Sawbriars
VIP Member
- Feb 18, 2012
- 1,113
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- Banned
- #1
Back in the dark age the Catholic Church refused to accept science...scientists were persecuted, tortured and sometimes killed for pursuing scientific truth.
Today we like to think we are beyond that..............but are we? Whilst the Catholic Church no longer persecutes scientists....it goes on nevertheless...but who is doing the persecution now?
These modern haters of science usually come under the heading of liberals dominated by their ideology of political correctness..........aka...........................
the philosophers' magazine, issue 41, spring 2008
'I am inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa. All our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours - whereas all the testing says not really.'
So claimed the Nobel Laureate, and co-discoverer of the structure of DNA, James Watson in a controversial interview in the Sunday Times. Censure was swift and universal. The Federation of American Scientists condemned Watson for choosing 'to use his unique stature to promote personal prejudices that are racist, vicious and unsupported by science'. London's Science Museum, at which Watson was to have delivered a lecture, cancelled his appearance, claiming that the geneticist had 'gone beyond the point of acceptable debate'. New York's Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, of which he was director, not only 'vehemently' disowned Watson's remarks but also forced him to resign.
To understand better the contemporary debate about race, we need to answer two questions. Is race a biological reality? And should political considerations limit scientific research?
For much of the past half century, politicians and scientists have largely spoken with a single voice on the issue of race. The experience of Nazism and the Holocaust made racial science politically unacceptable. It also shaped the scientific consensus that race was a social myth, not a biological reality. Today, however, that scientific consensus is beginning to crack. From heart drugs designed to be used only on African Americans to software programmes that allow anthropologists to determine an individual's race from the shape of his or her skull, race has, over the past few years, returned in a big way as a category in scientific and medical research. And this, in turn, has led to a fierce debate about the scientific meaning of race. Those who understand what is happening in the field of modern genetics know that 'a decade or more of population genetics research have documented biological differences between the races'. Yet this scientific truth is so controversial that most universities suppress it.
We should be wary of calls to ban scientific genetical research. If we believe that a particular methodology is flawed, that is reason to challenge the methodology, not ban the research. In the Watson row, the Science Museum claimed that Watson had gone 'beyond the point of acceptable debate'. But what is acceptable debate? Two years ago, the then Harvard chancellor Larry Summers caused outrage by suggesting in a speech that evolved brain differences, rather than gender discrimination, may explain why men dominate science. Like Watson, Summers faced great condemnation. Like Watson, he was forced to apologise for his comments. And like Watson, he was pushed eventually to resign his post. The evolutionary psychologist Steven Pinker was asked whether Summers had put himself beyond the pale of legitimate academic discourse with his comments. 'Good grief', Pinker exclaimed, 'Shouldn't everything be within the pale of legitimate academic discourse, as long as it is presented with some degree of rigour? That's the difference between a university and a madrassa.' The issue of race, and of the relationship between race and intelligence, remains and should remain a matter of legitimate scientific debate despite all the efforts of the politically correct to censure it.
But the banning of scientific research will not necessarily prevent the stigmatisation of particular social groups. Do we really believe, for instance, that had references to sickle cell anaemia as a black disease been excised in the first part of the twentieth century, there would have been less discrimination against African Americans?
As in many controversies about the human condition, the argument over race is a debate, not so much about the facts of human differences, as about the meaning of these facts. Nobody on either side of the debate denies that there are myriad genetic differences between human populations. The question is: what is the significance of such differences and in what context are they significant? It is only through open debate that we will be able to decide which interpretation of the facts is the most meaningful. A scientific debate that is policed to ensure that opinions do not wander beyond acceptable moral and political boundaries is no debate at all and itself loses any meaning.
The genetics of population differences is a biological reality. The interpretation of such differences is, however, deeply shaped by politics. As of now the devotees of political correctness continue to denounce and very effectively............the scientific study of racial differences-- prompting many scientists to avoid such fields that are considered controversial and a potential danger to their careers. Should these modern day pc witchhunts be tolerated? Of Course not.
Today we like to think we are beyond that..............but are we? Whilst the Catholic Church no longer persecutes scientists....it goes on nevertheless...but who is doing the persecution now?
These modern haters of science usually come under the heading of liberals dominated by their ideology of political correctness..........aka...........................
the philosophers' magazine, issue 41, spring 2008
'I am inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa. All our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours - whereas all the testing says not really.'
So claimed the Nobel Laureate, and co-discoverer of the structure of DNA, James Watson in a controversial interview in the Sunday Times. Censure was swift and universal. The Federation of American Scientists condemned Watson for choosing 'to use his unique stature to promote personal prejudices that are racist, vicious and unsupported by science'. London's Science Museum, at which Watson was to have delivered a lecture, cancelled his appearance, claiming that the geneticist had 'gone beyond the point of acceptable debate'. New York's Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, of which he was director, not only 'vehemently' disowned Watson's remarks but also forced him to resign.
To understand better the contemporary debate about race, we need to answer two questions. Is race a biological reality? And should political considerations limit scientific research?
For much of the past half century, politicians and scientists have largely spoken with a single voice on the issue of race. The experience of Nazism and the Holocaust made racial science politically unacceptable. It also shaped the scientific consensus that race was a social myth, not a biological reality. Today, however, that scientific consensus is beginning to crack. From heart drugs designed to be used only on African Americans to software programmes that allow anthropologists to determine an individual's race from the shape of his or her skull, race has, over the past few years, returned in a big way as a category in scientific and medical research. And this, in turn, has led to a fierce debate about the scientific meaning of race. Those who understand what is happening in the field of modern genetics know that 'a decade or more of population genetics research have documented biological differences between the races'. Yet this scientific truth is so controversial that most universities suppress it.
We should be wary of calls to ban scientific genetical research. If we believe that a particular methodology is flawed, that is reason to challenge the methodology, not ban the research. In the Watson row, the Science Museum claimed that Watson had gone 'beyond the point of acceptable debate'. But what is acceptable debate? Two years ago, the then Harvard chancellor Larry Summers caused outrage by suggesting in a speech that evolved brain differences, rather than gender discrimination, may explain why men dominate science. Like Watson, Summers faced great condemnation. Like Watson, he was forced to apologise for his comments. And like Watson, he was pushed eventually to resign his post. The evolutionary psychologist Steven Pinker was asked whether Summers had put himself beyond the pale of legitimate academic discourse with his comments. 'Good grief', Pinker exclaimed, 'Shouldn't everything be within the pale of legitimate academic discourse, as long as it is presented with some degree of rigour? That's the difference between a university and a madrassa.' The issue of race, and of the relationship between race and intelligence, remains and should remain a matter of legitimate scientific debate despite all the efforts of the politically correct to censure it.
But the banning of scientific research will not necessarily prevent the stigmatisation of particular social groups. Do we really believe, for instance, that had references to sickle cell anaemia as a black disease been excised in the first part of the twentieth century, there would have been less discrimination against African Americans?
As in many controversies about the human condition, the argument over race is a debate, not so much about the facts of human differences, as about the meaning of these facts. Nobody on either side of the debate denies that there are myriad genetic differences between human populations. The question is: what is the significance of such differences and in what context are they significant? It is only through open debate that we will be able to decide which interpretation of the facts is the most meaningful. A scientific debate that is policed to ensure that opinions do not wander beyond acceptable moral and political boundaries is no debate at all and itself loses any meaning.
The genetics of population differences is a biological reality. The interpretation of such differences is, however, deeply shaped by politics. As of now the devotees of political correctness continue to denounce and very effectively............the scientific study of racial differences-- prompting many scientists to avoid such fields that are considered controversial and a potential danger to their careers. Should these modern day pc witchhunts be tolerated? Of Course not.
