Judging the Secular Shamans
David Oderberg is a friend of mine from the UK and is a philosophy professor at Reading University. In this splendid column published in the San Francisco Chronicle, Oderberg takes on the worrisome trend in which many in society treat scientists as if they were priests. One cause of this phenomenon, as I have written, is that for some, science is morphing into scientism. In other words, science is seen as an ends rather than a means, a belief system rather than a technique for obtaining knowledge. Some people who have rejected religion (and some who haven't)look now to science for Truth (with a capital T), which science is incapable of providing.
Referring to the fraud that has recently come to light, Oderberg writes, "It's all very well having secular shamans, but when they're caught cooking the holy books once too often, the faithful start to get worried."
Oderberg also calls for a "separation from science and state."
"It may be inviting poison e-mails to say it, but I venture to suggest that contemporary science is now so corrupted by the lust for loot and glory that nothing less than root-and-branch reform can save it. For a start, although I distance myself wholly from his anti-rationalism and methodological anarchy, I share the late philosopher of science Paul Feyerabend's demand for a separation of science and state, or at the very least a radical curtailment of public financial sponsorship of scientific research. How could the millions thrown at scientists be anything other than a veritable inducement to misconduct? When you combine it with the innumerable honors and awards that await the next would-be secular savior of humanity, one wonders that fraud is not even more common than it appears to be."
I don't necessarily agree with removing public funding from science. (I do think that when public funding leads to remunerative patents and products, the public should receive some sort of return for their investment.) But, Oderberg is onto something important. Look around at the embryonic stem cell field. Can there be any doubting that the funding issue has sparked an hysteria among the science community and chamber of commerce type advocates?
He closes with a well-deserved slam against the California Center for Regenerative Medicine, the campaign for which (Proposition 71) had its own problems with integrity:
"It would be an act of utter folly and of contempt for honesty and integrity were Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's beloved California Institute for Regenerative Medicine now to go ahead. Were a bishop to be caught doctoring the Gospels, I doubt any scientists would be rushing to approve the Church's latest request for help to build a new cathedral. Why it should be any different for the secular bishops of science is difficult to discern."
Check Oderberg out. His opinion is well worth pondering.
posted by Wesley J. Smith @ 1:43 PM
4 Comments
4 Comments:
Reminds me of Lewington's book (Harvard bio-chair) called "Biology as Ideology."
Of course Lewington is a rational and devout Atheist, but at least he sees the abuse and subterfuge entwined in the psychology of academia today.
Regarding public funding, it's a tough call. I'm a grad student in an embryology lab (fish embryos) and we're just getting off the ground. Funding is not, how do you say it, easy to get? Especially since the NSF and NIH have been on a budget freeze, only the top 15% of grants get funded (RO-1 federal grants) and the evaluations of how the investigators use the money after they win the award
Man is of course weak, and with this growing ideology placing the P-H-D above the G-O-D, scientists do fudge and lie in order to get better publications and funding. But I don't think it's exactly limited to the embryonic stem cell areas of research.
Course, having said that, I have absolutely no idea what a good solution would be. The peer-review process is bogged down in non-disclosures, patent protection and out-right distrust in a lot of publication reviews (from what I hear) - the upshot being that a lot of times the reviews for Science and Nature papers as well as the editors are only seeing the bare-necessary data to make some dramatic and important scientific observation. This mentality leads to a lot of errors, but I'm not sure that if they did an exhaustive review of every publication submitted that they'd be financially viable.
Oops, I see right under this post that you acknowledge the fact that the dishonesty in the system extends beyond ESC research.
Your points about peer review are well taken. That is why I think there should be a review within the science community, and perhaps by government, to see what needs fixing and how to best go about it. Quality peer review is essential to the advancement of science and to help advise on appropriate public policies. If it needs fixing, we had better figure out what needs to be improved and how to go about it. Thanks for visiting Secondhand Smoke.
Reminds me of the Know-nothings' campaign to seize control of the construction of the Washington Monument, in order to stop it.
Oderburg's comments simply are off the mark with regard to American government funding of science. Does he seriously call for an end to the campaigns against influenza? Does he seriously think we can afford to defund the war on cancer? Does he think the work of the National Institutes of Health unworthy? Has he ever bothered to look at the careful and high standards required for research money from the National Science Foundation or the National Institutes of Health?
The Know-nothings were eventually ousted from power, and the Washington Monument was completed. Their achievements? They succeeded in allowing the prices to rise to finish the monument, and they managed to dump the memorial stone to Washington offered by the Pope, into the Potomac River.
That's the legacy Oderburg offers us, to lose stones in the river. Feh.
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