It's interesting how we see positions we agree with as just common sense while the positions we strongly disagree with as "overtly political".
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Scientific American's departing editor and the politicization of science
201–210 of 1001 posts
Re: Scientific American's departing editor and the politicization of science
#202To be honest, even 18 years ago, long before this editor in chief, I found Scientific American rather ideological. Maybe it got more obvious over time, but I don’t see its recent tone categorically different.
The problem is >40 years old. I was a subscriber in the early 1980's (when SciAm was still quite good), and recall them publishing one of Carl Sagan's articles on the dangers of nuclear winter. Whatever the correctness of Carl's science, he was an astronomer. Not a subject-matter expert. And the the article was very clearly ideological. In an era when the political winds in Washington were blowing hard in the other d…
You’re absolutely right. Nuclear was an emotional topic that caused many many otherwise grounded scientists to lose it. SDI was another.
Re: Scientific American's departing editor and the politicization of science
#203Every piece called out here is clearly labeled "opinion" - did they even read the normal news and analysis sections? Countless newspapers and outlets and actual scientific journals have opinion/editorial sections that are generally very well firewalled from the factual content. You could collect the worst hot takes from a few years of nearly any site with a dedicated opinion page and pretend that it has gone downhill…
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Re: Scientific American's departing editor and the politicization of science
#204To be honest, even 18 years ago, long before this editor in chief, I found Scientific American rather ideological. Maybe it got more obvious over time, but I don’t see its recent tone categorically different.
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Re: Scientific American's departing editor and the politicization of science
#205If anyone is interested, there's some discussion of this piece on the subreddit of the Blocked and Reported podcast (which is co-hosted by Jesse Singal, the author of this article): https://old.reddit.com/r/BlockedAndReported/comments/1gult0b... https://www.reddit.com/r/BlockedAndReported/comments/1gult0b...
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Re: Scientific American's departing editor and the politicization of science
#206Earlier quoted context omitted.
Informed opinion, clearly labeled so, on interesting but non-controversial non-ideological topics can be great instigators of curiosity. What might have come before the Big Bang? Do quantum superpositions really collapse somehow based on some as yet uncharacterized law, or does our universe produce a web of alternate futures, still connected but where straightforward links are quickly statistically and irreversible o…
> Not to mention, with respect to Scientific American in particular, a betrayal of many decades of higher standards, work and reputation. It's hard to deny science itself is under attack by the same people who try to establish alternative facts and truths based on what's politically convenient to them, even if nothing of that is backed by objective reality. Science will always be a force pushing against such agendas.…
Science can touch on politics, but that doesn’t mean science is coextensive with politics. You selected examples where science bears on politics, but Helmuth’s fixation wasn’t on how many people believe vaccines cause autism. As demonstrated by her closing screed, it was about non-falsifiable moral assertions (“sexism,” “racism,” and the “moral arc of the universe”).
Indeed, the point of the Reason article is that if scientists want to have credibility on questions where their expertise applies, they should avoid opining in their official capacity on political questions where their expertise doesn’t apply.
Science has much to say about politically important issues like climate change and vaccines! But people will blow off those assertions if scientists lend the imprimatur of their authority to advance social causes, for example by opining that it’s “racist” to vote to deport illegal immigrants.
Re: Scientific American's departing editor and the politicization of science
#207Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ugh. I'm sorry, but could you please explain yourself? I also read Inherit the Wind in middle school, and my understanding is that it fictionalized the (true) story of the "Scopes/Monkey Trial", which was an ideological conflict between science and religion. It's been over 50 years, and maybe I'm so pure that I disregarded any racial context, but I don't remember any. How does "White Supremacy" come into the story, o…
Biological evolution was butting heads with the dying concept of social evolution at the time, and that conflict provides illuminating subtext to the trial and book.
Which is another interesting aspect of the political use of science: that people will cherry-pick and bend all they can in ways that support their policies.
Re: Scientific American's departing editor and the politicization of science
#208A lot of criticism of SA seems to be from those who don't read the magazine. It is still mostly just thorough coverage of developments in physics, biology, engineering, and other pretty uncontroversial science topics and this coverage has not 'gone downhill'. It is a lot of work to do good reporting of an area of science by talking to a range of experts in that area and SA still does good work here. Some topics are politicized, but that doesn't mean you just don't report on the science in those areas. Almost everyone who thinks 'SA used to be good now it is woke' are either revealing they don't read it or just don't seem to like how the consensus in an area of research might now conflict with their worldview.
They do have an opinion section, like many journalism outlets, which sort of by definition have to be 'hot takes' (e.g. you don't publish opinion pieces that 99% of people will already agree with). Out of thousands it is seems hard to avoid having some bad ones (all major outlets seem to have opinion pieces that are dumb). Most of the flack they get seems to be from these dumb pieces, and it is sad that the entire brand gets tarred with it. You could argue that SA just shouldn't have opinion pieces at all, but ultimately opinion pieces are pretty good at drawing readers and SA is not a non-profit. Additionally, while there are some that overstep the research and are 'click-baity', some opinion pieces are thought-provoking in a valuable way. Nonetheless, perhaps it would be better to get rid of the opinions just to avoid hurting the reputation of the rest of the magazine, but running a journalism magazine is a tough business and it is easy for commenters on the internet to pop in and say stuff like this who don't actually have to run a magazine. I would rather they exist with occasional bad opinion pieces than not exist at all, as their coverage in general is still great.
This guy seems to really not like their coverage of science around gender non-conforming individuals, though I don't see why I should trust his representation of the research over theirs as he seems to have an agenda as well. He then cherry-picks a few examples of some bad opinion pieces not written by their journalists that overstepped the research and then paints the entire outlet with it, and that is frustrating because most of the science coverage reporting is still excellent.
Re: Scientific American's departing editor and the politicization of science
#209I grew up believing that science was the search for truth and fact, and that it should be constantly challenged to further that. What has happened I think, is that there has been a great polarization of science as government and groups have used and twisted it to fit a political agenda. Which essentially stops that search for truth. Challenging scientific conclusions should be encouraged not cancelled.
But only to a point, correct? Otherwise we end up in the current dialogue where flat earthers, moon landing deniers, and a large percentage of religious believers feel more platformed than ever. It's far too easy for the uninformed to challenge science simply because it challenges their non-scientific beliefs.
I don't think it helps to cancel them, probably hurts. It's not as if you have to either censor or send your highest-status scientists to debate them, and that exhausts the finite menu. In a diverse info ecosystem someone will have their comparative advantage on engaging with cranks. The important thing about overall ecosystem health is, is it reasonable in what it amplifies?
Scientific American hasn't seemed very healthy after the 80s. In the decades before, it was an unusual labor of love by one or two chief editors (I don't remember specifically).
Re: Scientific American's departing editor and the politicization of science
#210Trust in institutions is at an all time low. The last thing we need is for these institutions to veer away from their goals to push a political agenda. Good riddance to her.
I believe we are living in an interesting time (yeah, that kind of 'interesting time"). Decades from now, given a historical context, I suspect a lot of the headlines like this one will be viewed very differently.