Bush's Lysenkoism. The Bush administration's Lysenkoism. Mark Kleiman directs us to this analysis of the Bush administration by Winston Smith. He could have added a lot more examples from economic and social policy as well. The basic attitude seems to be, "There are people who say they are experts on both sides, so who the hell knows? Let's claim this is true: it will satisfy the Base." Science and the Postmodern Presidency [This post by CalPundit prompted me to post this, a shorter version of a longer piece I've been fiddling around with.] 'Lysenkoism' is a vague term for a complex and fuzzy phenomenon. Roughly and for my purposes here, to engage in Lysekoism is to distort science in order to bring it into line with political orthodoxy. (A) It is well-known (though not well enough known) that the Bush administration is Lysenkoist, though it isn't often put in those terms. This administration has suppressed or distorted scientific conclusions about - among many other topics - global warming, the effectiveness of abstinence-only sex education, drilling in the ANWR, and air quality in Manhattan after 9/11 in order to force science to conform (or appear to conform) to the administration's antecedently-accepted political beliefs.... [Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal (2004)]

The Adminstration's need to make the facts fit the dogma makes me mad. It also scares me. Tremendously. The world is a very complex place, where you absolutely require the best information in order to make correct decisions. As a scientist, I know howw easy it is to fool yourself. If the information is tainted, if it is distorted, the decisions will be also. If this continues, there will likely be a horrible series of decisions made by people who hold their hands on the greatest military might every assembled. We may soon wonder why we have so few friends left. Fear will do that. Fear of a poorly informed giant with more atomic weapons, WMDs, soldiers, money and power than every seen on Earth. Power substantially less that this has corrupted every other society in human history. We should rightly fear such power, instead of embrace it as this Administration does, instead of using it to twist and distort facts and make them lies. The easy ability of these men to do this with science, the one hope we have of making it through the next century, makes me afraid. The Apocalypse could really be what some of the people actually want to force.  11:30:32 PM    

NCSU Libraries cancel Elsevier contract. News Out of NC says Students and faculty using electronic journals for research this semester may find limited accessibility. The NCSU libraries, along with the rest of the Triangle Research Libraries Network (TRLN), have decided not to renew their contract with Reed-Elsevier, which provided member universities with electronic access to journals published under the Elsevier Science imprint. According to the memo written to faculty members of all three schools, a new contract with Elsevier would have locked the TRLN libraries into an inflexible collection policy, because Elsevier insisted that the individual libraries commit to a policy of zero cancellations over the life of the license. The financial constraints of such a contract would have required the universities to cancel subscriptions to journals from other publishers and in alternate disciplines. [LISNews.com]

Elsevier seems to be coming under a lot of pressure from university libraries. I love the zero cancellation policy. They include a number of their 'less popular' titles if you want to get access to their 'popular' ones. Seems to be a sure way to make them all unpopular. Elsevier may have to find a different business model.  10:52:06 PM    

The Paper Chase. An Alternet article by Monte Paulsen of the Dragonfly Review of Books discussing the impact of publishers not using recycled paper.

Ninety-five percent of the paper on which U.S. books are printed is made from virgin fiber. That added up to almost a million tons of paper in 2001, according to the American Forest and Paper Association. This shameful story brightened just a bit during 2003, when one edition of "Harry Potter and the Order Of the Phoenix" was released on recycled paper. British author J.K. Rowling asked that her bestselling novels be produced on recycled paper. Her American publisher, Scholastic Inc., ignored her request. (Apparently, Scholastic's mission to "educate, entertain and motivate children" does not include enlightening them about real-world woodlands.) But Rowling's Canadian publisher behaved like a wizard. Vancouver-based Raincoast Books released "Order of the Phoenix" on 100-percent post-consumer recycled paper. [LISNews.com]

I think I will buy any new Potter books from Canada, rather than Scholastic Books.   10:48:58 PM    

Replacing Science with Politics: Peer Review Endangered

12:51:06 AM    

Cut From A Single Cloth

The final version eliminates the conclusion that healthcare disparities are 'national problems.' The scientists' draft found that 'racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic disparities are national problems that affect health care at all points in the process, at all sites of care, and for all medical conditions - in fact, disparities are pervasive in our health care system."'The final version states only that "some socioeconomic, racial, ethnic, and geographic differences exist.'

Bruce voices some of my concerns and gives a great quote from Jacob Bronowski's book, Science and Human Values. Lies hurt us all, even if they are for a 'good' purpose. Here is how he ends the piece, with a passion not usually seen in a man of science:

This is exactly why they hate science. Lies are what brought them to power. Lies are what hope will keep them in power. Lies, and whatever fear of their power they can manage to instill in others. Theirs is the morality of thugs and criminals. The practice of science represents everything they loath and fear and resent about the human status, that they themselves have long since renounced. It empowers, because knowledge is power, whereas in their zero sum view of life and existance, any power gained by others, is less for themselves. Science proceeds from the evidence, not the dictates of authority. Science is a noble endevor, encouraging and rewarding the best within us, curiosity, thoughtfulness, a desire to learn, a courage to follow knowledge wherever it leads, a habit of truth. More then the contradictions to their cherished dogmas, it is the vision of the nobility which is possible to the human race, reminding the thugs and cheats of the world of what they sold out, of the empty void they've made of their inner selves, that they hate about the practice of science. It's not just that they want the facts bent to suit their policies, it's that they want practice of science to be finally regarded as the heresy they have always regarded it as being: the heresy that says there is more to life, and to what it is to be human, then the gutter they live in.

This was written on Wednesday. He found out on Friday that the Hubble was to be forgotten. I do not think this will be the end of the cuts on science at NASA. I do not think it will be the end of cuts in science in other areas of the government where truth conflicts with ideology. It seems that every time this Adminstration comes out with a plan that nominally does X, it really is set up to do not-X.  12:08:05 AM