Chris Mooney, a political advocate attempting to do politics using science, and hoping to profit from book and article sales pitching red meat to radical paleo-leftists, has a recent post repeating previous nonsense. [via The Loom]

Kurt Gottfried, Chairman of the Union of Concerned Scientists. Gottfried kicked things off by giving the history of the UCS's previous battle with the Bush administration over the issue of science politicization, which occurred earlier this year. He noted that the administration dismissed UCS's charges then, necessitating the group's new investigation and report.

Mooney isn't concerned with science at all, he's merely a Kerry supporter seeking ways to advance his politics and sell his writing. In previous posts, Witch Hunts and Sword Swallowers, he made the same attacks, using the same references from politicized pseudo-science groups such as UCS. As noted in another post, The President's Council, the UCS isn't a respectable apolitical science organization, it is a political advocacy group with such nutters as Paul Ehrlich in lead roles.

The UCS, Mooney and those who support them do science and society a great disservice by attempting to mask their own long standing politicization of science by accusing others of initiating the practice. The sad fact is that the past several decades have seen bad policy enacted based in part on the shrill advocacy of vocal and politically active scientists who gave bad advice to government. This previous post, dnE ehT ... toN, tells part of that history.

Science is politicized and has been so for a long time. It's no where near as bad in the US as it is in Europe and Asia but that's no reason to gloat. Those such as Mooney who are whining now were silent when science was politicized in ways they liked, even though it led to bad policy in important areas such as the environment and health. They are only speaking now for political reasons and that's shameful.

What is needed now is full disclosure of the dirty history of politicized science and the social harm done by the practice. It doesn't matter which political spin was at fault so much as that we recognize and correct the practice. Somebody should write that book instead of yet another tedious political screed attempting to conceal the faults of one side while trumpeting those of the other. A possible benefit of an intellectually honest public debate would be to restore some of the lost credibility of both the science and political establishments which are coming to be held in the same regard as journalism.

This is important stuff. We really do need to name and shame those such as Mooney that perpetuate the nastiness. Policy based on useful and honest science is perhaps more important now than ever as we face significant threats. It probably looks the same in each era, everybody sees their own age as important, but that doesn't diminish the importance of doing right and doing well in this age.

» Just For Drill from Crumb Trail
There's another seemingly futile post at M&M attempting to inject a little bit of honesty into the politicized science wars. What is needed now is full disclosure of the dirty history of politicized science and the social harm done by the practice. It......[read more]
Tracked: July 8, 2004 04:33 PM