This makes most of what I have studied irrelevant

[grinninfoole]

A lot of ink has been spilled in the history and sociology of science trying to explain just what it is scientists do, how they engage with the world and then try to understand their results, and how they wrangle with each other, and how they struggle for credibility and for certainty.

Of course, it doesn't much matter if they just lie. Which is why this article from LA Times is so depressing. It's not that there is no history here to write, but that it isn't really history of science. Whether a president lies or not, it's still political history. When a prophet is exposed as a total fraud, it's still religious history. But when someone knowingly misrepresents the world and presents it as science, it isn't really history of science anymore. Not the way that studying Newton or Galileo is.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-scientists10feb10,0,4954654.story?coll=la-home-nation

Comments

[crouchback.livejournal.com]

I think it actually opens up a new field for research-the politicization of science.

I am not an expert, but I think that the politicizaiton of science is largely a consequence of the World Wars and the way science funding has become something governments largely control.

[grinninfoole.livejournal.com]

Well, actually, the politicization of science is what I study. But, that's not what I mean here. What I mean is that what makes science worth studying is the bit that can't be faked or spun. The bit where all the equipment and experiments and guess work and theories and messy bits that one doesn't want others to see, all that is in aid of doing your best to accurately describe the world. And what the article talks about is people doing all of that and being told, or just choosing on their own, to report something else. To lie.

It's exactly the same way in which the Black Sox scandal is certainly part of the history of baseball, but in throwing the games, the Black Sox themselves were not playing baseball. They were cheating. And all the clever books trying to understand how science actually works don't apply, because those liars at Fish and Wildlife (and anywhere else where people lie and call it science) aren't doing science. Just like all of Ted Williams's insight into hitting doesn't really matter when you aren't actually trying to hit the ball.

[dishliquid.livejournal.com]

Hey, is this Mike? This is Jason, from Jim's game. I'm friending you, because your LJ is awesome.

[grinninfoole.livejournal.com]

OK. Thanks.