Has The Public Soured on Science ?
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Octaveoctave
 March 16 2025
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    I was struck by a recent article published on the Substack venue, Heterodox STEM: 

    Warnings of the Past, Foreshadowing the Future

    https://hxstem.substack.com/p/warnings-of-the-past-foreshadowing

    This article is about the post-modernist ideology souring the public's opinion of science, perhaps inevitably leading to the current funding cuts.

     

    It is true that this post-modernist nonsense has soured the public on academia and science.

    But, it is not the only factor. The pandemic and its response revealed some rot in the scientific enterprise, with one person in particular claiming that he personally was synonymous with "the science". Many in the public scoffed, and they were correct. This looked, and was, ridiculous.

    Climate change science has become entangled with politics, much to its detriment. Now the scientists have to dance to the tune of the activists and politicians. Now, for the third time that I am aware of, our best data in this area, the Keeling atmospheric carbon dioxide data, is at risk of losing funding. The previous two threats, amazingly, came from the Clinton-Gore administration and the Biden administration.

    If we are ever to consider terraforming or geoengineering, we need to understand these planetary systems. A wag has stated, "Geoengineering is a bad idea whose time has come". There are many of these efforts being considered, or currently underway, but here is a recent example I became aware of:

    After decades of fighting sulfur pollution, @MakeSunsets is pumping sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere to cool the planet!

    CO2 is a pollutant but this isn't?

    I am more than a bit skeptical of these attempts, which might be charitably classified as premature and ill-advised, perhaps.

    On top of this, numerous figures, including Peter Thiel, are noticing a decline in research and development productivity according to a variety of metrics:

    This Is the Final Taboo & It Can No Longer Be Denied | Peter Thiel

    Science is in trouble and it worries me.

    I was asked to keep this confidential

    No Scientific Innovation Since the 1920s…

    In addition, numerous speeches and comments by retired General John E. Hyten, former Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, US Government Department of Defense about the current state of innovation and research and development in the defense arena describe a variety of deficiencies.

    And these are just the tip of the iceberg. It is why I have been considering a new approach to R&D that might reinvigorate the process. We might do well to return to what worked previously, instead of staying mired in our current morass.

    #funding cuts #post-modernism #r&d cuts #public view of stem
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