After eight years of wandering in a wilderness of faith-based misinformation and six-pack-Joe-ism, it appears intelligence, or at least an appreciation of real science, is poised for a return. People will no longer need to hide their copy of Scientific American nor lie about only reading it for the pictures. Abbas Raza, Primary Editor of 3 Quarks Daily, points to Chris Mooney’s optimistic, though caveat laden, article at Slate.
From Slate:
Mission Accomplished
The “war on science” is over. Now what?The “war on science” is over. Or at least it is in the sense that I originally meant the phrase: We’re at the close of the Bush administration’s years of attacks on the integrity of scientific information—its biased editing of technical documents, muzzling of government researchers, and shameless dispersal of faulty ideas about issues like global warming.
The attacks generated dramatic outrage and considerable activism from the traditionally staid science community and the sympathy of politicians like Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. So it’s no great surprise to find the president-elect setting out to restore dignity to the role of science in government. George W. Bush didn’t even bother to name his White House science adviser until well into his first term, and his appointee (physicist John Marburger) didn’t win Senate confirmation until October 2001. In contrast, Obama has already named a Nobel laureate physicist (Steven Chu) to head the Energy Department and a climate specialist and prominent leader of the scientific community, Harvard’s John Holdren, as his Cabinet-level science adviser.
Scientists are ecstatic about these developments and about Obama’s recent promise to listen to them “even when it’s inconvenient—especially when it’s inconvenient.”
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There will be hurdles along the way. Americans are repeatedly being told that science represents an assault on their core beliefs and values. Battles over the relationship between science and religion are newly resurgent, driven in part by the “New Atheism” of Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, and others, and in part by culture warriors on the other side of the aisle who continue to see evolution as a stalking horse for irreligion. If science is ordinarily distant from the lives of ordinary Americans, unending science-religion conflicts can make it seem hostile.
Another hurdle involves not the message but the medium: Newspaper science sections have shrunken or vanished across the nation; on television, real science news has long been struggling, and CNN has let go of its entire science and technology unit. The science blogosphere is, of course, booming—but as media scholars like Matthew Nisbet of American University have observed, the blogs are unlikely to reach very many citizens who aren’t already science lovers. And what would be the effect if the blogs did get to a wider audience? The semi-finalists in the recent “Best Science Blog” of 2008 contest were a site that questions the reality of global warming and PZ Myers’ Pharyngula—ground zero for a potent mix of pro-evolution advocacy and uncompromising criticism of religion.
The un-dumbing-down of America has begun. Hallelujah! Now let’s make sure our schools have the funding and tools they need to help American students catch up. The Washington Post reported that in 2006 American students placed 17th out of 30 industrialized countries in the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) — a measure of scholastic achievement in science and mathematics given every three years. Not a good sign.
Tip: Abbas Raza at 3 Quarks Daily
