Voting for Science

[owheelj]

As mentioned in the reading topic, I've been reading the fantastic book by Mark Henderson; The Geek Manifesto: Why Science Matters. Let me start by recommend you read it.

Anyway one of the things he talks about is the need to create a voting block, analogous perhaps to "the religious vote" of rational people who will vote for science. What this means is vetting the candidates of your elections carefully, and voting for the one that appears to have the most respect for science, regardless (to a degree) of which party they belong to, or whether you agree with the rest of their values (to a degree). He argues that there enough people in the UK and US (and I assume Australia) who do support science as the basis for political policy, that if we become a voting block it would force politicians to pay more attention to science and to defend their policies in a scientifically valid manner.

Recently in Tasmania all of our 3 major parties voted against the so called "super trawler" and in doing so completely dismissed the scientific evidence presented in at least 2 peer reviewed scientific papers by the independent scientific body that's part of my university (IMAS at UTas) without offering any criticisms of the methodology or making any suggestion that they'd read the paper. I'm not saying that the trawler is a good thing, or should be approved, I'm just saying none of the parties give a fuck about the science. (Actually perhaps I am unfair to some members of the Greens who have commented on the science by suggesting that it's corrupt and paid for by "big industry").

So this is a difficult commitment to make. Difficult because of the possibility of being forced to vote for a Liberal candidate next election (although perhaps that is unlikely) and difficult because sometimes there may be no candidate to choose from.

Nevertheless, I think he's right that if we want science based policy and politicians to respond to science, not just when it confirms with their pre-conceived notions, but especially when it contradicts them, this is probably the best strategy for achieving that goal.

[the_gelf]

Originally Posted by owheelj

Recently in Tasmania all of our 3 major parties voted against the so called "super trawler" and in doing so completely dismissed the scientific evidence presented in at least 2 peer reviewed scientific papers by the independent scientific body that's part of my university (IMAS at UTas) without offering any criticisms of the methodology or making any suggestion that they'd read the paper. I'm not saying that the trawler is a good thing, or should be approved, I'm just saying none of the parties give a fuck about the science. (Actually perhaps I am unfair to some members of the Greens who have commented on the science by suggesting that it's corrupt and paid for by "big industry").

Very rarely will you find that people in the position to vote have any idea what they are voting about. I say this as a facilitator for a national body, where the people are supposed to be aware of the issues, but clearly do not fully comprehend a mere ounce of what the issue is about. It becomes the responsibility of the facilitator (analgous to your voting block/sciece community) to, in proposing a vote, take that chance.

A politician does not know the importance or reliability of a scientific paper, nor do they know how to read one. They simply aren't educated enough. Most likely the information about the supertrawler was not presented simply and clearly enough for them to understand, and they had to delegate the interpretation to a subjugate, who probably di not understand either. You see where this goes. Welcome to bureaucracy