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Subordinating science to ideology

  
 
YNH
08:38 / 13.06.02
Sure this conjures up images of mid-20th century German eugenics but that's only 'cause you're not thinking very carefully. Science always serves ideology, even and especially when it claims not to. Just as any revolutionary or reformist project must consider economic and social phenomena, with a nod toward directing them, so must it recognize and accept the necessity of directing and evangelizing particular directions of scientific inquiry.
 
 
Lurid Archive
12:04 / 13.06.02
A general question about politics. Most people on the board are left wing and I'd like to ask, broadly speaking, why. Is it a purely subjective matter, or are there good reasons to support a left wing position? More specifically, Lets take an example. There is a lot of feeling that the US acts badly internationally.

Is that an ideological driven position that we only take up because our political sympathies? When a defender of the US says that all the evidence usually cited against it is a distortion used to serve political ends, do we fundamentally agree?

I don't. I think the US does act badly. My ideology may blind me to certain facts and make me concentrate on others but it is not so all-powerful as to invalidate and subvert everything. I listen to facts and try to decide upon them. If I realise I've been one sided, I amend my position.

This, pretty much, is also my view of science.
 
 
Chuckling Duck
16:26 / 13.06.02
Science is itself an ideology, one that properly restricts its own sphere of influence to observing and explaining physical phenomena. In that sphere of influence, it has demonstrated its superiority to all competing ideologies.

Frankly, I trust science more than I trust social idealogues. I consider working scientists far more qualified to determine what direction research would most fruitfully be directed than all the politicians and armchair philosophers in the world.
 
 
Grey Area
17:48 / 13.06.02
Let us not forget the fact that a lot of science is funded by governments. While it would be great to have the ideal situation where all the money is distributed equally without regard to political aims, there is nevertheless the case that governments can focus their support on research programmes that fit their ideology. No matter what direction scientists believe research should head, if they can't raise the resources to progress, then the research peters out.

Thankfully, this ideological control does not prevail everywhere, nor is it total. However, governments can still choose to favour certain research projects over others.

Even when the support given by government is meant to be egalitarian, the systems in place can leave a lot to be desired. In Britain, the Research Assessment Excercise is used to determine the level of funding the government assigns to universities for research. A lot of worthwhile research projects are underfunded simply because the university that they are based at falls short of the government-set performance indicators.

I know I'm ignoring privately funded research, and this is simply because I do not have any experience with that area. My personal view is that a company is more likely to fudge results in favour of the funding individual's bias to obtain more funds and ensure the continuation of their project. In a way, this is corporate ideological control.

The sad fact is that research costs money, and therefore the situation usually turns out to be that research heads towards those goals specified by the entities, corporate or government. As the topic abstract says, science does not happen in a happy vacuum where everything is given equal consideration and the scientists are always listened to.
 
 
alas
18:05 / 13.06.02
i was just going to say what grey area said--in the US, especially, corporate interests are providing more and more funding for science, and most working scientists are living not on "cushy" tenured (and I use that term loosely, because being on the tenure track is not all roses and champagne) position but on grant funds. Very few scientists are able to simply follow their curiosity wherever their research leads, they have to do the kind of research that will keep the taps on from their funding organizations. Sometimes--often--this means "proving that brand x does what the corporation claims." Not even just proving that brand x does WELL what Big, Inc., claims, or that it does it better or even as well as anything that's already on the market, just that it, to an even minimal degree, does it.

I'd rather have armchair philsophers making these decisions than corporations, personally. (What's so bad about armchairs, anyway?)
 
 
gozer the destructor
18:53 / 13.06.02
There's a point raised this month in new scientist that the mistrust of science by the public (and the reverse that scientists wouldn't trust the public with controling the direction of science with it's 'quaint primitive fears' ie anti-genetic manipulation) could be solved by more openess, allowing lay panels to sit with experts to debate ethical process and direction within the scientific attitudes. An idealistic proposal, perhaps, but the same person quotes the statistic that popular science books have never been so much in demand (and there has been a real spate of them over the last few years). This leads us to belive that the collision between the public's attitude and the scientific determination to proceed in fields that the public feel uncomfortable about could be explained with the old idea of the mad profesor who stops for no one in the name of progress.

However, I feel this a naive conclusion given the previous examples of funding (or rather those providing the funding) controling the direction of science. Logically then, science (like everything else) is controled by an ideology of profit (or power for the overtly cynical) and this is fast becoming, if it hasn't already, the only direction that scientists can afford to investigate.
 
 
The Monkey
19:28 / 13.06.02
Well, honestly, alas, the record on armchair philosophers put in a position of power using science, or the facade of science, to justify theories that cost/ruin lives is just about up there with corporations. The latter rack up body counts by being greedy, the former by deciding which eggs are to be broken for a utopian omelet.

In either case to the problem lies in when ideology - even "corporate ideology"...the overall business plan, etc. - adopts the scientific mantle to validate its actions. There is an inherent contradiction to this process, since an ideology is grounded in core beliefs...while the basis of rational empiricism and the scientific method is to accept no givens without a logical reason. Science that starts with a governing premise such as National Socialism, Deism, or Marxist materialism abandons empiricism and the filtration processes that make science...um..."scientific."

Since the belief system of every individual is a de facto "ideology," all actions including the directing of scientific research are guided by ideology and beliefs systems. My presumption is that the original post is referring, though, to a hegemonic ideological force guiding research's direction, not merely to abstracted "ideology," but the economic and punitive forces that such a hegemonic party can bring to bear. Hegemonic forces have attempted to limit the direction of knowledge pursuit since the organization of society. While no doubt we are inclined to think in terms of modern examples of governments and corporations, in history and anthropological monograph we can see societal forces guiding the ideation process since prehistory: the very idea of "religion," from shamanism to the Church, represents the forces of guided thought concretising and limiting the answers possible to questions about the world. With the development of a currency-based economic system and the honing process over time vis-a-vis the the scarcity of equipment and supplies required for scientific pursuit, this process of guiding thought has grown more visible...especially as the products of research and ideation are now economic consumables available to a "public" as opposed to private - think of the Medici's "patronage" - audience.

That the ideation that leads to research in guided by zeitgeist, ortgeist, and all of the available types of hegemony is inevitable, if sometimes regrettable, even pathological. What proves to be more hazardous is when these forces shape the *result* of research...twisting or misrepresenting data to legitimize or simply deceive.
 
 
Grey Area
19:45 / 13.06.02
Conversely, there have been cases where research carried out under ideologies that were less than humanitarian has been used for humanitarian results. One example that springs to mind is that researchers developing survival techniques in artic conditions used quite a bit of data gained from the terrible experiments carried out in Nazi concentration camps on living subjects (immersion in freezing water until dead, exposure to freezing, debydrated environments, etc.). While the results from the survival research are no doubt laudable, the use of data obtained in such an inhuman fashion is a very thorny issue to consider.
 
 
YNH
04:44 / 14.06.02
What proves to be more hazardous is when these forces shape the *result* of research...twisting or misrepresenting data to legitimize or simply deceive.

And, see, nobody wants that. Ideally, any such system of guidance/control/government would have checks against that sort of thing. Peer review actually does quite a lot as it is. The suggestions above, though, of exploding peer review to include the citizen appear necessary.
 
 
Grey Area
07:05 / 14.06.02
Exploding peer review to include the citizen brings with it a whole host of issues though. You can't ask *everyone* their opinion on issues regarding research...that's why we have elected government representatives to represent our interests. So now we're faced with the dilemma that we've discounted government control because of ideological reasons.

I can't think of a way around this (couldn't find coffee filters this morning, ergo no coffee and brain still fuzzy. Argh) but wanted to make the point.
 
 
gozer the destructor
09:12 / 14.06.02
You can't ask *everyone* their opinion on issues regarding research

I don't see why? Public debate, referendum (possibly just phone ins like Big Brother), lay panels, all these things would bring a more inclusive perspective on the ethics/public opinion regarding scienctific research. This woud not be anti-progress, just progressing in an exceptable direction, this is the main problem, capitalists controling the direction of science rather than a desire to better civilisation.
 
 
Grey Area
09:35 / 14.06.02
Point taken that the mechanisms for judging public opinion exist. However, given that participation in referendum-type activities is dropping worldwide and we're in a time that is marked by severe apathy from the general public towards most government activities, who's to say that the turnout for the referendum will accurately reflect the opinion of the majority of the populace? (I use the term "referendum" here to mean any activity used to gauge public opinion)

Look at France, where voter apathy allowed Jean-Marie Le Pen to slip in as a presidential candidate. Who's to say similar apathy on other countries won't allow certain segments of society to hijack science-type referendums and twist them to their own ideology?

Maybe empowering the citizens more isn't the solution, but allowing them greater scrutiny into the activities and opinions of the government officials they have elected to represent them is?
 
 
Lurid Archive
10:11 / 14.06.02
I think we should be allowed to vote about what research takes place. For instance, there are environmenatilists who want to assess the damage that current lifestyles do and possibly curb some habits. Surely the average citizen deserves a say in whether or not that should go ahead?
 
 
gozer the destructor
11:09 / 14.06.02
Regarding voter apathy, another topic I know, but this idea is misleading. People are as intrested now in what goes on as they ever have, it is beneficial for those in control to perpetuate this idea that no one gives a toss, this in turn adds to the feelings that people have about lack of control, there is a need for the ruled mass to feel impotent.

Back on thread topic;

Alowing the electorate some controls over direction instantly creates access to more transparency over the decisions finally made.
 
 
grant
13:33 / 14.06.02
I think Lurid hit on the thing I'm thinking there. Science answers questions, but ideology decides which questions get asked.
And there's something about reality that fulfills expectations.
"Could Iraq bomb America?" is a loaded question. It can be answered scientifically and rationally, but still, the answers might not mean anything in a larger sense... other than to stir up fears for something that would probably never happen.
 
 
Chuckling Duck
14:50 / 14.06.02
I’ll agree that researchers should be held responsible to a code of ethics that has the force of law, but that code should be an extension of existing laws (against murder, assault, theft, abduction, etc.) rather than using the US administration’s current test of “moral revulsion” or being based on laypeople’s notion of what is and isn’t “natural”.

The real problem with letting the entire populace determine the ethics of scientific research is that a substantial portion of the public may not understand the issues well enough to make an informed decision. If voters were educated on the issues first--for example educated as well as jurors are when DNA evidence is introduced in court--then I’d be comfortable with a vote.

As for the funding of research, I don’t see any problem with anyone with some money being able to fund research. What we could use is a mechanism that prevents the scientists conducting the research from knowing which side is buttering their bread. In other words, just as the scientific community currently disregards any research that doesn’t survive the review process of respected journals, any research not funded by a blind trust and given a neutral mandate (i.e. “research the effects of smoking tobacco on humans”, NOT “question the findings that smoking is harmful to humans) would be set aside.
 
 
Grey Area
11:59 / 15.06.02
The idea of a "blind trust" to distribute research resources is a good one, however I do believe that since having one's name pinned to research bears with it a certain degree of prestige, not many potential financiers would sign up to it. There would also be an issue if and when the source of a particular research project is leaked and turns out to have a vested interest in the results.

For instance, I would gladly sign up to receive resources for my research into childrens' consumer behaviour. However, should it be leaked that some of the resources came from marketing and advertising companies who want to use my research to more effectively exploit children, it could damage the perception of my results and my motivation behind conducting the research. As it stands, I am conciously not approaching these types of companies for funds, even though they'd probably throw loads of cash at me, for that very reason.
 
 
YNH
17:05 / 15.06.02
So the major issues with citizen participation pretty much center on the education of the populace and the framing of the questions? Right now, our tax monies are invisibly distributed. Y'all like that? Wouldn't you rather it was your ideology?
 
 
The Monkey
18:14 / 15.06.02
Yes, everyone wishes that it was *their* ideology governing all things economic and scientific. The problem being that on the ground there is no such thing as a public consensus, or even a consensus of citizenry that could be wedged into the Lycra uniform of an ideology...so who gets to decide?
Second, consider the drag coefficents operating on the minds of people in large groups. The power of the lowest common denominator is not that most people are lumpen morons, but rather that the LCD position comprises those few things that a mass can agree upon after subtracted the totality of overlapping ideologies impressed on individual minds. And since rational thought is a learned process, and logic-chains (cause-effect, attribution, etc) are inevitably colored by ideology, the lowest common denominator is comprised largely of wish-fulfilment imagery and primal fears of the most rudimentary sort...things that when intersected with the realm of the scientific possible and our thermodynamic universe don't really mesh.
[ack. lost my train of thought...more later]
 
 
Grey Area
09:38 / 16.06.02
So what you're saying is that if you subtract the bits of everyone's opinions that don't intersect, at the LCD level you're left with "I want more money, sex, time off and a bigger car/house/TV/(insert consumer item here), all in a nice warm place."?
 
 
The Monkey
19:30 / 16.06.02
Um...yes. Think Abraham Maslow and the Hierarchy of Needs, except factoring in that humans don't necessarily always operate on a rational basis. Anyway, it was a single point that was part of a larger argument that I can't be nonced to make anymore. The final point was that conflicting ideology and the conscious blinders that people put over their critical thinking skills generate a sort of consensual paralysis of thought, or a very least a directionality that if placed in charge of guiding scientific thought would generate as much damage and as much inefficiency (from the perspective of the liberal-minded, help-everyone hurt-noone ideal prevalent, and shared by me, on this board). The risk of this sort of stasis grows proportional the size of population engaged in the blunt-majority democratic process.

Hm. Consider this in real-time. Remember when HIV/AIDS was still just GRID? How many people in the US gave a shit about immune research? What proportion do you think would allocate funding...what proportion of *educated* people gave a damn, and would allocate funding? Oh, yes, that's right, in the eighties there was vein of baseline homophobia fed by the child-molestation cases sweeping the nation...mind you, most people did not sit and do the head math on *gay* does not equal *pedophile*, heh...not to mention the heyday of certain crowd-pleasing hellfire-braying mutants by the names of Swaggert and Bakker....

The idea that "people" - meaning non-specialists and also non--hegemons - would positively direct scientific study is predicated in their sufficient knowledge of the base ideas to be effective evaluators. But what this neglects is, well, free will and the conscious choice to ignore information [that from our perspective would be considered intellectually broadening]. Thus for the system to be viable, there would necasarily be
1) A minmum level of education in the general sciences and the underlying philosophical and rhetorical systems
2) Possessing of a larger mindset that considers the latter information to be not merely a valid assessment process, but on par with other key evaluative processes...religious, secular ideological, interpersonal....

So, the question is, how do you get everyone to play on those terms? {and what do you do when a vocal minority keep insisting "no"?) Oh, yeah, the answer is "ruthless indoctrination." In which case we're kind of back to intellectual square one.
 
 
Grey Area
19:53 / 16.06.02
I don't think ruthless indoctrination is the only solution to ensuring that we would have a large segment of the community educated to a level to which they would be able to make an informed decision on research. To use your example of HIV/AIDS (albeit after the name change from GRID and the realisation that heteroexuals could be infected too), the mass-education campaigns that followed were pretty effective at raising awareness and changing a lot of peoples' attitudes towards the disease and those infected by it. OK, so it's not really feasible to start such campaigns for every issue, but I do believe that a slightly more low-key attempt at education could be made before a vote on key issues.
 
 
The Monkey
20:58 / 16.06.02
Indeed, I agree with you because it's the best available option...to try and educate. Please understand that I do write in a somewhat exageratedly cynical fashion at times.
 
 
Grey Area
21:27 / 16.06.02
I understand, no problem. Forgive me if I rephrase parts of your posts in what seems like an ironic way...I'm just making sure I get the jist of your post.
 
 
Thjatsi
09:23 / 28.06.02
Public debate, referendum (possibly just phone ins like Big Brother), lay panels, all these things would bring a more inclusive perspective on the ethics/public opinion regarding scientific research. This would not be anti-progress, just progressing in an acceptable direction, this is the main problem, capitalists controlling the direction of science rather than a desire to better civilization.

Are you proposing that government funding should be controlled using this method, or are you stating that a country should actively put a stop to certain research when 51% of its citizens decide that it is not acceptable?

Here's an example. I am planning on becoming a scientist, and devoting my life to finding a way to end the aging process. Now, if you look at opinion polls, the majority of people think that my intended area of research is not a good idea.

As we approach the point where a cure for aging starts to become a possiblity, the public may decide that they don't want their taxes to pay for it. They tell the government that they don't want to fund this research, and I stop receiving grants. This would be a setback for me, and I'd be pretty pissed, but I recognize that this is the peoples' money, and they can spend it any way they please. Besides, well off capitalists who agree with me would still be willing to fund my work. True, government grants usually have the most money, but I'd find a way to get by. I'm assuming that this isn't what you are proposing, since it can already occur under the political systems in most democracies.

But, what happens if this referendum has the power to decide that the direction of my research is unacceptable and to force me to stop? This is my dream, and I am willing to sacrifice a great deal to attain it. I can assure you that I will continue my work, no matter what the cost. My question for you, if this is what you are proposing, is, "What are you prepared to do to me to enforce the decisions of this referendum?"

By the way, this isn't just a hypothetical situation, I'm starting graduate school this fall.
 
 
Chuckling Duck
17:56 / 01.07.02
I think a sufficiently educated electorate should be allowed to decide both what research receives government funds and what research techniques should be prohibited or controlled by law.

To answer your specific example, I don’t think a blanket prohibition against anti-aging research would be constitutional in the US, and I don’t think it would be good law. But I do think prohibitions against specific research techniques--growing human embryos, for example--would be constitutional and good law, even if I don’t think they would be good ideas.

Again, I think the only legal limits on research should be based on existing laws against murder, assault, theft, kidnapping, animal cruelty and so on. But then again, I think all kinds of fucked-up things; polling the entire educated populace would be the most sane way I could think of deciding this matter.
 
 
Lurid Archive
20:49 / 01.07.02
I agree with Chuckling Duck that good laws can be made to restrict areas of research and as long as these are based on general principles that try to protect people and the environment from harm I have no issue with it. I may disagree with any particular decision but the only fair way is to decide through our established legal and political processes. Just a thought here; Do you think that laws should be decided on an entirely democratic mandate? Vote for sentencing? I think not.

Similarly, I don't think that the direction of research should be decieded by an entirely democratic process. In order to allow academic freedom, there needs to be some unaccountability in funding. I don't mean that it should be entirely in the hands of scientists or bureaucrats, but that scientists should have some degree of autonomy.

Of course, the level of distrust in scientists makes this seem quite unattractive. One should reflect that large companies will always be able to fund research to their ends and a highly proscriptive Governmental funding policy may tend to stifle independent research. Despite what seems to be in vogue at the moment, science performs a pretty good job at trying to gather information and theorise about the world in an observer independent fashion. There are flaws and there are bad scientists, but it should be plain to most that the scientific endeavour has been quite sucessful.
 
 
Thjatsi
20:54 / 01.07.02
To answer your specific example, I don’t think a blanket prohibition against anti-aging research would be constitutional in the US, and I don’t think it would be good law.

What section of the constitution protects my right to research a cure for senescence?
 
 
Ticker
20:21 / 06.10.06
Frankenbunny Stem Cell research

my spouse read it and said:

Medical and scientific ethics are hilarious. They're
like a distillation of the bullshit morality that's so
pervasive in our culture.

"No! No using human egg cells for stem cell research.
It'd be inhumane."
"Well...what if a tenth of a percent of the cell was
rabbit cellular material?"
"Oh, hell yeah. That's fine. Not the same thing at
all."


The article clearly states:
The embryos will allow scientists to perfect stem cell creation techniques without using human eggs.
 
 
Red Concrete
21:50 / 06.10.06
It's not clear on what that 0.1% actually is? The weight of the rabbit DNA? Regardless, I fail to see how this is in any way a sly way to find a loophole in complaints about using human eggs. It's a way to develop the relevant techniques without ever using human eggs. Here's what actually going on:

"No! No using human egg cells for stem cell research.
It'd be inhumane."
"OK, can we use the DNA from rabbit eggs, in a regular human cell of the kind that foat around in your blood, or that you scrape off your gums every day?"
"Well, yes OK... Wait! Did you say Frankenbunny?!

I so resent the press sometimes. I completely encourage debate and welcome argument about these technologies. But I don't think you should have a firm stance without a decent understanding of the issue. Applies to any field, really.

Sorry if that comes across snarky, I know that snark doesn't encourage debate or argument about the issues, either...
 
  
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