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There is a very clear trend in the HN crowd's reaction to this statement, so I'm inclined to offer a defense. I'm not linked to Nature in any way, just of a reb

by n4r9 4y ago

There is a very clear trend in the HN crowd's reaction to this statement, so I'm inclined to offer a defense. I'm not linked to Nature in any way, just of a rebellious bent. The principle objections to the guidance appear to fall into the following categories: * They threaten the objectivity of science * They prevent the publication of "heretical"/"non-PC" results * They are too vague I strongly recommend that people read the actual guidelines before forming a strong opinion about the linked statement: https://www.nature.com/nature-portfolio/editorial-policies/ethics-and-biosecurity https://www.nature.com/nature-portfolio/editorial-policies/e... I'd also recommend mulling for a moment on the trade-off between scientific freedom and ethics. Because it has always existed and journals have for a very long time had a position on what is an appropriate trade-off. We've come far since scientists were able to cut live dogs open without anesthetic for their experiments, and that's a good thing. The great majority of the guidelines are in my opinion very specific (as opposed to vague) and relate either to the conduct of the research or to the language of the paper (as opposed to the results of the research). They are geared towards the removal of bias and make reference to guidelines set out by other well-established organisations. Probably the most problematic guideline is this one: > [editors reserve the right to request modifications to] content that undermines - or could reasonably be perceived to undermine - the rights and dignities of an individual or human group on the basis of socially constructed or socially relevant human groupings. I concede that this part requires further refinement, since it looks like it could be used to refuse results that aren't "woke". My good-faith take is that it really means "be careful you don't give matches to the pyromaniac". For example, if you're going to publish a result about substance abuse amongst different demographics, please be very cautious about the risk that certain institutions might use it as a pseudo-justification for persection of minorities. At the end of the day, a journal has a great ethical responsibility for the impact of what it publishes, and is within its rights to say "no" on that basis.

nathanaldensr 4y ago
> At the end of the day, a journal has a great ethical responsibility for the impact of what it publishes, and is within its rights to say "no" on that basis. You state this like it is or should be fact, but this is precisely the problem. Science should be the beginning of a chain starting at knowledge and leading to policy: science -> politics -> policy. It is not the job of scientists to try and predict or assume reactions to science; that partially inverts the flow: politics -> science -> policy. By placing politics first, science becomes politics, as nothing disapproved will reach the science phase of the process.
- n4r9 4y ago
  > Science should be the beginning of a chain starting at knowledge and leading to policy I sympathise with the goal of separating science from cultural politics. It feels like I'm against the tide here but I actually think the great majority of the guidelines strengthen this chain by promoting clarity and eliminating cultural assumptions. For example, specifying that the commonly accepted and/or scientific meanings of words like "sex" and "race" are used, and that the language adheres to bias-free practises. A thought experiment: if you were an editor and received a manuscript which was perfectly fine up until the last line which said "and as well all know, homosexuals are weak-willed sissies", would you still go ahead and publsh if the author completely refused to remove that line?
  - brushfoot 4y ago
    > if you were an editor and received a manuscript which was perfectly fine up until the last line which said "and as well all know, homosexuals are weak-willed sissies", would you still go ahead and publish No, because "weak-willed sissies" is subjective, informal, and indicative of an emotional value judgment in that context. But suppose there were no sensationalism, and the paper instead showed a higher rate of suicidal ideation among trans people. Would that be publishable under the new guidelines? Opponents of the research might argue no, because it suggests trans people to be weak and self-pitying. Proponents might argue yes, because it reveals the oppression of a marginalized group and a societal duty to support them. That's the trouble with conflating "what is" and "what should we do about it" or even "what should we think about it."
    - n4r9 4y ago
      > Opponents of the research might argue no, because it suggests trans people to be weak and self-pitying. That's not a reasonable argument, as suicidal ideation is just as likely influenced by external factors. Is your concern more about the editors abusing their own guidelines in an unreasonable way, rather than the guidelines themselves?
      - 4y ago
Banana699 4y ago
> a journal has a great ethical responsibility for the impact of what it publishes and is within its rights to say "no" on that basis. No. This is really hilarious, but really though, No. The whole point of science is no content-related norms. You can put content-related norms wherever you want. You can put them in your useless HR departments, you can put them in the brainwashing (uh, ahem, "orientation") of new hires. But the moment you start saying "All papers dealing with topic X are refused, regardless of supporting evidence or explanatory\predictive power" then you're literally not doing science. You're playing dress up. Every single philosophy of science from pre-Popper onwards is very clear that good science doesn't give a single shit about the moral content of an idea and how politically-correct it is, only how well supported it is and how elegantly it explains existing data and how accurately it predicts new data. Evolution says you're no better and no worse than rats, who are also your distant cousins btw, neuroscience says that what we call "you" is really just a bunch of electrochemistry that anybody can learn to manipulate and push to do things. Science doesn't give a shit about your panic that somebody can "misinterpret" those results, that's your problem, stop being lazy and find other solutions to it, don't censor science.
- n4r9 4y ago
  I don't feel that the guidelines could or would ban entire topics from being published. Do you have any specific topics in mind?
  - Banana699 4y ago
    Yes, see Monkey Pox. We all know who spreads it, we all know how can this fact be used.
TulliusCicero 4y ago
The whole point of science is to find the truth, not to only find the truths that we feel comfortable with. Of course many scientists throughout history have sucked at that at various times, but that doesn't make it a bad ideal.
JanneVee 4y ago
I read through the guidelines. I'm firmly in the camp that the fundamental ideas of the guidelines stem from ideas that deny the existence of objective shared reality. But science is and always has been the pursuit of knowledge of objective shared reality. The guidelines are antithetical to science.

by n4r9 4y ago

nathanaldensr 4y ago

> At the end of the day, a journal has a great ethical responsibility for the impact of what it publishes, and is within its rights to say "no" on that basis. You state this like it is or should be fact, but this is precisely the problem. Science should be the beginning of a chain starting at knowledge and leading to policy: science -> politics -> policy. It is not the job of scientists to try and predict or assume reactions to science; that partially inverts the flow: politics -> science -> policy. By placing politics first, science becomes politics, as nothing disapproved will reach the science phase of the process.

n4r9 4y ago
> Science should be the beginning of a chain starting at knowledge and leading to policy I sympathise with the goal of separating science from cultural politics. It feels like I'm against the tide here but I actually think the great majority of the guidelines strengthen this chain by promoting clarity and eliminating cultural assumptions. For example, specifying that the commonly accepted and/or scientific meanings of words like "sex" and "race" are used, and that the language adheres to bias-free practises. A thought experiment: if you were an editor and received a manuscript which was perfectly fine up until the last line which said "and as well all know, homosexuals are weak-willed sissies", would you still go ahead and publsh if the author completely refused to remove that line?
- brushfoot 4y ago
  > if you were an editor and received a manuscript which was perfectly fine up until the last line which said "and as well all know, homosexuals are weak-willed sissies", would you still go ahead and publish No, because "weak-willed sissies" is subjective, informal, and indicative of an emotional value judgment in that context. But suppose there were no sensationalism, and the paper instead showed a higher rate of suicidal ideation among trans people. Would that be publishable under the new guidelines? Opponents of the research might argue no, because it suggests trans people to be weak and self-pitying. Proponents might argue yes, because it reveals the oppression of a marginalized group and a societal duty to support them. That's the trouble with conflating "what is" and "what should we do about it" or even "what should we think about it."
  - n4r9 4y ago
    > Opponents of the research might argue no, because it suggests trans people to be weak and self-pitying. That's not a reasonable argument, as suicidal ideation is just as likely influenced by external factors. Is your concern more about the editors abusing their own guidelines in an unreasonable way, rather than the guidelines themselves?
    - 4y ago

Banana699 4y ago

> a journal has a great ethical responsibility for the impact of what it publishes and is within its rights to say "no" on that basis. No. This is really hilarious, but really though, No. The whole point of science is no content-related norms. You can put content-related norms wherever you want. You can put them in your useless HR departments, you can put them in the brainwashing (uh, ahem, "orientation") of new hires. But the moment you start saying "All papers dealing with topic X are refused, regardless of supporting evidence or explanatory\predictive power" then you're literally not doing science. You're playing dress up. Every single philosophy of science from pre-Popper onwards is very clear that good science doesn't give a single shit about the moral content of an idea and how politically-correct it is, only how well supported it is and how elegantly it explains existing data and how accurately it predicts new data. Evolution says you're no better and no worse than rats, who are also your distant cousins btw, neuroscience says that what we call "you" is really just a bunch of electrochemistry that anybody can learn to manipulate and push to do things. Science doesn't give a shit about your panic that somebody can "misinterpret" those results, that's your problem, stop being lazy and find other solutions to it, don't censor science.

n4r9 4y ago
I don't feel that the guidelines could or would ban entire topics from being published. Do you have any specific topics in mind?
- Banana699 4y ago
  Yes, see Monkey Pox. We all know who spreads it, we all know how can this fact be used.

TulliusCicero 4y ago

The whole point of science is to find the truth, not to only find the truths that we feel comfortable with. Of course many scientists throughout history have sucked at that at various times, but that doesn't make it a bad ideal.

JanneVee 4y ago

I read through the guidelines. I'm firmly in the camp that the fundamental ideas of the guidelines stem from ideas that deny the existence of objective shared reality. But science is and always has been the pursuit of knowledge of objective shared reality. The guidelines are antithetical to science.