cheap pandora earrings,What science can and cannot

But whilst science is sallying forth into areas that traditionally has been felt outside its reach, it has also been having something of a crisis of confidence in its customary function of understanding and explaining the natural world. Scandals such as “climate-gate”, and others in the biological sciences,cheap Christian Louboutin shoes, have cast doubt on the impartiality of peer review and the strength of some data. Other scientific institutions have been unable to stand up for scientific truth in debates such as those surrounding the MMR vaccine and GM crops. More broadly,http://www.daveandray.com/photogalle....php?pos=-1352, many working in science feel themselves under attack from a climate of pseudoscience and irrationality.
This simultaneous over-claiming and diminished confidence is a dangerous trend,Christian Louboutin Sandals sale, confusing the objective natural world, which scientific experimentation is exceptionally adept at uncovering,http://mochizuki.la.coocan.jp/mochiz....html#comments, with the inter-personal subjective world of politics and morality, which has to be understood in its own terms. Although evidence can obviously help inform decisions, when politicians replace ideology and conviction with “scientific evidence”, they both find a convenient means of sidestepping uncomfortable political arguments, and also undermine science itself by politicising it.
All sides weaken science’s objectivity in this attempt to co-opt science for political ends, and equally remove the public from the realm of political debate and discussion by trying to turn it into an “experts-only” affair. Science shouldn’t try and bolster itself by trying to tell us what to do; it can only tell us what is, not what ought to be.
Throughout October and November, The Independent Online is partnering with the Battle of Ideas festival to present a series of guest blogs from festival speakers on the key questions of our time.

Scientific institutions themselves are even getting in on the act: the Royal Society has recently instituted an enquiry into the thornily political issue of alleged over-population. It’s not just politics; the more esoteric areas of morality and religion that have come under the sway of science in recent years. Earlier this year physicist Steven Hawking was reported as saying that science had disproved the existence of God. Likewise, philosopher Sam Harris has suggested that morality can be understood through neuroscience and evolutionary theory.
Robin Walsh is a freelance writer on healthcare and the pharmaceutical industry. He is currently training to be a doctor, and previously worked in medical communications. He produced the Battle of Ideas debate What science can and cannot tell us on Sunday 31 October.
The Nutt affair took place as a result of this confusion; the government’s supposed reliance on “evidence” meant that it couldn’t just say that their moral opposition to illegal drugs trumped the facts of their relative harms,http://www.goldfashion.hk/bbs/viewth...%3D1&frombbs=1, and had to attack David Nutt and deny his research’s scientific legitimacy, whilst Nutt himself has (politically) demanded restrictions on alcohol on the basis of his calculations. Likewise, the damage that climate science has sustained in recent months is due to both sides using it as a proxy for their political disagreements. Climate sceptics slam the science rather than argue against green politics,cheap pandora sets, and the IPCC feels unable to admit uncertainty in its predictions on the off-chance that it will give political ammunition to its opponents.
Politicians and activists of all stripes agree that “The Science” is a trump card in any debate,cheap pandora earrings, and scrap over what the data shows rather than points of principle. Pro-life and pro-choice advocates argue more over foetal pain and viability than women’s rights or when life begins; Climate activists cite their “peer reviewed” status, and both Ian Duncan Smith’s family values agenda and New Labour’s Sure Start are conveniently supported by “the neuroscience”. Similarly,http://www.khamanigriffin.com/galler...ge.php?pos=-56, although Professor David Nutt was sacked for criticising government drugs policy a year ago,http://blog.paltalk.com/paltalkpress....html#comments, all sides in the drugs debate like to cite statistics rather than take a principled approach in their advocacy of prohibition or liberalisation of drugs and alcohol.
Tagged in: Battle of Ideas, David Nutt, New Labour, Sam Harris, science,cheap pandora bracelets, Steven Hawking
Recent Posts on Battle of Ideas An Unenthusiast Writes: AV, I supposeWhat does it mean to be a liberal today?Where do fathers fit?What makes life sacred?Behind closed doors: privacy vs transparency?
Science clearly plays a key role in modern society. It was one of the few areas spared drastic cuts in George Osbourne’s spending review, after having provoked hundreds of scientists to take to the streets the week previously under the slogan “Science is Vital”. But there’s something more to the current debate than the traditional support for scientific R&D. Indeed, it would have been embarrassing for a government of any colour to cut back the science budget given the increasing importance that politicians claim to place on science in their decision making – so called “Evidence-Based Policy”.