Science Lobby

It appears some of America's scientists have tired of walking the difficult objective line between science and policy and have gone all in and formed their own lobby group - Scientists and Engineers for America. The organisation states that it is "dedicated to electing public officials who respect evidence and understand the importance of using scientific and engineering advice in making public policy." On one hand, this sounds lovely - can't imagine a scientist that isn't frustrated with the manner in which science is used, misused, or ignored in public policy. And of course, SEFORA states that it is a "non-partisan" outfit. But that just makes me suspicious, as every hard-core ideologically driven lobbying group I've ever encountered says the same thing. And since they're explicitly looking to endorse and advocate for candidates (and policies, no doubt), my guess is that they'll be becoming pretty damn partisan pretty quick. The pitfall, of course, is that this gives critics all the ammunition they could ever need in their attempt to argue that scientists are a biased lot of folks whose mythic objectivity is only that. This moves science one step closer to being simply another political "issue".

Take the Union of Concerned Scientists, for example. According to its website, "UCS was founded in 1969 by faculty members and students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who were concerned about the misuse of science and technology in society." Again, sound great, but in this day and age, UCS is effectively recognised as one of a number of environmental NGOs that lobby in a not entirely non-partisan manner. Throwing another such entity into the mix isn't necessarily bad (depending on one's politics), but it seems doubtful that such lobbying is the path toward rational uptake of science in decision-making. Rather it's an attempt to swing decision-making toward someone else's brand of irrationality.