How Science Works

P. Z. Myers takes the occasion of President Obama reversing the Stem cell ban to explain how science works to people who are fundamentally opposed to free inquiry.

The stem cells to be used for this research come from the 600,000 embryos every year that are produced in the US for in vitro fertilization attempts, and which are discarded anyway. Although some on the right say that these eggs can be implanted in women and raised as children, only 60 a year or so are "adopted." That means that all those religious persons who say that they believe that human life begins at conception are hypocrites, standing idly by and allowing a virtual holocaust to occur annually, since they are not adopting these frozen embryos and raising them.

They also don't put filters on their toilets to try to save the millions of embryos that prematurely detach from the uterus wall in very early miscarriages, some of which scientists might be able to somehow save if the proper precautions were taken. I mean, if millions of adults were drowned in toilets annually, wouldn't we put in special safety procedures to stop it from happening?

I think the likelihood is that the strange new doctrine of life beginning at conception is mainly intended to keep women barefoot and pregnant, since no obvious heroic
measures are actually being taken by any significant number of believers to save
the embryos. The belief that life begins at conception is recent, irrational, and has frankly highly impractical consequences.

Under the Bush administration, scientific reasoning took a backseat to politics, as administration officials repeatedly manipulated the scientific process and distorted findings. This was seen in reporting on climate change, environmental issues, and even the run-up to the war with Iraq (remember how those aluminum tubes were pushed).

This manipulation was also seen in the stem cell research debate. Bush came to his decision on stem cells in 2001, after consulting with Karl Rove, not talking to his scientists.

Appearing on national television, White House officials repeatedly distorted the facts behind ES research. Even Bush's own scientists publicly broke with him on the issue. Obama's decision marks a long-awaited shift restoring science to public policy. Yesterday, Obama signed a Presidential Memorandum calling on the director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) to "make sure officials who deal with science and technology policy are selected because of their expertise rather than their politics."

Dark Ages Of Science Nearing An End

President Barack Obama today took a couple of steps to reinstating science to it's rightful place in the decision making process as he signed an executive order that lifted the limits on federal funding for stem-cell research and a new memorandum addressing the role of scientific research in his administration, and throughout the government.

These were further steps in clarifying President Obama's broader vision of how government engages with science.

As David Neiwert of Crooks and Liars says the War on Science is finally over and Science won.

As President Obama signed the executive order that lifted the limits on federal funding for stem-cell research he said:

This Order is an important step in advancing the cause of science in America. But let’s be clear: promoting science isn’t just about providing resources – it is also about protecting free and open inquiry. It is about letting scientists like those here today do their jobs, free from manipulation or coercion, and listening to what they tell us, even when it’s inconvenient – especially when it’s inconvenient. It is about ensuring that scientific data is never distorted or concealed to serve a political agenda – and that we make scientific decisions based on facts, not ideology.

By doing this, we will ensure America’s continued global leadership in scientific discoveries and technological breakthroughs. That is essential not only for our economic prosperity, but for the progress of all humanity.

While hosting the White House ceremony to announce the change, the president also explained a new memorandum he has signed addressing scientific integrity itself. President Obama stipulated that his memorandum is meant to restore "scientific integrity to government decision-making." He noted that this is the beginning of a process of ensuring his administration bases its decision on sound science; appoints scientific advisers based on their credentials, not their politics; and is honest about the science behind its decisions.

"Promoting science isn't just about providing resources, it is also about protecting free and open inquiry," Obama said. "It is about letting scientists like those here today do their jobs, free from manipulation or coercion, and listening to what they tell us, even when it's inconvenient especially when it's inconvenient. It is about ensuring that scientific data is never distorted or concealed to serve a political agenda and that we make scientific decisions based on facts, not ideology."

Alex Koppelman notes that this memorandum carries with it an "unsubtle ... repudiation of the Bush administration and its attitude towards science."

These are just more examples of the change that President Obama promised. Back when he introduced a Nobel Prize-winning physicist as his choice for Energy Secretary, President Obama said:

"His appointment should send a signal to all that my administration will value science, we will make decisions based on the facts."

Soon after, he introduced a really impressive science team, and soon after that, the president devoted one of his weekly multimedia addresses to the issue:

"The truth is that promoting science isn't just about providing resources -- it's about protecting free and open inquiry. It's about ensuring that facts and evidence are never twisted or obscured by politics or ideology. It's about listening to what our scientists have to say, even when it's inconvenient -- especially when it's inconvenient. Because the highest purpose of science is the search for knowledge, truth and a greater understanding of the world around us."

These are the reasons why I say that the Dark Age of anti-intellectualism pushed by George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and the Republican party is coming to an end.

Sarah Palin is a Blithering Idiot

Yesterday Sarah Palin delivered her first (and probably last) major policy address in Pittsburgh, PA. This speech was about Children with special needs, which we are told will be an area she works on if this country is unlucky enough to have her as a Vice President. In the speech she promised to care for “children with special needs who have been set apart and excluded” and to “fully fund the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.”

During the speech Sarah Palin went off on a weird tangent and mocked fruit fly research, during a general tirade against earmarks. This was a speech about autism and disabilities, so why would Palin mock "fruit fly research" as wasteful pork? Didn't anybody in the campaign do any research? Fruit fly research, pardon the pun, has been very fruitful for scientific research. It is one of the foundations of modern biological research.

In her remarks Palin said:

This is a matter of how we prioritize the money that we spend. We've got a three trillion dollar budget, and Congress spends some 18 billion dollars a year on earmarks for political pet projects. That's more than the shortfall to fully fund the IDEA. And where does a lot of that earmark money end up? It goes to projects having little or nothing to do with the public good -- things like fruit fly research in Paris, France...

Here is what science blog BiochemicalSoul.com had to say:

The fruit fly (Drosophila) has probably been the single most important organism for the study of genetics for over a century now. Almost everything we know about genetics, development, cell biology, neuroscience, and every other field of biology has strong roots in previous and current work on Drosophila. The fruit fly is one of a small handful of “standard model organisms” used by thousands of scientists across the world to learn how our bodies, organs, genes, and proteins work. Most of what we know about how a single fertilized cell becomes the amazingly complex beings we are comes from studies initially done in Drosophila. Vast amounts of our understanding of the brain (and brain disorders, diseases, and defects) also come from initial studies in fruit flies.

In fact, recent research from my own graduate alma mater, the University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill, on fruit fly brains has had an impact on the understanding of autism and has boosted autism research:

“[S]cientists at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine have shown that a protein called neurexin is required for..nerve cell connections to form and function correctly. The discovery, made in Drosophila fruit flies may lead
to advances in understanding autism spectrum disorders, as recently, human
neurexins have been identified as a genetic risk factor for autism.”

To decry research in [condescending and amazed tone] “the fruit fly” is a testament to the true idiocy of this woman and to the failure of our public education system.
In fact, her own father, Chuck Heath, was a biology teacher – obviously a complete failure of a biology teacher.

Keith Olbermann covered this on his show Friday night in his first segment, and the he interviewed Richard Wolfe of Newsweek. Richard had the best line when he said "This is the most mindless, ignorant, uninformed comment that we have seen from Governor Palin so far, and there's been a lot of competition for that prize."

Watch here:


Why has the Republican Party made the decision to not respect science? It is too pervasive throughout the party, to have not been a conscious decision by the party. It's one more example of the intellectual laziness that pervades the GOP. Why do modern Republicans respect stupidity and ignorance?

Palin’s dismissal of all earmarks in her remarks were also dishonest. A simple search of the Office of Management and Budget website shows that there are at least 19 autism-related projects in the 2009 budget:

- $250K to Parents as Teachers National Center, St. Louis, MO, to develop research-based materials and training for home visiting professionals for families of children with autism
- $200K for Southern Penobscot Regional Program for Children with Exceptionalities, Bangor, ME, for services for families with autistic children
- $100K to Marywood University, Scranton, PA, for campus-based autism education programs

Not every earmark is a waste of money, not every earmark is pork. And history shows that when it comes to priorities, there is little history that backs up Palin's grand statements in her speech.

John McCain and Sarah Palin run around all over the country giving speeches where they try to scare Americans about the dangers of expanding SCHIP and Medicaid for poor and sick children, yet this "evil socialism" would be avoided if the government is able to fund medical research or other special needs initiatives, to reduce disease and cure genetic disorders.

Palin’s rhetoric in the speech also does not square with her record, McCain’s individual market-centric health care plan, and penchant for gutting all forms of government programs.