Here's an interesting example of old and new media; Carl Zimmer has a review of Richard Dawkins' newest book, The Ancestor's Tale, in NYT and a blog post to say things that didn't fit in the print version. It's a review of a book about evolution, in a partially evolved form, one of those missing links so prized when found in the fossil record, like a proto-cetacean with legs not fully readapted to life in the sea after a long evolutionary history on land.

The form is interesting but so is the content. The blog post, The Missing Foe, ruminates about the fact that Dawkins' book didn't mention Stephen J. Gould, his long time antagonist.

Here's the most important thing about The Ancestor's Tale that I couldn't fit in my review. I kept noticing how little Richard Dawkins mentioned the other celebrity evolutionary biologist of our time, Stephen Jay Gould. After all, Gould was a prominent character in many of Dawkins's previous books, cast as the brilliant paleontologist misled by leftist ideology.

Gould was famous for his attacks on adaptationism--the notion that the creative powers of natural selection are behind all sorts of fine points of nature, from jealousy to 11-year cicada cycles. Dawkins was an ultra-Darwinian fundamentalist in Gould's opinion. Gould thought that evolutionary biologists should widen their horizons. They should consider that things that look like adaptations might just be by-products of how organisms develop. They should consider how random catastrophes can override all of natural selection's work, wiping out fit and unfit alike. They should consider how selection may work on many levels--not just with selfish genes, but with populations, and even species. (This was why Gould thought punctuated equilibrium was so important.)

Here are even more fossils to inform the student of evolution, this time shedding some light on a current conflict in science politics. We hear political activists whingeing about politicization of science, and attempting to sell the intellectually and historically bankrupt idea that this is a new phenomenon introduced by the dastardly Bushies, ignoring the evolutionary history of such behavior to claim that it sprang full grown out of the diseased minds of a few hated politicians. Nonsense. As the ancient Dawkins/Gould conflict demonstrates scientists have been politicians forever and their politics skew their science. So does their religion and culture. Duh.

The Dawkins/Gould conflict has particular relevance since many if not all current accusations of politicization are hurled by or reference the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) to which Gould belonged. A scientist widely known for leftist politics so consuming that they became central to his views of scientific issues as well as his professional conduct isn't in an intellectually defensible position to accuse others of politicization. The UCS is a leftist political action group with members that have a long history of politicizing science.

It isn't that the Bushies do not take political factors into consideration in their policies, obviously they do as every political organization does, it's that they are purely and simply political. They are not politicizing science they are, errr, politicizing politics. Duh!

The UCS and it's members are the ones that are more correctly blamed for politicizing science, for skewing science to fit their political views. Only scientists can politicize science. Gould's very public battles with E.O. Wilson in the early days of sociobiology, which Gould and fellow travelers felt weakened their Marxist views of culture, are perhaps the clearest example of the destructive effects of politicized scientists on science. This sort of politicization is a proper concern of scientists as well as the rest of society since it corrupts the foundation of modern civilization. Political disputes about the proper way to integrate science findings with ethics, economics and other disciplines that contribute to policy become more convoluted when the science findings have been skewed, politicized in advance by scientists.

A current example of this is found in the climate change issue, which has been highly politicized since the beginning and become more so over time. A voice of sanity in this dispute, Richard Muller, notes the defects in scientific behavior that have unfortunately become standard practice.

Some people think that science is served by open debate between left-handed and right-handed advocates, just as in politics. But the history of science shows it is best done by people who have two hands each. Present results with caution, and insist on equivocating. Leave it to the president and his advisors to make decisions based on uncertain conclusions. Don’t exaggerate the results. Use both hands. We cannot afford to lower our standards merely because the problem is so urgent.

Politicization of science isn't new and isn't a rare sin committed by only the most debased ideologues, it is standard practice. It is clearly harmful and we would be well served by reform, but few want this to happen. The UCS and those who support the politics of UCS are eager to greatly increase the politicization of science in hopes of advancing their political views. I doubt that this will change, that science can be purged of politicization, but it still seems useful to speak against it, to point and laugh at those who so crassly practice it, and so help in small ways to mitigate the destructive effects of organizations like the UCS and its members.

» Just Ducky from Crumb Trail
A new M&M rant, Quack Science, whinges about the way misinformation from environmental advocacy distorts society and leads to poor decision making. A main factor contributing to doubt about dire predictions of ecological doom is that the claims are so......[read more]
Tracked: October 21, 2004 02:58 PM