compromise the endeavor of scientific research altogether. The same institutions don't need to do both, and that they are separate is usually because "is" questions and "ought" questions are answered via different mechanisms.
- munificent 6y ago
  > The counter-counter-argument is that if you don't decouple the "doing of the scientific research" from "influencing human choices", you might compromise the endeavor of scientific research altogether. I don't disagree with you. Put more concretely, I think we need a blend of: 1. Allowing scientific concensus to influence the choices we make today. We should act on our current best knowledge of the world. 2. Allowing politics and our understanding of what humans need today to influence the way we allocate scientific resources. Critical problems and promising solutions should be given some priority because they have the greatest chance of improving people's lives. 3. Funding "pure" scientific research where we have no idea if it will pan out or not. 2 is biased because we don't have a perfect understanding of what research will pan out. Without some random resource allocation we will only hill-climb to the nearest local maxima of things we know are improvements. Sprinkling some fraction of our resources outside of obvious priorities allows paradigm shifts and serendipity, which are vital for progress on longer timescales. I think a lot of science nerds, especially here, focus on 3, and I agree that it's important and undervalued. But I think it's highly inefficient to only do that. Smart resource allocation does give greater weight to areas with greater probability of success, and to areas that provide the most benefit.

baddox 6y ago

Pretending that something which is unavoidably political is not political will not make that thing less political.