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> Attempts to scientifically “rationalize” policy, based on the belief that science is purified of politics, may be damaging democracy. Could anyone explain to

> Attempts to scientifically “rationalize” policy, based on the belief that science is purified of politics, may be damaging democracy. Could anyone explain to me what the phrase "may be damaging democracy" means? I've been hearing it a lot over the last several years, and I've been wondering what democratic ideal people who use this phrase have in mind. It looks as if independent opinion-making based on one's trusted sources "may be damaging democracy", because most of us are not equipped to identify fake news; open and free exchange of opinions on social media "may be damaging democracy" for the same reason plus due to the tendency of falling into warring tribes; and now this tagline from the article claims that bowing to the experts may also be damaging democracy. Is there anything that doesn't, and what does it all mean?

CapmCrackaWaka 5y ago
I take it to mean damaging to democratic countries or, in a more abstract sense, damaging to the credibility of the democratic form of government in general. A good example of this is the current effectiveness of disinformation in democratic societies. Authoritarian countries do not suffer nearly as greatly from this.
- azangru 5y ago
  So, instead of the abstract textbook word "democracy" one could rephrase this more concretely as "damaging to the present political situation in our country"? When put like this, this statement sounds truly conservative (small c, no necessary relation to parties); but I am hearing this phrase from people who are fine with the disruption of the political arena in the name of what they consider to be progress.
tgv 5y ago
> damaging democracy IMO, it means something like undermining the trust in elected government and law makers. There's a lot of policy making for which there's no solid evidence, because –crudely said– social sciences are far too sloppy. However, I don't think much policy is based on it. But in the public on-line debate (whether that's run by trolls or not), many appeal to science in their arguments. Perhaps that has some impact? The article itself has the same vibe as online debates. The first example of biased science is medical experiments using men, and some totally unnecessary anthropomorphization of the reproductive process, which sounds more like virtue signalling than pertaining to the topic. Whorff-Sapir like arguments complete the picture. Other arguments in the article point out that scientists can have a rather limited vision, resulting in sub-optimal solutions. But as I said above, I don't think much policy making is largely based on science, and the examples given point as much in the direction of tunnel vision by policy makers as the scientists they consult. > Is there anything that doesn't Where trust is absent, everything appears hostile. That would make a good Latin fake quote...
benlivengood 5y ago
A practical example are the Jan 6 riots in DC and the attacks on the integrity of voting. Both peaceful transitions of power and trustworthy elections are bedrocks of democracy and so attacking them weaken democratic societies. At some point a coup succeeds and democracy is dead.
- azangru 5y ago
  Weren't the rioters convinced that they were saving the democracy that was about to be undermined by what they considered to be a stolen election? If so, weren't they participating in the democracy? As a thought experiment, consider protests against fraudulent elections in other countries (Russia and Belarus come to mind, but I am sure I saw some other countries in newspaper headlines recently). Would you consider those protests to be an exercise in democracy?
  - speeder 5y ago
    What saddens me about that business, is that the criticism against certain voting machine companies in the US is considered "anti-democratic conspiracy theories" while the same criticism against the very same companies in other countries is considered "pro-democratic". The thing is, these companies are running the elections like a black box, Princeton University already has shown it is easy to hack Diebold machines for example, and we had very suspicious cases in other countries (for example voting machines in a state election in Brazil registered more votes than voters, and the amount of "invalid" votes, absentees and "blank" votes were all identical, when someone asked for a recount the response of the government was to say the machines must be trusted and fine the shit out of the candidate that complained, for "education purposes.")
  - benlivengood 5y ago
    Democracies don't die from a single stolen election. The remedy is in the courts to determine if the election was stolen and then in the legislature to fix whatever problems allowed it. Convincing people that democracies must be saved by violent revolt is what kills democracy. The true enemy is lawlessness, not the other half of the country. Fraudulent elections are happening in countries that are, in fact, no longer democracies and have not been for some time. I'm open to arguments that the U.S. is no longer a functioning democracy, but the ability to still have mostly peaceful transitions of power and for election audits to come back clean reassures me a little bit.

CapmCrackaWaka 5y ago

I take it to mean damaging to democratic countries or, in a more abstract sense, damaging to the credibility of the democratic form of government in general. A good example of this is the current effectiveness of disinformation in democratic societies. Authoritarian countries do not suffer nearly as greatly from this.

azangru 5y ago
So, instead of the abstract textbook word "democracy" one could rephrase this more concretely as "damaging to the present political situation in our country"? When put like this, this statement sounds truly conservative (small c, no necessary relation to parties); but I am hearing this phrase from people who are fine with the disruption of the political arena in the name of what they consider to be progress.

tgv 5y ago

> damaging democracy IMO, it means something like undermining the trust in elected government and law makers. There's a lot of policy making for which there's no solid evidence, because –crudely said– social sciences are far too sloppy. However, I don't think much policy is based on it. But in the public on-line debate (whether that's run by trolls or not), many appeal to science in their arguments. Perhaps that has some impact? The article itself has the same vibe as online debates. The first example of biased science is medical experiments using men, and some totally unnecessary anthropomorphization of the reproductive process, which sounds more like virtue signalling than pertaining to the topic. Whorff-Sapir like arguments complete the picture. Other arguments in the article point out that scientists can have a rather limited vision, resulting in sub-optimal solutions. But as I said above, I don't think much policy making is largely based on science, and the examples given point as much in the direction of tunnel vision by policy makers as the scientists they consult. > Is there anything that doesn't Where trust is absent, everything appears hostile. That would make a good Latin fake quote...

benlivengood 5y ago

A practical example are the Jan 6 riots in DC and the attacks on the integrity of voting. Both peaceful transitions of power and trustworthy elections are bedrocks of democracy and so attacking them weaken democratic societies. At some point a coup succeeds and democracy is dead.

azangru 5y ago
Weren't the rioters convinced that they were saving the democracy that was about to be undermined by what they considered to be a stolen election? If so, weren't they participating in the democracy? As a thought experiment, consider protests against fraudulent elections in other countries (Russia and Belarus come to mind, but I am sure I saw some other countries in newspaper headlines recently). Would you consider those protests to be an exercise in democracy?
- speeder 5y ago
  What saddens me about that business, is that the criticism against certain voting machine companies in the US is considered "anti-democratic conspiracy theories" while the same criticism against the very same companies in other countries is considered "pro-democratic". The thing is, these companies are running the elections like a black box, Princeton University already has shown it is easy to hack Diebold machines for example, and we had very suspicious cases in other countries (for example voting machines in a state election in Brazil registered more votes than voters, and the amount of "invalid" votes, absentees and "blank" votes were all identical, when someone asked for a recount the response of the government was to say the machines must be trusted and fine the shit out of the candidate that complained, for "education purposes.")
- benlivengood 5y ago
  Democracies don't die from a single stolen election. The remedy is in the courts to determine if the election was stolen and then in the legislature to fix whatever problems allowed it. Convincing people that democracies must be saved by violent revolt is what kills democracy. The true enemy is lawlessness, not the other half of the country. Fraudulent elections are happening in countries that are, in fact, no longer democracies and have not been for some time. I'm open to arguments that the U.S. is no longer a functioning democracy, but the ability to still have mostly peaceful transitions of power and for election audits to come back clean reassures me a little bit.