Aug 22, 2022 06:55 AM
(This post was last modified: Aug 22, 2022 10:22 PM by C C.)
Zero surprise that this appears in Scientific American.
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The public wants scientists to be more involved in policy debates
https://www.scientificamerican.com/artic...y-debates/
INTRO: Many scientists are loath to involve themselves in policy debates for fear of losing credibility. They worry that if they participate in public debate on a contested issue, they will be viewed as biased and discounted as partisan. That perception then will lead to science itself being branded as partisan, further weakening public trust in research.
But lately some commentators and scientific leaders have argued that scientists should overcome this unease and contribute to urgent debates from climate change to gun control, alerting people to relevant scientific evidence and, in some cases, endorsing particular policies where their data provide support. One oft-cited example is the ozone hole, where scientists spoke up in support of banning the chemicals that were destroying Earth's ozone layer. Expert intervention helped to galvanize support for the Montreal Protocol on Substances That Deplete the Ozone Layer, an aggressive phase-out that has been an enormous success.
The public actually may be eager to hear from scientists who advocate policies that fall within their realm of expertise, according to a study published in 2021 by my colleagues and me at ETH Zurich... (MORE - details)
You Won't Have Fauci to Kick Around Anymore
https://gizmodo.com/fauci-retiring-niaid-1849441512
EXCERPTS: Long-time public health official Anthony Fauci is set to retire from government soon. Fauci said Monday that he will leave his current roles as an advisor to the White House and a leading official at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) come this December.
[...] Most recently, Fauci and other public health officials have been accused of not being completely open with the public about the benefits of mask-wearing early on in the covid-19 pandemic, a strategy that seems to have been a clumsy attempt to preserve the then-limited supply of masks for health care workers.
The latter is a mistake that Fauci has owned up to, including in his recent interview with the Washington Post, saying that he and others were simply wrong to downplay masks for the public. And while Fauci has become deeply hated and blamed for just about everything by the conspiracy-tinged corners of the right wing, he remains well-trusted by a majority of the public, though there has been some loss in confidence as of early this year, according to survey data. Even many of his past detractors during the HIV/AIDS epidemic eventually grew to respect Fauci and his efforts to combat the public health crisis.
While Fauci may be leaving the government, he doesn’t intend to leave the public eye completely... (MORE - missing details)
Biden’s Climate Law Is Ending 40 Years of Hands-Off Government
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/arch...cy/671183/
INTRO: President Joe Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act into law. It is no exaggeration to say that his signature immediately severed the history of climate change in America into two eras. Before the IRA, climate campaigners spent decades trying and failing to get a climate bill through the Senate. After it, the federal government will spend $374 billion on clean energy and climate resilience over the next 10 years. The bill is estimated to reduce the country’s greenhouse-gas emissions by about 40 percent below their all-time high, getting the country two-thirds of the way to meeting its 2030 goal under the Paris Agreement.
Since the law emerged from a surprise compromise between Senator Joe Manchin and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer last month, most attention has been paid to the fact of the bill itself: that it is a climate bill, that America’s sorry environmental record has begun to reverse. Far less attention has been paid to the ideas that animate the IRA. That is a shame. Every law embodies a particular hypothesis about how the world works, a hope that if you pull on levers A and B, then outcomes C and D will result. Yet even by the standards of landmark legislation, the IRA makes a particularly interesting and all-encompassing wager—a bet relevant to anyone who plans to buy or sell something in the U.S. in the next decade, or who plans to trade with an American company, or who relies on American military power. And although not a single Republican voted for the IRA, its wager is not especially partisan or even ideological.
The idea is this: The era of passive, hands-off government is over. The laws embrace an approach to governing the economy that scholars call “industrial policy,” a catch-all name for a wide array of tools and tactics that all assume the government can help new domestic industries get started, grow, and reach massive scale. If “this country used to make things,” as the saying goes, and if it wants to make things again, then the government needs to help it. And if the country believes that certain industries bestow a strategic advantage, then it needs to protect them against foreign interference.
The approach is at the core of how the IRA seeks to resolve climate change. Democrats hope to create an economy where the government doesn’t just help Americans buy green technologies; it also helps nurture the industries that produce that technology... (MORE - missing details)
- - - - - -
The public wants scientists to be more involved in policy debates
https://www.scientificamerican.com/artic...y-debates/
INTRO: Many scientists are loath to involve themselves in policy debates for fear of losing credibility. They worry that if they participate in public debate on a contested issue, they will be viewed as biased and discounted as partisan. That perception then will lead to science itself being branded as partisan, further weakening public trust in research.
But lately some commentators and scientific leaders have argued that scientists should overcome this unease and contribute to urgent debates from climate change to gun control, alerting people to relevant scientific evidence and, in some cases, endorsing particular policies where their data provide support. One oft-cited example is the ozone hole, where scientists spoke up in support of banning the chemicals that were destroying Earth's ozone layer. Expert intervention helped to galvanize support for the Montreal Protocol on Substances That Deplete the Ozone Layer, an aggressive phase-out that has been an enormous success.
The public actually may be eager to hear from scientists who advocate policies that fall within their realm of expertise, according to a study published in 2021 by my colleagues and me at ETH Zurich... (MORE - details)
You Won't Have Fauci to Kick Around Anymore
https://gizmodo.com/fauci-retiring-niaid-1849441512
EXCERPTS: Long-time public health official Anthony Fauci is set to retire from government soon. Fauci said Monday that he will leave his current roles as an advisor to the White House and a leading official at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) come this December.
[...] Most recently, Fauci and other public health officials have been accused of not being completely open with the public about the benefits of mask-wearing early on in the covid-19 pandemic, a strategy that seems to have been a clumsy attempt to preserve the then-limited supply of masks for health care workers.
The latter is a mistake that Fauci has owned up to, including in his recent interview with the Washington Post, saying that he and others were simply wrong to downplay masks for the public. And while Fauci has become deeply hated and blamed for just about everything by the conspiracy-tinged corners of the right wing, he remains well-trusted by a majority of the public, though there has been some loss in confidence as of early this year, according to survey data. Even many of his past detractors during the HIV/AIDS epidemic eventually grew to respect Fauci and his efforts to combat the public health crisis.
While Fauci may be leaving the government, he doesn’t intend to leave the public eye completely... (MORE - missing details)
Biden’s Climate Law Is Ending 40 Years of Hands-Off Government
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/arch...cy/671183/
INTRO: President Joe Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act into law. It is no exaggeration to say that his signature immediately severed the history of climate change in America into two eras. Before the IRA, climate campaigners spent decades trying and failing to get a climate bill through the Senate. After it, the federal government will spend $374 billion on clean energy and climate resilience over the next 10 years. The bill is estimated to reduce the country’s greenhouse-gas emissions by about 40 percent below their all-time high, getting the country two-thirds of the way to meeting its 2030 goal under the Paris Agreement.
Since the law emerged from a surprise compromise between Senator Joe Manchin and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer last month, most attention has been paid to the fact of the bill itself: that it is a climate bill, that America’s sorry environmental record has begun to reverse. Far less attention has been paid to the ideas that animate the IRA. That is a shame. Every law embodies a particular hypothesis about how the world works, a hope that if you pull on levers A and B, then outcomes C and D will result. Yet even by the standards of landmark legislation, the IRA makes a particularly interesting and all-encompassing wager—a bet relevant to anyone who plans to buy or sell something in the U.S. in the next decade, or who plans to trade with an American company, or who relies on American military power. And although not a single Republican voted for the IRA, its wager is not especially partisan or even ideological.
The idea is this: The era of passive, hands-off government is over. The laws embrace an approach to governing the economy that scholars call “industrial policy,” a catch-all name for a wide array of tools and tactics that all assume the government can help new domestic industries get started, grow, and reach massive scale. If “this country used to make things,” as the saying goes, and if it wants to make things again, then the government needs to help it. And if the country believes that certain industries bestow a strategic advantage, then it needs to protect them against foreign interference.
The approach is at the core of how the IRA seeks to resolve climate change. Democrats hope to create an economy where the government doesn’t just help Americans buy green technologies; it also helps nurture the industries that produce that technology... (MORE - missing details)