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New page: Politics, Religion, and Science Some people are apparently under the impression that scientific findings are heavily influenced by political leanings. Altho...
Politics, Religion, and Science
[[Talk:theory of relativity|Some people]] are apparently under the impression that scientific findings are heavily influenced by political leanings. Although the funding of scientific endeavors, and policy implementations based upon scientific findings, ARE political in nature, I contend that science as a discipline is not, and that all honest scientists will have the same findings, regardless of their personal beliefs.
Let me be clear that by "science," I mean an impartial, falsifiable effort to model the observable (measurable) universe.
==Reasoning==
#''How would political bias be intentionally introduced?''
It's unclear to me how one would introducing political beliefs into their scientific findings. To do so, a scientist would have to
a.) Identify a current political issue he or she personally feels strongly about (easy to do)
b.) Relate that issue to his or her specific field of interest (hard for many scientists, but perhaps easy for others, such as climate scientists)
c.) Perform a pertinent experiment whose outcome could influence public opinion or those in power (harder still, but possible)
d.) Spin the conclusions in such a way as to deceive the scientific and political communities.
Part d.) is the kicker.
#''Nature is consistent''
Science is, at its core, the study of the natural world. The laws of the natural world are, presumably, the same everywhere in the universe (if they're different, then what's the point of even trying to do science in the first place?). Injecting bias into scientific findings is therefore a dicey proposition, since findings
If science had a political tilt, then we would expect the scientists of one political system to arrive at different con
[[Talk:theory of relativity|Some people]] are apparently under the impression that scientific findings are heavily influenced by political leanings. Although the funding of scientific endeavors, and policy implementations based upon scientific findings, ARE political in nature, I contend that science as a discipline is not, and that all honest scientists will have the same findings, regardless of their personal beliefs.
Let me be clear that by "science," I mean an impartial, falsifiable effort to model the observable (measurable) universe.
==Reasoning==
#''How would political bias be intentionally introduced?''
It's unclear to me how one would introducing political beliefs into their scientific findings. To do so, a scientist would have to
a.) Identify a current political issue he or she personally feels strongly about (easy to do)
b.) Relate that issue to his or her specific field of interest (hard for many scientists, but perhaps easy for others, such as climate scientists)
c.) Perform a pertinent experiment whose outcome could influence public opinion or those in power (harder still, but possible)
d.) Spin the conclusions in such a way as to deceive the scientific and political communities.
Part d.) is the kicker.
#''Nature is consistent''
Science is, at its core, the study of the natural world. The laws of the natural world are, presumably, the same everywhere in the universe (if they're different, then what's the point of even trying to do science in the first place?). Injecting bias into scientific findings is therefore a dicey proposition, since findings
If science had a political tilt, then we would expect the scientists of one political system to arrive at different con