Anywhoo, just wanted to say hi and welcome to the world of blog.

Risa you are being wrong in suggesting that only the guys with a hat labeled “politician” would play politics, and that the guys with a hat called “scientist” on their head would strictly play in scientific ways.

Nothing could be more wrong than judging people based on the type of hats they wear, as I told Mark many times. Scientists are pretty good at playing politics and politicians are quite capable of playing science. There plenty of cases of scientists turned politicians, and physicists are the most likely ones to do so. Do you think stuffs like Global Warming Theory are really science, not crackpot, just because it is main stream? A super tzumani happened and some experts jumped out and cry “global warming”. It’s only because the idea was too obviously silly that it did not spread. However those were ideas suggested by people wearing a hat called “experts” in the field.

Now, money and politics are never separable. If you are trying to tell me that big science can try to use the money, without really having politics involved. It is like saying I can wash my hands without getting my hands wet.

Politics are ALWAYS involved in big money big science. But the influence may not always be negative. By chance some times it pushes it further away from scientific truth and some times it does push closer to scientific truth. In the case of global warmings theory, I think the recent congressional inquiry may actually force scientists to be a little bit more honest, which is good. BTW I am definitely no fan of any Republican of any type.

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How did the universe get here and where is it going? Is string theory viable? And most importantly, how did the fundamentalist dopes get theology and politics in my science?
The answers to these questions and more …. are a mystery for now. But lo, the n

It might be more precise to say that you’ve noted an increase in the politicization of science of a particular, and insidious, kind.

I don’t think you’re being reasonable if you’re implying that scientists thought politics was “going their way” when they were assigned to work on The Bomb. Also, whenever a new technological threat appears, I think the scientists often try to abate it.

Now about science and politics. I wonder why that sounds
like news to you. Money and politics are twin sisters
and they never separate. If there is no money, there is
no politics; if there is small money, there’s small
politics. If there’s big money, there’s big politics.
Politics is all about how to split the money and other
interests and benefits, and nothing else. Don’t you
realize that?

Now, science costs money, that’s where politics comes to
play. Big science involves big money, and that means big
politics involvement. It has alway been that way, ever
since modern science became a full fleged modern industry
employing millions of people. So no, don’t tell me it’s
news that politics get involved in science. It has always
been that way.

The point is: when politics goes the same way the
scientists want, they never complain about politics
gets involved in science. Only when the direction of
politics turned, and they no longer find politics fitting
their tastes, will those scientists start to complain
about politics. Has there been any complaint when physics
was developed in how to make the most destructive nuclear
weapons that would one day wipe out the human race? Has
there been any complaint when chemists developed
pesticides that pollutes the whole planet? Huge politics
was also involved but scientists never complained then.

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