Feb 22, 2024 10:23 PM
https://www.irishtimes.com/science/2024/...te-debate/
EXCERPTS (William Reville): Science is based only on evidence and logic. No genuine scientific conclusion can be “good”, “bad”, “sexist”, “racist” etc – only true or false. The PC a priori rejection of scientific investigations on moral grounds is anti-scientific. Science describes the world as it is; PC describes the world as PC thinks it ought to be.
[...] Most people can sympathise with the general motivation of protecting the disadvantaged that underlies political correctness (PC), because it harmonises with traditional concepts of decency and fair play.
However, PC has developed into a bullying tactic, aimed at shutting down all except PC views on various issues and stifling legitimate debate. PC obstructs the self-correcting nature of scientific inquiry as described by Nathan Cofnas in Foundations of Science – Science Is Not Always “Self-Correcting”. Many scientists undertaking research unacceptable to PC activists in areas such as global warming, evolutionary biology, human intelligence, gender studies and more are now subject to harassment.
[...] PC also distorts evolutionary science and intelligence studies, labelling studies indicating innate sex or racial differences between groups as “bad science“. PC judges the quality of such studies solely on the basis of the studies’ conclusions. Indeed, even raising the possibility that such differences could exist is judged to be immoral.
Of course, I’m not saying that everything under the sun is appropriate material for scientific investigation. For example, such areas of research as developing weapons of mass destruction, or new methods of human torture, and more, would rule themselves out on ethical grounds... (MORE - missing details)
EXCERPTS (William Reville): Science is based only on evidence and logic. No genuine scientific conclusion can be “good”, “bad”, “sexist”, “racist” etc – only true or false. The PC a priori rejection of scientific investigations on moral grounds is anti-scientific. Science describes the world as it is; PC describes the world as PC thinks it ought to be.
[...] Most people can sympathise with the general motivation of protecting the disadvantaged that underlies political correctness (PC), because it harmonises with traditional concepts of decency and fair play.
However, PC has developed into a bullying tactic, aimed at shutting down all except PC views on various issues and stifling legitimate debate. PC obstructs the self-correcting nature of scientific inquiry as described by Nathan Cofnas in Foundations of Science – Science Is Not Always “Self-Correcting”. Many scientists undertaking research unacceptable to PC activists in areas such as global warming, evolutionary biology, human intelligence, gender studies and more are now subject to harassment.
[...] PC also distorts evolutionary science and intelligence studies, labelling studies indicating innate sex or racial differences between groups as “bad science“. PC judges the quality of such studies solely on the basis of the studies’ conclusions. Indeed, even raising the possibility that such differences could exist is judged to be immoral.
Of course, I’m not saying that everything under the sun is appropriate material for scientific investigation. For example, such areas of research as developing weapons of mass destruction, or new methods of human torture, and more, would rule themselves out on ethical grounds... (MORE - missing details)
