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Benjamin Franklin, Civic Scientist

Posted by michael on from the no-quoting-please dept.

Guinnessy writes "Neal Lane, the ex-science advisor to President Clinton, has written an article in Physics Today magazine, that explains why he thinks Benjamin Franklin, was an early American prototype of a civic scientist, i.e. someone who would 'probably address many of today's concerns with wisdom, practicality, and a deep sense of civic responsibility.' Ironically the same issue has an example of a modern day civic scientist, a profile of Richard Meserve, a physicist who became a lawyer. Interesting stuff."

6 of 155 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Grammar? by EvanED · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    "There should me no comma before *either* 'that' or 'was an early'."

    Um, yeah. That should say "There should be..." in the last sentence. Figures it's a grammar post that I make a typo in...

  2. Re:Grammar? by Soko · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    There should me no comma before *either* 'that' or 'was an early'.

    Curse of the Grammer Nazis, dude. Get used to it. The Karma police will be along shortly. ;)

    Soko

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  3. Re:Grammar? by Second+Vampyre · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    If Mr. EvanED was paid to post comments on Slashdot, he'd certainly be fired now.

  4. Re:ROY is DEAD (of Sigfried and Roy) by The+Clockwork+Troll · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    That is horrible. There's only one thing to say at a time like this - GO GET EM TIGER! ROY IS ON TEH SPOKE!!!~`1

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  5. Urban legend or real smack? by kamapuaa · · Score: 0, Offtopic
    Benjamin Franklin definitely did positive things for the US. However, his advocacy of using massive attack dogs and smallpox-infected blankets when dealing with Indians makes him a difficult figure to accept as a modern-day role model.

    I've also heard that he fucked young boys, and was involved with infamous rake's clubs while in England. However, are these charges real, or just an urban legend?

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    Slashdot: providing anti-social weirdos a soapbox, since 1997.
  6. Re:Safari by edalytical · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    No the page is not valid HTML there are 93 errors.

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