Cake taken
Yesterday the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists moved the hands of its Doomsday Clock two minutes closer to midnight. Their press release explains:
By moving the hand of the Clock closer to midnight — the figurative end of civilization — the BAS Board of Directors is drawing attention to the increasing dangers from the spread of nuclear weapons in a world of violent conflict, and to the catastrophic harm from climate change that is unfolding.
By way of response, the editorial in The Australian today takes the cake for sheer ideological blather.
With the hysterical headline “Scientists turn back clock on progress”, the editorial opens with the oh-so-clever one-liner:
According to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, it is now five minutes to midnight and any moment now the planet will turn into a pumpkin.
Tee hee, that one’s worthy of Tim Blair. Those Oz editorialists clearly must have a finger on the pulse of the zeitgeist. (Lips pressed to the Prime Minister’s bum, more like ... but I digress...)
The writer goes on to declare that “speaking truth to power”
... is the last thing scientists should be doing. Rather than complaining to politicians or hectoring the public, if the scientific community sees threats to humanity it should lock itself up in a lab and come up with solutions. High-profile scientists have no more credibility when it comes to politics and sociology than other celebrities who think that success in one field of endeavour equates to expertise in others.
So, it seems that scientists have no business engaging in civil discourse. Period. Their voices are to be banished from the social sphere, and their brains relegated to the lab where they might stand a chance of doing some good. Oh alright, perhaps if they behave themselves we might let them out to vote every 3 or 4 years.
Can that writer really be serious about equating “high-profile scientists” with “other celebrities”? Astonishingly, the writer then goes on to assert that “the resetting of the doomsday clock is symptomatic of a broader rejection of science and reason that is taking place across Western society.”
As if shutting out the voices of distinguished authorities in their fields represents a fervent embrace of science and reason?
One wonders just whom this writer believes should have the function of “speaking truth to power”. Presumably the Oz editorialists would shunt themselves to the top of the list.
The hubris and arrogance of these Gatekeepers knows no bounds.
posted by Jacob A. Stam at 1/19/2007 10:53:00 PM
5 Comments:
Five minutes to midnight isn't too bad, so they're rather over the top.
Isn't two minutes to midnight the worst it has been?
One minute to midnight would give cause for concern.
Over the history of the clock, five minutes is about average, I would have thought.
Scientists should stay out of everything. Leave it to amatuers; they do such a terrific job.
Hmm. A point that might have been stressed more in this piece is that a multitude of voices, whether 'expert' or 'amateur' or whatever, should be welcomed in a so-called modern, pluralist society. The Oz editorialists seem to think that only unambiguously rosy views of the world should be permitted. I think the Murdochian consensus demands that 'negative' influences be expunged from public dialogue, perhaps because 'negativity' has a deleterious effect on consumer confidence and prerogatives, etc.
I was being sarcastic; okay, not my "best" sarcastic swipe for the year, but the year is still young!
Science is still the only thing we have going for us in relation to understanding many things, but let's not pretend it's always neutral (it almost never is), and let's not pretend that politics, culture and social forces do not feed directly into the scientific vein, and vice versa.
Telling scientists to "keep out of it" is akin to declaring enormous pride in keeping and nuturing one's ignorance.
Yes, let's not be "negative", because, gee, gosh, it's so negative!
It's a view that assumes a gross stupidity on the part of the unwashed masses, really.
Sorry, I did get the sarcasm, was just preoccupied with that angle I was, er, preoccupied with.
Yeah, the unspoken assumption of 'stupidity' of ordinary people is quite common with agenda monkeys. What it really betokens is anxiousness that ordinary folk might come to the 'wrong' conclusions.
Hence the apparent necessity to ramp up the hype: These goddam delinquent scientists want to turn back the clock on progress, they broadly reject science and reason, they're just jumped up celebrities who ought to be interned in laboratory camps etc etc etc.
Yep, thanks guys. Always a bloody crisis with these thought nannies.
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