Re: "Political Correctness" drives scientific errors

From: tadchem (tadchemNOSPAM_at_comcast.net)
Date: 03/20/05 

Date: Sun, 20 Mar 2005 12:15:50 -0500

"OG" <owen@gwynnefamily.org.uk> wrote in message
news:423ce43a$0$10939$cc9e4d1f@news-text.dial.pipex.com...

> As regards the "alarms => grants" claim.
> Ah, if only it were so - it is well known that it is very difficult to
> raise grants to investigate 'suspected' hazards. You are a chemist,
> surely you know about this. The world splits into two camps - if there
> is big money involved, then hazards have to be proven *unambiguously*;
> whereas if there is no big money involvement, then the precautionary
> principal is involved "we cannot allow any risk", which (strangely)
> often works in the favour of big money.

Agreed, one often finds a dollar sign in the pilot's seat. Sometimes,
however, the connection is disguised. The original work in the 70's and
80's that fingered duPont's Freon brand products as culprits in the
destruction of stratospheric ozone was funded by duPont itself.
Interestingly, the work was published shortly before duPont's patents on CFC
production methods were due to expire, and the production processes passed
into the public domain. This was done in time for regulators to respond to
the inevitable public outcry against CFCs with a ban. Equally interesting is
the fact that duPont started developmental work on HCFC production processes
(on which they currently hold a patent-protected monopoly) almost at the
same time as they started the research on the adverse impacts of CFCs. Now
duPont is getting rich from 'CFC alternatives'.

Isn't it interesting that the exhaust from a coal-fired power plant is more
strongly radioactive than the environment of a nuclear power plant?
http://www.ornl.gov/info/ornlreview/rev26-34/text/colmain.html

> > > Get a copy of the 5th March New Scientist
> >
> > Not the most reliable of sources. It rates about even with Scientific
> > American and TV Guide for reliability in reporting.
>
> Did you read the article?

Frankly, no. I do not choose to subscribe to New Scientist. I do subscribe
to Science through my AAAS membership.

> > The opinions of a professional crafter of fiction are to be given more
> > weight than a critical analysis of the research reports because...?
>
> Absolutely no reason that I can think of, but there are plenty of people
> who think otherwise.

Fortunately for us the scientific method does not make decisions
democratically. Democracy (the collective consent of a large number of
people) only enters into the process in deciding which questions are going
to get the attention required for empirical testing and either validation or
contradiction.

> Understandably, people's natural inclination is to give a stronger
> weighting to 'evidence' that supports their own view. As you have
> identified, this unfortunately gives opportunities for cheats and
> fraudsters; hence the importance of picking up unconscious bias or
> mistaken assumptions.

The epitaph for Dan Rather's career...

> As regards the NS article, the author was commenting on how people pick
> up strange misunderstandings of historical events.

Much of what we hear about is filtered through the biases of the popular
press. Frankly, I had hard that Greenpeace was actively protesting French
atomic tests in the South Pacific, but I had not heard of a sinking or a
fatality in connection with that.

> As I implied earlier, if you know your audience you can make claims that
> go unexamined because they match the preconceptions of the audience.

Nobody questions anything that *confirms* their beliefs.

> You seem to be treating commercial and political interests as though
> they were separate here.

Often they are, but not always. If they were not separate, there would be
no need for the public spectacle of elections, there would be no lobbying
groups, no political fund-raisers. Washington DC would become a ghost town
as all significant decisions could be made by teleconferencing, and the Wall
Street Journal would be published by the Government Printing Office.

> I wasn't aware we had a certification system for biased work - just so
> we know whether it is competent and honest.

All work is, to some extent, biased. All work must be reviewed and, when
possible, replicable. There is nothing wrong with the concept of
certification of biased work. The bias should never infringe on the
competence, the honesty, or the replicability of the work. 'Cold fusion'
and 'memory water' are recent examples whre the bias became excessive.

> All science is subject to critical analysis. It is possible (in fact it
> is necessary) to treat all science as provisional and unconfirmed -

agreed

> However, this doesn't mean that you can dismiss it if it produces
> results that are capable of independent verification and consistent with
> other results.

Is this what you really meant to say? I (and all honest scientists) feel
that if the results are independently verifiable and consistent with other
results, they shoud NOT be dismissed.

> Big money's trick is to claim that the 'provisional and
> unconfirmed' status means that it cannot stand in the way of commercial
> and political interests.

You may be misinterpreting the position of 'big money' (whomever you define
them to be). Consider that you have megabucks of discretionary funds to
invest. You have a choice of investing in a small improvement in current
technology which will guarantee a small but certain profit, or a
'provisional and unconfirmed' new technology which *may* produce a profit,
maybe even a *larger* profit, but there is no guarantee, and you might also
lose your investment with nothing to show for it. What are you going to say
to the stockholders?

> Since 'medical studies' was the original subject of the article, you
> seem to be keen to assert that climate research and environmentalism are
> subject to the same effect

Yes.

> - i.e. that any claim will generate healthy
> research grants.

You have overgeneralized my position. I specifically used the word "alarm."
The claims that generate research funduing are generally the most *alarming*
claims. Few people will care if an exotic species of frog shows up in
Florida swamps, but if you use words that have been pre-loaded with
emotional content - words such as 'mercury' or 'arsenic' or 'radioactive' or
'extinction' or 'catastrophe' or 'AIDS' - then you are almost guaranteed
attention by the press, the public, and the lawmakers - in that order.

> Have you spoken to many climate researchers and general
> environmentalists about this, or is this just your prejudice?

It is my (admittedly unsystematic) assessment of which fields are
*currently* receiving gobs of research funding consequently to raining loud
alarm bells. In previous eras the same phenomenon has held in other fields,
as the whims of public attention required. Nobody worries about being
buried alive any more - a major concern in Victorian England.

> I also
> note that you make no claim about any other area of research, are they
> totally or partially exempt from the same "alarm => grant" effect? Some
> unconscious bias there perhaps?

No bias there. My brief listing was intended to be illustrative, not
exhaustive.

Very few other fields are effectively ringing the alarms, although tsunami
warning systems have been getting a lot of attention since Christmas.
Personally I would like to see more money going to active seismic monitoring
systems for the island of La Palma,
http://www.drgeorgepc.com/TsunamiMegaEvaluation.html
discovering and tracking near-earth asteroids
http://neat.jpl.nasa.gov/
detailed study of the Yellowstone caldera with an objective of predicting
future activity
http://vulcan.wr.usgs.gov/Volcanoes/Yellowstone/framework.html
and research into the multiple and various *causes* for the two most
incapacitating (but non-fatal) diseases affecting modern society - allergies
and obesity.

Each of these fields of study *could* be ringing alarms quite loudly, but
they are not, and they don't get the grant money.

These priorities were selected because they will or could produce
significant benefits for the maximum number of people - hundreds of
millions. The first three reference events that could kill literally
hundreds of millions of people, but which could have the deaths averted by
foreknowledge and planning.

Tom Davidson
Richmond, VA

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