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“Science must respect the dignity and rights of all humans”

nature.com

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Re: “Science must respect the dignity and rights of all humans”

#431

Post by fleddr »

I did try to read it in good faith and give it the benefit of the doubt, but there's about 20 red flags in the article. With the ultimate smoking gun "to consult with advocacy" groups.

Advocacy groups as gatekeepers for scientific publication. It's impossible to get a more biased, emotional and fatalistic view on science.

The next articles on the website:

"Marginalized" people struggling to attend conferences (due to Visa issues)". "Equity in the workplace." "Cultural diversity is crucial for African neuroethics" "Historical trauma compounds experiences of racial injustice"

It's like a Tumblr blog. You can't ever meet the moral "purity" of such staff, so I predict serious scientists go elsewhere, and a game of oppression Olympics begins, as oppression is power.

Re: “Science must respect the dignity and rights of all humans”

#432

Post by midoridensha »

Banana699 wrote: post #244
AlanYx wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's interesting that the linked policy says almost the exact opposite of Fermi's statement, implying that ignorance is sometimes better than knowledge: "...considerations of harm can occasionally supersede the goal of seeking or sharing new knowledge, and a decision not to undertake or not to publish a project may be warranted."

I know the people behind statments like these are coming to it with extremly unintelligent and bad faith definitions and intentions, but the actual words are actually correct. If you had the option to delay humanity's discovery of atomic bombs to late 20th century or after, and therefore delay any substantial deep understanding of the atomic physics beneath, you would probably do it. If you had the atomic bomb, you p…

>Fermi was probably talking about inevitable things, e.g. if climate is already worsening beyond human limits it's always good to know even if it's too late to do anything. But if knowledge (or our pursuit of it) would lead to new dangers, its perfecly reasonable to (try) to limit knowledge and its spread or pursuit.

Yes, it's like teaching small children how to make poisons and bombs. It's really much better that children be kept ignorant of such things: this knowledge isn't going to help them, or the world, it's only going to cause problems. Adult humans really aren't any better; they're just bigger children.

Re: “Science must respect the dignity and rights of all humans”

#433

Post by systemvoltage »

dkonofalski wrote: post #388
systemvoltage wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet your opinion falls in the same criteria on limitations of the language you're confining it to. "believe in science" can mean what you said, i.e "it means all evidence gathered so far indicates that it is true, but if more data comes in and a different conclusion is drawn, then the belief should be abandoned"; however, it was also exemplified during COVID as "You're not allowed to question it no matter what merit…

>"You're not allowed to question it no matter what merit you have, no matter how logical and methodical your perspective is and regardless of the content of your argument; science is untouchable" Is this what happened, though? Outside of the politicization of COVID, the majority of the conversation that was anywhere near this was more simply "if you are going to question the people who are providing evidence, you mus…

Absolutely, here is Stanford Prof that was cancelled. All of his viewpoints were grounded in science, but he was skeptical and simply raising the concerns such as "There is no high quality evidence for masks and we should conduct further studies" (Emphasis mine, he didn't say there was no evidence, just not good enough). Worth watching his interviews on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MpnbMIOvbjc

Re: “Science must respect the dignity and rights of all humans”

#434

Post by nomel »

deanCommie wrote: post #405
Dig1t wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://youtu.be/uU7nzwbJ-Hk?t=41 Here is a good example: > "I want to recognize that your line of questioning is transphobic and opens trans people up to violence" This is a US senator and a Berkeley law professor talking in court.

Let's start with this: I don't know how I can explain why this kind of discourse opens trans people up to violence if we can't first agree why this is transphobic. Fundamentally we keep having this conversation in humanity. "This is wrong (homophobic, transphobic, racist, classist, casteist)" "No it isn't!" And over and over and over again. And we look back and think how could it have been possible that we were SO di…

> Fuck, let people live their lives. We all only get one.

I think this is greatly simplifying the concerns that people have in transitioning minors, the statistically anomalous rise in minors that identify as trans [1], and the safety of puberty blockers. For example, see the data that guided the recent Swedish health board decisions to mostly stop puberty blockers. I'm pointing out "minors", because it's all I see in serious discussions. These discussions, and even Sweden's decision, is labeled transphobic. It's trivial to find news article with the title "Sweden is killing trans people".

The word "minor" appears to be the wedge driving the trans division, where those that don't support know that minors aren't good with permanent decision, and those that do support it know that the permanent decision needs to be made as early as possible. I don't think the wedge will be removed without hard science proving safety, which natures statement can only impede.

As some evidence that 15 years ago was better for LGB than it is now for T:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_dramatic_television_se...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_transgender_characters...

1.

Doubled since 2017: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/10/science/transgender-teena...

5x in 13-17 vs 65 years old: https://www.losangelesblade.com/2022/06/10/study-300000-yout...

Re: “Science must respect the dignity and rights of all humans”

#435

Post by llanowarelves »

hoppyhoppy2 wrote: post #377
drorco wrote: post #78

Can anyone actually think of an actual discovery that harmed people? I'm missing some actual examples of what they're trying to protect people from.

e.g. the eugenics movement, which led to forced sterilizations of people who many scientists of the time considered "unfit to reproduce." https://www.history.com/topics/germany/eugenics#section_3

Metrics like IQ also help establish merit instead of nepotism, and identify what level a person is capable of learning at.

A group metric for your country becoming more successful and capable of maintaining what we call "democracy" -- 95 IQ and below can't really.

Re: “Science must respect the dignity and rights of all humans”

#436

Post by bobthechef »

Banana699 wrote: post #232
NoboruWataya wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it not? I certainly don't know or understand even a fraction of what would be considered established science, but if a credible expert tells me that something is supported by established science I will believe it over something like religious dogma. I consider myself to be a "believer" in science.

"Believe" is an overloaded word. In one sense, it's simply the content of your mental state. In basic epistemology, Knowledge is defined as "Justified True Belief", i.e. when your mental state matches the actual state of the world for the "right" reasons (this is surprisingly tricky to make formal, see [1])If your head is a memory cell, your beliefs are the actual 0s or 1s inside it. In other senses, "beliefs" are an…

No post body was provided.

Re: “Science must respect the dignity and rights of all humans”

#437

Post by thrown_22 »

fatherzine wrote: post #392
DiggyJohnson wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well connected - and I think this comparison is becoming more apt each passing day. These statements and policies are just so… egotistical … for lack of a better word. What happens when we stop agreeing on what the “good” is? How can you claim to respect all humans when you don’t respect the human cognitive ability to disagree? Thanks for posting.

Q: What happens when we stop agreeing on what the “good” is? A. I am right and you are evil. Age old conflict resolution method.

He with the biggest gun wins.

Now I'm not exactly sure why the side which is currently stoking the culture war is also the one that's disarmed itself, but here we are.

Re: “Science must respect the dignity and rights of all humans”

#438

Post by brightball »

slibhb wrote: post #407
brightball wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the 90s before mass internet adoption, it sure felt like it. We had disagreements, but nothing compared to what we see today.

People always say this. But I have a hard time believing things weren't more divisive, say, during The Vietnam War. The internet makes conflicts more visible. It also attenuates them, so fewer people get killed. Physical conflict is transformed into digital conflict.

I’m specifically talking about the 90s and not all pre-internet time periods.

Cold War was over, Berlin Wall came down, Gulf War was over on almost the first day thanks to stealth technology. Comedy was at a high point, music was diverse and fun.

There was a lot more happy and a lot less angry in people.

Re: “Science must respect the dignity and rights of all humans”

#439

Post by brippalcharrid »

scelerat wrote: post #236
Dig1t wrote: post #192

I'm pro trans rights, pro LGBTQ, and also very much value free speech. There is a trend on the political left right now that basically equates speech directly with violence (e.g. asking whether a man is capable of getting pregnant is violence) >Academic content that undermines the dignity or rights of specific groups >We commit to using this guidance cautiously and judiciously, consulting with ethics experts and advo…

> There is a trend on the political left right now that basically equates speech directly with violence (e.g. asking whether a man is capable of getting pregnant is violence) I must admit I have not seen an argument like this outside of a strawman characterization.

Perhaps you hadn't yet encountered the subject of Epistemic Violence, in that case:

“I have thus defined epistemic violence as a forced delegitimation, sanctioning and repression […] of certain possibilities of knowing, going hand in hand with an attempted enforcement […] of other possibilities of knowing.”

Sebastian Garbe 2013

https://epistemicviolence.aau.at/index.php/en/home-2/

https://newdiscourses.com/tftw-epistemic-violence/

Re: “Science must respect the dignity and rights of all humans”

#440

Post by jwarden »

tarakat wrote: post #6

Yet, people can be harmed indirectly. For example, research may — inadvertently — stigmatize individuals or human groups. It may be discriminatory, racist, sexist, ableist or homophobic. It may provide justification for undermining the human rights of specific groups, simply because of their social characteristics. [..] Advancing knowledge and understanding is a fundamental public good. In some cases, however, potent…

The statement from Nature has been very carefully worded.

The quote in the parent comment seems to suggest that perfectly valid scientific findings should be withheld if there is a possibility that bad people would misuse them. The consequence of this of course would be a complete victory of "Blank Slate"[1] Dogma (because any scientific finding that finds differences between social groups could be misused to undermine the human rights of one group).

And yet the statement never quite explicitly says findings should be withheld only because they could be misused. Rather it says that research that contains contain hate speech, etc. should perhaps not be published. It says authors should consider the potential harm of their research, and so on.

The intended result I think is a sort of chilling effect with plausible deniability. It pleases the inquisition, and at the same time leaves the scientists with a remainder of self-respect. I am not sure how long this delicate truce can last.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Blank_Slate

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