On the fifty year anniversary of Sputnik yesterday, the Center for American Progress launched "Science Progress," a new web and print publication dedicated to science policy. The editor in chief is Jonathan Moreno, a Senior Fellow at CAP and the David and Lyn Silfen University Professor and Professor of Medical Ethics and the History and Sociology of Science at the University of Pennsylvania. His introductory essay is here. It includes a mission statement:
Science Progress proceeds from the propositions that scientific inquiry is among the finest expressions of human excellence, that it is a crucial source of human flourishing, a critical engine of economic growth, and must be dedicated to the common good. Scientific inquiry entails global responsibilities. It should lead to a more equitable, safer, and healthier future for all of humankind.
I also have a contribution to Science Progress that came out yesterday. Fifty years after the launch of Sputnik, I take a look at one major societal change that continues to trouble scientists: a wholesale transformation of the media. After the jump, a longish excerpt:
We've gone from the age of Edward R. Murrow to the age of Bill O'Reilly. And if we seek the reasons that scientists have seen their influence on policy decline--and the gulf between themselves and society widen--we can't neglect that there's been very little adaptation on the part of the scientific community to a radically different, and far more challenging, media environment.Two decades ago we truly had "papers of record." And if you sat down to watch the evening news at 6 p.m., you pretty much had to opt for network news coverage, including coverage of science-related issues that were seriously explored. Today, in contrast, newspapers are struggling, but we have millions of blogs, ideologically driven news outlets matching every political persuasion, hundreds of cable channels, and Google News to sift our headlines.
The consequence is profound: Citizens who don't care about science now don't have to hear about it at all. They don't need to stick their fingers in their ears and go, "la la la." They can simply steer away from that particular channel, or from that particular nook of the Internet. They can just watch the Food Network.
As a result, scientists can no longer assume that a responsible and high-minded media will treat their ideas with the decorum and seriousness they deserve and deliver them up to policymakers and the public for somber consideration. Instead, partisan media will convey diametrically opposed versions of where science actually stands on any contentious subject--even as most of the public (and many policymakers) tune out science more or less completely in favor of entertainment, sports, and other media choices.
The answer for scientists, of course, is to learn something about how to communicate in this new media atmosphere, along the lines that Nisbet-Mooney have suggested.
Of course, as I've written in Seed, it would also be nice to have a president who understands science and can communicate about it. That's why I'm so heartened that the Democratic frontrunner, Hillary Clinton, came out so strongly on the subject yesterday. Her full speech is here, and her science policy proposals are here. Let's just say I'm impressed, and hope to have a more detailed discussion soon. I'll leave you with an excerpt from Hillary's speech:
I have been fascinated by Sputnik ever since I was a little girl and as I have moved on in life and become involved in the public service and public office holding of our nation, I have spent time reflecting on what Sputnik meant and what our nation did in response. Historic decisions were made in the days, months, and years following Sputnik and I think we had a great response as a nation. Less than two weeks after news of Sputnik swept the globe, President Eisenhower called a meeting of his Science Advisory Committee and asked for recommendations. He would come to rely on that panel for unvarnished, evidence-based scientific advice. Shortly after that first meeting, President Eisenhower addressed the nation. It was a sober yet optimistic assessment. Yes, the Soviets had made gains which carried implications for our security and our economy. Yes, we had work to do. But there was no reason to fear, because America, he said, stood at the ready to draw on our "voluntary heroism, sacrifice, and accomplishment when the chips are down." Then we set about proving it.
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Oh, but there's always Alton Brown...
My admiration for Eisenhower grows in retrospect. For example, the following quotation from my review of Paul Dickson's Sputnik: The Shock of the Century reveals that plenty was going on behind the scenes.
I wish we had a choice between candidates like Eisenhower and Stevenson today. Both placed a premium on integrity and public service.
Too many of today's candidates focus on the power of the office. Perhaps that's necessary to get elected. If so, it's a sad commentary on today's electorate. Is that also a consequence of living in the Age of The O'Reilly Factor instead of Murrow's See It Now?
Click my name for the full Sputnik review.
I can agree with Dr. Bortz this.
The 1956 election was the first where I had the opportunity to go over to a neighbor's house so that I could watch at least some of the conventions on the television that was just beginning to make a presence in rural Illinois. The choice of Stevenson and Eisenhower had been very much a back room deal in 1952 and that was repeated in 1956.
I refer back to this because with all of the availability of information today, it seems that we have a less informed electorate. In a paraphrase of Gresham's Law, bad information drives out good information. We have exchanges manipulated opinion for reasoned discourse, easy answers for intellectual curiosity, instant gratification for the satisfaction of work well done.
I don't expect science policy to matter in this campaign, because it has mattered absolutely never in the past. It won't persuade voters to shift allegiance, and I have no sense of whether this is a real priority for Sen. Clinton, or just the current week's focus on the anti-Bush meme she is using pretty effectively. The only way this policy announcement distinguishes her from any of her Democratic competitors is that she mentioned it.
Look at the laundry list of science policy objectives. Those that lead the list are arguably single-issue policy choices, save for the last point about improving innovative capacity. And the last point buys into the myopia Dan Sarewitz noticed when he described that science policy is typically assumed to be science budget policy. It certainly buys into the woefully inadequate linear model of science policy.
Ultimately, nothing new or innovative here, save for a mention of physical science research at the Department of Defense.
I do note, once I scanned all the way down, that she wants to double the NIH budget over 10 years. Given how badly the end of the last doubling has been handled (and how badly the doubling connected to the America COMPETES Act will likely be handled), I'd rather see a commitment to a more regular series of increases above the rate of inflation, so people aren't desperate for grant money after an agency budget doubles. As that requires rational forethought and proper financial planning, I won't hold my breath.
Science at its core is a method to determine the validity of ideas about physical systems. There is no "should" or "why" in science.
Attributing these moral attributes to Science is to fundamentally misunderstand it.
When it gives answers that comport with one's personal views of the world it is embraced. When those answers are less comforting it is questioned or even rejected.
People on all wavelengths of the political spectrum are equally capable of embracing the results they like and turning from those they don't.
As a scientist I am resigned to follow the science. I don't always like what it tells me, but it is better to face a terrible truth than live a beautiful lie. I'm not sure there are significant numbers of people that share my fatalism.
The science policy that matters, whether it is spoken of in this light by the candidates or not, will be energy.
How will our society function when liquid fuels start to become scarcer? And this could easily happen in the next 5 years, not 10, 20, or 30.
No alternatives or combination of alternatives are currently, or within the foreseable future, ready to compensate for the shortfall.
What will happen to transportation and shipping by land, sea, and air? What about agriculture and food distribution? How will we be able to afford to drive to work? Will there be work? What about basic services such as water treatment, access to medical care, waste removal, etc?
What will happen to the financial markets when net available energy begins to decline? Who will be making investments, in what? What challenges will beset the entire financial system?
How expensive will it become to continue efforts to build energy infrastructure for nuclear, wind, and solar, when the cost of energy skyrockets?
How can you reduce CO2 emissions when more coal may desperately be needed for conversion to gasoline?
When prices at the pump hit $5.00, $7.00, or $10.00/gal or more, or some other rationing protocol put in place, self-protection at your local gas station may be a more immediate concern than climate change.
Eric the Leaf,
You continue to raise this important issue, but people here don't respond to it.
Those of us with blogs at www.scienceblog.com would love to have you join us to discuss peak oil. I suggest that you sign up for a blog there and see whether it draws more response than here.
As you noted in an earlier posting, the people who consider Peak Oil as an issue that needs more policy attention recognize that global warming is also an issue. But not vice versa.
The two issues together add up to a need for a well considered energy policy, with plenty of open discussion, i.e., not the Cheney secret-meeting approach.
It's a vital issue that certainly ought to command the interest of those who are interested in the intersection of science and politics. Why should we wait until it becomes politically "hot" when so much can be accomplished before the ideologues get into the act?
Chris has rather modestly not mentioned that Hillary's speech prominently featured the phrase "war on science" (the "Republican" part obviously being inferred from the context). IMHO it's too good of a phrase to not get a lot of use during the general election campaign. This can't be a bad thing for Chris's career.
I predict (not very boldly) that John Holdren will be the next science advisor.
Fred,
Thanks for pursuing this topic here on The Intersection and for your suggestion/invitation to participate in discussion at the Science Blog.
You are correct that my attempt to raise the issue of peak oil with the leadership and readership here at The Intersection has not elicited a response. That is particularly disappointing and, actually, contributes to my level of pessimism about our energy future.
If the issue does not resonate among people knowledgeable enough to take an interest, imagine how poorly prepared the general public will be to process the root causes of events that may unfold in the near future? It provides nearly a blank slate for vested interests to influence opinion and policy, and citizens will have forfeited the ability to influence action and mitigation, to the extent that is possible. Lacking awareness and outreach, people will be blindsided and will lash out or cast blame in inappropriate and counterproductive directions.
While the government has indeed requested and received analyses of peak oil (the GAO study and the Hirsch Report), it has hit the media with all the force and fury of a dull thud. It is of course unlikely that oilmen like Dick Cheney are unaware of the situation. Their strategy? Go to war--to perhaps oversimplify.
One suspicion I entertain is simply that people don't want to hear about peak oil because the message is too dissonant. Or perhaps it's easier to get behind a cause like global warming because the battle lines are more clearly delineated and the research relatively accessible.
My wife recently attended a lecture to city political and business leaders by the Chairman of Shell Oil. She left that meeting disturbed and frightened because the message, portrayed fairly accurately, is that we are clearly in trouble, that our national security is threatened from inside and out, and that we desperately need a national energy policy. Predictably, the chairman suggested that part of that policy would make heavy use of unconventional oil sources (clearly looking for investors and to shape opinion).
Riding the elevator afterwards, my wife wondered to anybody who would listen: "Doesn't it take about the same amount of energy to extract that resource than it produces and isn't it unbelievable polluting." Blank stares and silence. She could have been on The Intersection.