Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

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

nature.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

521–530 of 883 posts

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

#521

Post by tsimionescu »

klyrs wrote: post #203
blueflow wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What happens when we stop agreeing on what the “good” is? Did we ever agree? I always felt like Democracy is some kind of status quo between the incompatible.

No, there is no universal "good" otherwise wars would not occur. The American Civil War and WW2 are pretty classical examples of massive disagreements over the legitimacy of certain classes of humans. Had those wars not ended the way they did, black people would still be property, and Jews, Romani, and LGBT people would have been exterminated. There are still people who wish that we lived in that alternative history.…

One small note: LGBT people can not be exterminated in the same sense as other minorities, since new LGBT people will always born, regardless of how many of us would be exterminated, up to and including 100%.

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

#522

Post by Beltalowda »

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…

On the other hand, nuclear physics is also used for things like treating cancer.

In that sense it's the perfect analogy: you don't really know where your research will end up. Did Rutherford split the atom to cure cancer? No, of course not. Most (or all?) people working on particle physics in the early 20th century would have been quite surprised to learn it would be used as such down the line.

> If you had the atomic bomb, you probably wouldn't have shared it with Stalin's USSR or Hitler's Germany and, for that matter, Roosevelt's USA

If I felt that it was plausible that the genocidal regimes of the USSR or Nazi Germany could have developed such a bomb (which was the case): yes, I absolutely would have shared it with the US.

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

#524

Post by skissane »

hilbert42 wrote: post #472
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.

In philosophy good is known as a simple notion, that is it cannot be reduced further. We cannot define its length, breadth etc., even adding very or little to it doesn't put a measure on it. Saying '0.5' or '10%' of good is essentially meaningless. Good and bad, etc. are metaphysical constructs and thus we have a fundamental problem when using these terms in connection with Science which intrinsically and inextricabi…

> In philosophy good is known as a simple notion, that is it cannot be reduced further

That is the position of some philosophers – it is G. E. Moore's famous doctrine that the good is simple, undefinable, irreducible to anything non-ethical – which Moore defended through his "open question argument", a staple of undergraduate introductory courses on the philosophy of ethics. However, it is worth pointing out that far from all philosophers agree with that position–indeed, my armchair impression is that, in contemporary academic philosophy, objectors to Moore's position outnumber his supporters.

> Saying '0.5' or '10%' of good is essentially meaningless.

That's another topic of philosophical dispute. Many classical utilitarians were quite convinced it was meaningful to speak in that way – hence Jeremy Bentham's felicific calculus. I believe that approach has few supporters in contemporary philosophy – but, while there is widespread agreement it is a failure, there is far less agreement on exactly why. And, Bentham's felicific calculus is not entirely dead – outside of philosophy, it is the direct intellectual ancestor of the economist's utility function.

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

#525

Post by systemvoltage »

bcrosby95 wrote: post #502
warning26 wrote: post #411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah I never really got the whole "ableist" thing; for example, obviously someone who can't see is less capable of performing visual tasks than someone who can. Does that mean shipping a device with a screen is ableist because not everyone can take advantage of the fact that it has a screen?

I know many people that are sensitive on this issue and none of them would call that ableist. I'm sure they exist but focusing on the extremes of a movement don't do anyone any favors For example, most people on this site are a fan of open source. How would they feel if anytime the subject came up people talked only about the ideas of Stallman?

> I know many people that are sensitive on this issue and none of them would call that ableist.

I think this overton window keeps shifting and there is no one courageous to say "No, this is unreasonable". It is not just happening in this one instance but the entire culture; we have now instituted things like "birthing persons". We can't even call "Fathers" and "Mothers" anymore. We are too coward to speak up and risk our jobs. The chilling effect is real.

This house of cards is going to fall hard and fast.

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

#526

Post by tayistay »

bigcat12345678 wrote: post #150

I am getting dumb-funded by the obvious senseless thinking in the title: Science is about the mechanisms of natural worlds. It's the foundation of human civilization. It's the basis of human thoughts and the ideology etc. To say Science must respect dignity and rights of all humans, it's like to say nature must respect the dignity and rights of all humans. But Science is the rendition of natural world's mechanisms, t…

Science is a human endeavor. They didn’t say the laws of nature must respect dignity/rights of humans.

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

#527

Post by tbossanova »

narrator wrote: post #512
jwarden wrote: post #440

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 undermi…

Imagine the confusion that would result by future CRISPR modifications to adults that would increase intelligence by replacing genes found in less intelligent people with genes found in more intelligent people. Imagine if those genes are only found in certain races. I guess we can't have that according to the journal's rules, can we? You will simply not be allowed to research or publish that because it would break th…

I don’t see why you’d need to consider race at all in this scenario? You find intelligence genes in some people, give them to others. Anything to do with race would seem to be an unnecessary extra step.

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

#528

Post by refurb »

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…

You know any time someone says "Although [academic] freedom is fundamental, it is not unbounded.", watch out!

It's a common trope many use to slowly whittle away freedoms. A more accurate rephrasing would be "Your rights are all ready limited, so limiting them more shouldn't cause any concern,"

It's lazy thinking, because whatever limitations are in place today, have no bearing on the validity of the limitations the author is proposing - those should be viewed independently and skeptically.

What people don't realize is that when your freedoms are taken away, it's not some evil dictator yanking them from your clutches and you are beaten down by armed thugs, it's you and fellow citizens willfully giving them up for "the greater good".

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

#529

Post by nine_k »

jwarden wrote: post #440
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 undermi…

> perfectly valid scientific findings should be withheld if there is a possibility that bad people would misuse them.

This approach basically means that each and every scientific finding should be withheld (better yet, never produced) because chances are high that a bad actor would try to use it for evil purposes.

Mathematics has run into it with encryption: for fundamental reasons, it cannot be made hard only against bad guys, but penetrable to law enforcement.

We should stop any progress if we want to guarantee that any new evil would never apper. The promise of the progress is that it brings more good than evil, more jet liners than jet fighters.

Post reply on HN