Thread Rating:
  • 0 Vote(s) - 0 Average
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5

The Anti-Science Movement is Escalating, and Killing Millions

#1
Leigha Offline
Antiscience has emerged as a dominant and highly lethal force, and one that threatens global security, as much as do terrorism and nuclear proliferation. We must mount a counteroffensive and build new infrastructure to combat antiscience, just as we have for these other more widely recognized and established threats.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/artic...thousands/


Looks like the article is more of a rant against the Republican party, and seems hyperbolic. To me, it's not that ''most'' people are becoming anti-science, it's that many have lost faith in the government pushing certain agendas, and using science as a tool to do so.

What do you think?
Reply
#2
Syne Offline
Yeah, science has been weaponized against political foes, amping up the rhetoric to justify taking more and more fascist and perhaps violent actions. Or at the very least, trying to grab more power. But casting Republicans as a larger, or comparable, threat than actual terrorists is nothing new. Leftists have undeveloped amigdalas, and are thus incapable of making accurate threat assessments. And Scientific American is like most other media, pretty far left.

There is no anti-science "movement." There's just people making their own risk assessments, like free adults. Hell, all those who don't want the Covid vaccine (not fully approved by the FDA) aren't even full blown anti-vaxxers. BUt that doesn't stop the left from running around like their hair's on fire.
Reply
#3
C C Offline
(Aug 20, 2021 03:46 AM)Leigha Wrote: [...] Looks like the article is more of a rant against the Republican party, and seems hyperbolic. To me, it's not that ''most'' people are becoming anti-science, it's that many have lost faith in the government pushing certain agendas, and using science as a tool to do so.

What do you think?

Peter J. Hotez, M.D., Ph.D.


Even Tyson was once still mentally vigilant enough to not publicly approach the anti-science issue from a lop-sided political perspective.


(2016) Neil DeGrasse Tyson tells Bill Maher that anti-science liberals are full of #### too
https://gizmodo.com/neil-degrasse-tyson-...1780648740

EXCERPT: This past Friday, Maher repeated a claim he often makes that was finally smacked down by Neil DeGrasse Tyson. Namely, Maher said that conservatives are consistently more anti-science than liberals. That’s bullshit.

“Let’s not pretend that Democrats and Republicans equally deny science,” Maher said. But TV-scientist and friend of the show Neil DeGrasse Tyson quickly stepped in to correct Maher.

“Don’t be too high and mighty there,” Tyson said. “Because there are certain aspects of science denials that are squarely in the liberal left.”

Maher asked Tyson to elaborate. “I know one, but I don’t want to get into it,” Maher said.

What was “the one”? For viewers who are familiar with Maher’s bizarre belief that vaccines cause autism (they don’t), we could guess what he was talking about. But the panelists said it out loud anyway.

[...] Tyson went on to explain that liberals also tend to be the ones who consistently scare people about what they believe are the dangers of genetically modified organisms. He also rightly pointed out that liberals tend to be big believers in “alternative medicine.”

- - - - - - -

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s anti-vaxx website shared more than WHO and CDC: Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s anti-vaccine website is shared more on Twitter than the websites of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the World Health Organisation (WHO) combined, according to data from Indiana University’s Observatory on Social Media.

Promotion of COVID-19 conspiracy theories: During the COVID-19 pandemic, Kennedy promoted multiple conspiracy theories related to COVID-19 including false claims both Anthony Fauci and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation are trying to profit off a vaccine."

Robert F. Kennedy Jr: "Throughout the presidency of George W. Bush, Kennedy was a persistent critic of Bush's environmental and energy policies. He accused Bush of defunding and corrupting federal science projects." [Hell calling the Sahara hot.]

Political endorsements: In late 2007, Kennedy and his sisters Kerry and Kathleen announced that they would be endorsing Hillary Clinton in the 2008 Democratic Party presidential primaries. After the Democratic Convention, Kennedy campaigned for Obama across the country. After the election, he was named as a front-runner for Obama's EPA administrator.


A significant chunk of activity in the social sciences seems to treat humanities literature and its outputted propaganda and advocated political orientations as if they have de facto status. Thereby being a proper cognitive stance for evaluating research data, filtering or cherry-picking it, and dabbling in statistical fallacies to circularly justify those guiding presuppositions, and their policy prescriptions.

Social sciences & humanities have a reciprocal relationship: "It’s therefore no surprise that the role of the social sciences, humanities and arts is so critical right now."
Reply
#4
Yazata Online
(Aug 20, 2021 03:46 AM)some bullshit quoted by Leigha Wrote: Antiscience

What is "antiscience"? How is that word defined?

Doubts about scientific objectivity and about whether science is being used as a tool of favored political ideologies that have been embraced for non-scientific reasons isn't the same thing as being "antiscience". It's the attempt to keep science honest.

Quote:has emerged as a dominant

"Dominant"? Where?

Who controls hiring and tenure decisions at most universities? Who controls who successfully earns a PhD and who doesn't?

Quote:and highly lethal force

"Highly lethal"? That's simply bullshit.

How has my skepticism about the objectivity of science and my reluctance to simply believe when instructed to believe, my damnable determination to practice a little critical thinking and to retain a little freedom of thought, contributed to the death of anyone?

Where is the causal connection?

Quote:and one that threatens global security, as much as do terrorism and nuclear proliferation. We must mount a counteroffensive and build new infrastructure to combat antiscience, just as we have for these other more widely recognized and established threats.

More over-the-top hyperbolic bullshit.

How is skepticism about what self-proclaimed authorities tell us in the name of "science" a threat to global security? Where does the word "must" come from in the next sentence? What justifies its use, given the is/ought distinction and the fact that science deals in 'is'? (It looks to me like the magazine editors sneaking in their own political opinions once again.)

See this thread

https://www.scivillage.com/thread-10450.html

As I wrote there

Unfortunately, repackaging science as social activism feeds precisely that public skepticism about the  truth and objectivity of science, that the Scientific American editors so shrilly condemn and insist they are trying to combat.
Reply
#5
Leigha Offline
Agree ^

From my take of the article (in my OP), “anti-science” is a word that is designed to insult anyone who is interested in keeping politics and science separate, and keeping science “honest.” The idea that anyone would dare question science if it seems to be intertwining with political narratives, can be deemed blasphemous in certain circles. Science doesn’t need a political (or any) narrative, it just needs to be explained.

Some employers are starting to mandate the Covid19 vaccine, and it seems there is no federal law to prevent this, so this begins a slippery slope into something we won’t be able to turn back from.
Reply
#6
Syne Offline
Just have to wait for the lawsuits to work their way through court.
Reply
#7
Leigha Offline
But the time that will take, employers have much deeper pockets than their employees and my concern is the lawsuits will just be delayed and delayed until employees run out of money. But, we’ll see...
Reply


Possibly Related Threads…
Thread Author Replies Views Last Post
  "Bill Maher is right about the fat-acceptance movement" C C 2 103 Aug 11, 2022 03:46 AM
Last Post: Zinjanthropos
  "Defund the police" movement: Social workers will protect communities from crime C C 2 181 Jun 27, 2022 03:13 AM
Last Post: Syne
  Canada needs to build millions of EV charging stations, industry group says C C 0 81 Dec 21, 2021 09:31 PM
Last Post: C C



Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)