4 ms·

Who is a scientist? If you scope this to PhDs who have done serious research in academia, you pretty much just said "no ex-university career before the age of

by patio11 15y ago

Who is a scientist? If you scope this to PhDs who have done serious research in academia, you pretty much just said "no ex-university career before the age of 40." That is going to make it very hard to develop the networks you'll need to advance up the ranks of either party. You'll also likely require substantial external support for initial campaigns because relative to the lawyers, doctors, businessmen, undertakers, and pilots in your cohort you are, ahem, kinda poor. This would be easier if you had married well, and indeed having the right kind of spouse is a huge asset to your political career, but the academic lifestyle is notorious for inducing prolonged singleness. For a broader definition of scientist which e.g. includes engineers or doctors, Americans elect them quite regularly.

adrianN 15y ago
Then the problem is that your connections are more important in American politics than elsewhere?
gcp 15y ago
Among the 435 members of the House, for example, there are one physicist, one chemist, one microbiologist, six engineers and nearly two dozen representatives with medical training....This showing is sparse even with the inclusion of the doctors, but it shouldn’t be too surprising. The article clearly considers engineers and doctors to be scientists. As it should - they are all well-versed in the scientific method by education and should know how to apply it.
- Maro 15y ago
  My wife is a medical doctor doing a Phd right now. By her own admission, doctors are _not_ well-versed in the scientific method _by education_. The others in her lab are all biologists, and she spent the first year playing catch-up in terms of being able to do science, and says she still feels like she'll always be behind compared to the biologists in the lab who got a regular scientist training in their 5 years at the University. She's certainly being pessimistic though, her lab is headed by a medical doctor... Anyways, my point is, doctors are not trained to be scientists. Disclaimer: This is Hungary. I have four doctors in my close family. I'm a physicist.
  - gcp 15y ago
    Well-versed may be a very relative term. I've been exposed to physics, engineering and computer science. The physicists had the scientific method drilled in deep. The engineers a bit. The computer scientists had vaguely heard about it. We still call them computer scientists. Your wife may suffer from a similar "relative difference". (Coincidentally, I could repeat your story with my wife, who's a computer scientist working for doctors who work with biologists in a lab.) Does a law degree or an MBA cover the "characterize, hypothesize, predict, experiment" cycle?
    - Maro 15y ago
      One thing that comes up again and again is understanding significances, errors and such. This stuff is second nature to a good (and honest) physicist coming out of University, even before he becomes a "pro". In my experience, to a doctor, even a good one, _at first_ it's just an annoying thing they have to do to get published and they don't really understand the significance of significances. (LOL.) I would argue that this type of sensitivity to understanding data should be important if you're running a country. You can't even say that there are underlings for this, because this data is so important, and the possibility of underlings skewing it for whatever reason so sizable, that I certainly would want to have some understanding and feeling for the data before doing a press conference about it or using it to guide my lawmaking.
      - barry-cotter 15y ago
        In my experience, to a doctor, even a good one, _at first_ it's just an annoying thing they have to do to get published and they don't really understand the significance of significances. There is an entire medical discipline that knowingly uses shitty statistics[0]. Then there are the ones who unknowingly use shitty statistics[1]. Absent someone with a qualification that is impossible to get without learning real statistics as a co-author the default when reading medical research should be that the result is either overblown or wrong. Biologists aren't much better than medical doctors, to my knowledge. [0]http://lesswrong.com/lw/72f/why_epidemiology_will_not_correct_itself/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/72f/why_epidemiology_will_not_correc... [1]http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/11/lies-damned-lies-and-medical-science/8269/ http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/11/lies-dam...
arguesalot 15y ago
No they don't the author of the article took that into account. To be clear, that's not an american-only issue, but we need more studies to say whether it is a problem or not.
joejohnson 15y ago
Did you read the whole article? The definition used included engineers and doctors.
blario 15y ago
I think this is close, but the real reason to me is the barrier to entry raised by the current state of campaign finance. Elections are bought today. No caps on spending. No limits on individual contributors. In addition, not just billionaires electing politicians, corporations get to throw in their millions now too. It's worse today than it's ever been before. Gingrich has largely been financed by one guy the past month or so. Romney out spent Gingrich in Florida at least 5 to 1. Current governor of Florida bought his seat. To win today, rich entities have to want you in power. The understanding is that they pay for your allegiance. To get this sponsorship, and NOT be a crook, takes a special person; a true politicker capable of raising the money, keeping them happy enough to sponsor you again the next round, but still work for the citizens of the country as much as possible; rare and difficult. A scientist is not a politicker. Scientists like facts, scientific laws; concrete and measurable realities. Not deception and corruption (manchurian candidates instead of democratic republic). If a scientist was not completely disgusted by the political arena, they would not get far without pretending or actually being bought by some rich entity.

by patio11 15y ago

adrianN 15y ago

Then the problem is that your connections are more important in American politics than elsewhere?

gcp 15y ago

Among the 435 members of the House, for example, there are one physicist, one chemist, one microbiologist, six engineers and nearly two dozen representatives with medical training....This showing is sparse even with the inclusion of the doctors, but it shouldn’t be too surprising. The article clearly considers engineers and doctors to be scientists. As it should - they are all well-versed in the scientific method by education and should know how to apply it.

Maro 15y ago
My wife is a medical doctor doing a Phd right now. By her own admission, doctors are _not_ well-versed in the scientific method _by education_. The others in her lab are all biologists, and she spent the first year playing catch-up in terms of being able to do science, and says she still feels like she'll always be behind compared to the biologists in the lab who got a regular scientist training in their 5 years at the University. She's certainly being pessimistic though, her lab is headed by a medical doctor... Anyways, my point is, doctors are not trained to be scientists. Disclaimer: This is Hungary. I have four doctors in my close family. I'm a physicist.
- gcp 15y ago
  Well-versed may be a very relative term. I've been exposed to physics, engineering and computer science. The physicists had the scientific method drilled in deep. The engineers a bit. The computer scientists had vaguely heard about it. We still call them computer scientists. Your wife may suffer from a similar "relative difference". (Coincidentally, I could repeat your story with my wife, who's a computer scientist working for doctors who work with biologists in a lab.) Does a law degree or an MBA cover the "characterize, hypothesize, predict, experiment" cycle?
  - Maro 15y ago
    One thing that comes up again and again is understanding significances, errors and such. This stuff is second nature to a good (and honest) physicist coming out of University, even before he becomes a "pro". In my experience, to a doctor, even a good one, _at first_ it's just an annoying thing they have to do to get published and they don't really understand the significance of significances. (LOL.) I would argue that this type of sensitivity to understanding data should be important if you're running a country. You can't even say that there are underlings for this, because this data is so important, and the possibility of underlings skewing it for whatever reason so sizable, that I certainly would want to have some understanding and feeling for the data before doing a press conference about it or using it to guide my lawmaking.
    - barry-cotter 15y ago
      In my experience, to a doctor, even a good one, _at first_ it's just an annoying thing they have to do to get published and they don't really understand the significance of significances. There is an entire medical discipline that knowingly uses shitty statistics[0]. Then there are the ones who unknowingly use shitty statistics[1]. Absent someone with a qualification that is impossible to get without learning real statistics as a co-author the default when reading medical research should be that the result is either overblown or wrong. Biologists aren't much better than medical doctors, to my knowledge. [0]http://lesswrong.com/lw/72f/why_epidemiology_will_not_correct_itself/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/72f/why_epidemiology_will_not_correc... [1]http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/11/lies-damned-lies-and-medical-science/8269/ http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/11/lies-dam...

arguesalot 15y ago

No they don't the author of the article took that into account. To be clear, that's not an american-only issue, but we need more studies to say whether it is a problem or not.

joejohnson 15y ago

Did you read the whole article? The definition used included engineers and doctors.

blario 15y ago

I think this is close, but the real reason to me is the barrier to entry raised by the current state of campaign finance. Elections are bought today. No caps on spending. No limits on individual contributors. In addition, not just billionaires electing politicians, corporations get to throw in their millions now too. It's worse today than it's ever been before. Gingrich has largely been financed by one guy the past month or so. Romney out spent Gingrich in Florida at least 5 to 1. Current governor of Florida bought his seat. To win today, rich entities have to want you in power. The understanding is that they pay for your allegiance. To get this sponsorship, and NOT be a crook, takes a special person; a true politicker capable of raising the money, keeping them happy enough to sponsor you again the next round, but still work for the citizens of the country as much as possible; rare and difficult. A scientist is not a politicker. Scientists like facts, scientific laws; concrete and measurable realities. Not deception and corruption (manchurian candidates instead of democratic republic). If a scientist was not completely disgusted by the political arena, they would not get far without pretending or actually being bought by some rich entity.