Slashdot Mirror
Vint Cerf and Others Form Advocacy Group
Omega writes "Vint Cerf, father of TCP/IP, and several Nobel Prize winners have formed a 527 committee called 'Scientists and Engineers for Change.' Among their major complaints are that the Bush administration has ignored and misused scientific findings to achieve political goals and that it has stifled scientific research. While the group isn't officially endorsing Kerry, Dr. Cerf points out it's pretty obvious what their goal is."
"While the group isn't officially endorsing Kerry, Dr. Cerf points out it's pretty obvious what their goal is."
Yes, it is obvious. They are circumventing campaign finance laws by campaigning for Senator Kerry, and against President Bush, in the guise of an issue advocacy group.
I thought we all decided 527s were evil and borderline-illegal ever since the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth started airing out Senator Kerry's dirty laundry. I guess they are a good thing this week.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
Cerf and confederates are quite right but the problem with science as a political issue is that a scientific development leads its political consequences by years, sometimes decades. Politicians and most businesses don't operate in that sort of timeframe. [And most politicians are getting most of their money from businesses? gawd, I can't tell flamebait from reasonable conjecture anymore!] So even though most of the jobs we do today and the way we fight wars today involve technology that was hot science 10 or 20 years ago, few of us are voting like science mattered, let alone being led by leaders who think that way. A poll at scienceblog.com shows that its readers strongly consider Bush harmful to scientific progress.
SLASHDOT: news for people who can't concentrate on work or have no life at all and got tired of yelling back at the TV.
The NY Times article glosses over what they're actually working towards, other than saying they don't want the US "losing the edge" in technology. That's then followed immediately by this paragraph:
Robert Hopkins, a spokesman for the Office of Science and Technology Policy, disputed that opinion. "I don't know where their accounting is coming from," Mr. Hopkins said. "The president has been a strong and generous supporter of science, increasing federal R&D budgets 44 percent to a record $132 billion."
A quick Googling doesn't show anything for their group's name, either.
What the hell? Are they just a few people that doesn't like Bush and decided to form a soft-money group to campaign against him? This article made it to Slashdot how, again?
--trb
What proof do they have that Kerry will be any different? Sure, there are "campaign promises," but really, how do they know? What specific promises has John Kerry made about scientific research?
This guy has a presense IDENTICAL to Timothy Leary (RIP). I thinkt hey were separated at birth. He's cool though..
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
In light of the whisper campaigns and the dirty tricks of copresident Rove, and the rhetoric of the RNC ("Iraq was our response to 9/11" etc), I don't know whether to hope liberal 527's play fair or not. I haven't seen enough politics to have an opinion other than blatant cynicism (all politics is dirty, right?). My gut says that a group headed by an engineer would be more interested in facts than slander... but does anyone win anything without slinging filth? Maybe it's my liberal bias talking but it seems to me that Rove & co think it's key, and it seems quite effective. Are people really swayed by "whisper campaigns" and personal slander, or is it just fodder?
"A witty saying proves nothing." ~Voltaire
"d'Oh!" ~Homer
> Vint Cerf, the father of TCP/IP, formed a 527 something-or-other, but he couldn't be bothered to make a fucking website!
527 Page Not Found
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
I had no idea he had fathered several Novel prize winners...
You mean, like This One ?
"When I grow up, I want to be a weirdo"
Scientists should not use their status to give political affiliation a veneer of legitimacy, as our opinions are no more valid than truck drivers, shop assistants or lumberjacks.
Except they are giving lectures on how this administration has been insanely worse than any previous administration when it comes to science. Former administrations simply ignored scientific reports from within the government they didn't like, knowing that few would read a 500 page report on some toad's habitat. But this administration has been so paranoid that they actually rewrite them. Plus there is increasing evidence that they use very shallow political judgements decide how grant money is allocated. This is an issue that effects scientist directly and they have just as much right as lumberjacks to talk about how the administration's contempt for them hurts truck drivers and shop assistants too.
This probably isn't the most important issue on most people's radar this year, but it's still an important issue if you, or someone you care for, plans to live on this planet 10, 20, 30 years from now. The world won't come to an end, but our economy will suffer, and hence people will die, if we don't remove our collective heads from the sand.)
Guess what? President Putin, of all people, has solidly supported the treaty and intends to sign it.
Want another example? The Bush administration refused to enact tough standards for automotive emissions and claims that they are unfeasible. Yet, the California government has just enacted such legislation. Furthermore, the technology is quite feasible. Both Honda and Mazda make ULEVs (ultra low emission vehicles).
The issue is not one of whether government should be funding or subsidizing research and development. We all have our opinions on such government intervention.
The issue is one of the Bush administration (and also previous Democratic administrations) simply making false statements about science and technology and then using those false statements to pursue policies that damage the environment.
The best example is nuclear power. It is clean and efficient and could substantially reduce our dependence on oil from Islamic thugs. Yet, science frauds in the government have effectively stopped the construction of any more nuclear power plants since the 1970s.
Really, we can blame only ourselves. We elect these idiots.
If you hate what is happening to our nation, the USA, then write the following on the November ballot.
president: Bill O'Reilly
vice-president: Tammy Bruce
My mother's boss got repeated phone calls aimed at suppressing her research because her research directly contradicted several tenets of leave no child left behind. The problem with objective scientific research is it frequently conflicts with current policy decisions. However, due to it's objective nature that can't spin it so they keep trying to suppress it.
One of the major themes of
x .p hp
http://scientistsandengineersforchange.org/inde
which is apparently Mr. Cerf's (and other's) website on this issue, is "Science isn't being given enough money." I wonder if these boys and girls realize that Joe Undecided typically takes that kind of approach as admission that this is a special or vested interest speaking, angry that it is being put on a diet after previously being given more generous portions of public funds. Scientists saying "Candidate A is bad because he doesn't give scientists enough money" might carry more weight than drug companies saying "Candidate A is bad because he won't support paying for drugs at the prices we want", but the essential self-interest involved in the opinion speaks loudly.
An illustration that scientists remain human and thus subject to their own delusions about themselves is the site's describing their movement as a "growing consensus". A consensus refers to agreement prevailing among all the parties concerned, and there are vastly more scientists in the US than the 60-some signatories on this site. A small slice with an opinion and an overwhelmingly larger portion with no expressed opinion does not constitute any variety "consensus" in the first place. If 90 fans of kiwi tarts all agree that kiwi tarts are great while 200+ million other Americans have no expressed opinion on the matter, there is no sensible reference to the American "consensus" on kiwi tarts, whether "growing" or otherwise. There is only a consensus among those 90 kiwi tart fans. The bizarre use of "growing consensus" ought to have alerted these people to the idea that they risk being accounted among the spin doctors, but they seem blind to their own illusions under the more generous assessment.
The difference between
fuck, apparently I lose :(
[o]_O
The example that struck me was the decision to axe Elizabeth Blackburn from the Bioethics council so that they could get a "consensus" from a "scientific" advisory body that was consistent with the anti-abortionists position on stem cell research. Of course, she was the only real scientist on the entire panel...
Right, because ACT, moveon.org, and CBS News would never ever consider lying about the other guy.
Well, maybe they do spew out obvious lies but that's different, because they... um... are the Good Guys.
It's all becoming clear.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
On the one hand Kerry says he is personally against abortion. On the other hand Kerry has support Roe v. Wade and keeping abortion legal.
Some people insist there is some contradiction in these two positions. These people see the world as black and white and like simple slogans such as, "you're either with us or against us."
Kerry has a personal, possibly religious, opinion on an issue. Why is it a sign of weakness or deception if he doesn't insist everyone in the US of A (or the world) adhere to that same viewpoint? The church says it's a sin to eat meat on Friday. Is it a travesty Kerry doesn't insist on that law as well? Opps, apparently that's not a sin anymore. Guess the pope likes to flip-flop on the issues.
Anyway, those who like to insist someone's political stands must conform to their religious beliefs should remember, the government operates by force. Laws are enforced at gun point, whether by police or armies. I know the US of A is not under martial law, I don't see tanks rolling down the street, so it's easy to forget.
Almost all the people work well in the construct of society almost all the time without the physical manifestation on the government's powers. But every law, every regulation, is backed with that final threat of enforcement. So when you take matters of faith and institute that into law, you are trying to ensure faith by force.
I'm not saying politicians should equivocate and play both sides of an issue without reproach. I'm saying we should expect a politician's personal actions to support what they are saying are their political and personal beliefs. Kerry's record supports what he says is his political stand. As to his personal actions and his religious beliefs--how he would council a family who was considering an abortion--I do not know. How does that make him a lying bastard?
Holding a religious belief makes you a person of faith. Using force, or the threat of force, to make everyone else conform to your religious belief makes you a wakko nut job. These are the people who shoot doctors, kill children, fly planes into buildings, and in general ruin the game for the rest of us.
Ahh, but Bush believes the much smaller camp of lumberjacks who say it's a Beech, just because he can sell it for more.
Lars T.
To the guy who modded me down from perfect to terrible Karma - Apple haters still suck
And since I'm on a roll.. I understand that the first blogged comments about the CBS documents appeared nearly instantaneously. For a moment, I thought "Hm, if I were Karl Rove and I wanted to tie off the damage to Bush over the Guard AWOL issue, would I consider slipping CBS some fake documents via a patsy, then slamming them for their coverage?" Yeah, that would work. Just conjecture, but hey, who needs reality when one has faith?
"A witty saying proves nothing." ~Voltaire
"d'Oh!" ~Homer
Regardless of what happens, Bush or Kerry, hence people will die. Thats just a fact of life, it ends.
I laughed at the weak who considered themselves good because they lacked claws.
Frankly, the fact that Kerry only had two daughters means he was breaking this one.
Then again he never tells us what he did does he?
Too many in this election are operating under the ideal of "Anyone but Bush" and are failing to seeing the possibility that it could actually get worse.
I am not a Bush voter but at least I know where he stands, contrasted to the fact I can't tell where Kerry stands on anything. Is there ANY candidate for the rest of us?
As for 527s, I have no objection other than the fact that they came about with that garbage Campaign Finance reform bill which was an assault on the Constitution by Congress.
Why should these groups be permitted to campaign while others cannot?
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
This is at least the third Slashdot story on scientists - including some 48 Nobel laureates and 62 National Medal of Science recipients - outraged at events of the last few years. Not merely ignoring science or believing one camp over another, we are talking about manipulation, supression, distortion, and general subverion of science. The vast majority of cases are motivated by purely business interests, though a few are motivated by religious/moral positions.
This is NOT a case of looking at the science and then deciding other economic/moral factors outweighted it. This is a case of actively sabotaging science itself. Of figuratively smashing a calculator with a hammer and twiddling the wires until 2+2 yeilds 3.
The Bush administration pressured the Environmental Protection Agency until it completely eliminated the section on climate change from the report. Stacked an enviornmental lead-level commitee with lead industry employees in order to raise permissable levels of lead pollution. Directed mining impact scientists to exclude certain information and reccommendations from their submissions and stated that if they did submit that information and reccommendations it would not be included in the report. Suppressed another EPA study that showed that the administration's proposed Clear Skies Act would do less than current law to reduce air pollution and mercury contamination of fish. The Department of Health and Human Services (including the Center for Disease Control if I am not mistaken) deleted information on disease prevention from its Web sites because it runs contrary to the president's preference for "abstinence only" sex education programs. The Office of Foreign Assets Control made it much more difficult for anyone from "hostile nations" to be published in the U.S., so some scientific journals will no longer consider submissions from them. The Office of Management and Budget has proposed overhauling peer review for funding of science that bears on environmental and health regulations--in effect, industry scientists would get to approve what research is conducted by the EPA. The National Cancer Institute misrepresented the scientific consensus that abortions do not cause breast cancer. A U.S. Department of Agriculture microbiologist who found antibiotic-resistant bacteria in the air near hog confinements was prevented from presenting his findings due to pressure from pork producers. The EPA told rescue personnel and residents that the air around Ground Zero in New York was safe soon after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, despite evidence to the contrary (all the sooner to reopen Wallstreet?).
Not only have scientific committees and panels been stacked with people with severe conflict-of-interest industry ties, but in some cases they are stacked with people who have absolutely no scientific background, because those people will supply the reports the administration wants to receive.
The list just goes on and on. All you have to do is hit Google News: Bush nobel science for countless links.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
This is at least the third Slashdot story on scientists
All approve by michael, who is vehemently anti-Bush and does not apologize for spreading his bias to Slashdot.
including some 48 Nobel laureates and 62 National Medal of Science recipients
Even they can be partisan. I'm sure there are just as many who support Bush.
What was Cerfs position at MCI/WorldCom during the MCI/WorldCom 'Issue'?
If you can equate Dr. Cerf and some 20 Nobel prize-winners and some of the nation's top scientists and engineers with the not-so-swift boat veterans for "truth" (funded and coordinated by Karl Rove as early as January of 2003), then you have got to be in complete denial of reality. In a related story John Chambers (a big backer of Pres. Bush in 2000 and CEO of CISCO Systems) announced that CISCO was developing a 325 million dollar technology center in China because as he put it "in ten years China will be the leading market in technology". Such an alarming development is only a small piece of a larger calamity in US Science and Technology policy that has Dr. Cerf and his fellow scientists so concerned with the Bush administration's record on science and technology. Of course, we can continue to receive our talking points from Karl Rove and blissfully disregard the warning signs, but don't expect to fare well as the rubber begins to meet the road. Bush has allowed China to eagerly become one of the largest holders of our debt (perhaps you haven't noticed the future of our economy and government budget is in hock because are living on money borrowed in large part from Chinese communists). Once they have technological superiority, now predicted by our own captains of industry to occur within 10 years, they won't need us or our debt. It will then occur to the world financial markets that our currency (the stuff used to pay for all the expensive imports for high end hardware for many of our weapons) will be next to worthless. Of course, discussion of any of this is off the table until after the November elections so no point bringing up during the debates. My guess is that Bush will continue to buy off the Chinese in a fashion he has similarly crafted for the Saudis, another large buyer of our debt. For the Saudis he has ruled out any conservation measures that would reduce the cost of oil, thereby allowing the Saudi and the bin-Laden family to reap huge profits in return for their political support. For the Chinese he will more than likely continue to pursue failed trade policies that will send even more high-tech jobs to China. (Don't get me wrong I'm a big holder of CISCO stock and I fully expect Bush to succeed). But then as P.T. Barnum said "There's a sucker born every minute." Seems to me that you appear to have been born yesterday.
Here's the official hard line:
6. When "these precautionary measures have not had their effect or in which they were not possible," and the person in question, with obstinate persistence, still presents himself to receive the Holy Eucharist, "the minister of Holy Communion must refuse to distribute it" (cf. Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts Declaration "Holy Communion and Divorced, Civilly Remarried Catholics" [2002], nos. 3-4). This decision, properly speaking, is not a sanction or a penalty. Nor is the minister of Holy Communion passing judgement on the person's subjective guilt, but rather is reacting to the person's public unworthiness to receive Holy Communion due to an objective situation of sin.
[N.B. A Catholic would be guilty of formal cooperation in evil, and so unworthy to present himself for Holy Communion, if he were to deliberately vote for a candidate precisely because of the candidate's permissive stand on abortion and/or euthanasia. When a Catholic does not share a candidate's stand in favour of abortion and/or euthanasia, but votes for that candidate for other reasons, it is considered remote material cooperation, which can be permitted in the presence of proportionate reasons.]
Any questions?
Late reply.
Show me where I said it was "Bush bashing", partisan, or a call to have Bush replaced. Please, show me. Again, like I mentioned, the reason the story appeared on Slashdot 3 times is because michael is heavily anti-Bush, and he flat out admits his bias.
I defy you to find Nobel laureates who reject this Restoring Scientific Integrity paper
I actually did find well written, long, and plausible response written by several political professionals (don't know if it included Nobel laureates or not, but generally, far and away, more papers are written to attack than defend). I I also don't care to look it up again for you. You wrongly judged me from a short, simple comment, so I do not consider you to be a rational enough to understand a complex issue. So why bother?
And saying Bush is against Science is absurd. That's like saying Bush is against the economy or against children. You only show how ignorantly blinded by anger you are with such a statement.
the reason the story appeared on Slashdot 3 times
:)
I would be troubled if that joint statement on scientific integrity *hadn't* run on Slashdot, even if it were somehow pro-Bush and anti-Kerry. If a scientist-based 527 group formed pro-Bush/anti-Kerry I would certainly want to see that on Slashot as well. I'd be quite interested in seeing what science issues motivated it. I don't recall the third story off hand.
Michael may have been dancing in glee at posting them, but I do not think the appearance of these stories on Slashdot is in any way improper. If Slashdot suppresses a signifigant pro-Bush or anti-Kerry story that is science / tech / computer related then let me know, I'll be pissed at Slashdot.
Show me where I said it was "Bush bashing", partisan
The joint statement on scientific integrity signed by 48 Nobel laureates and thousands of other scientists - you dissmissed it with "Even they can be partisan". You did not use the phrase "Bush-bashing", but dismissing it as "partisan" isn't too far off.
Your comment about Michael "spreading his bias to Slashdot" seems to me to sweep the "bias" brush across the stories and the scientists in them as well. I admit it can also be more narrowly construed.
or a call to have Bush replaced.
The reason I indicated it was not an attack on the president was that you dismissed it as a partisan attack - presumably against the president. The joint statement was citing a signifigant science problem. The fact that it reflected badly on Bush is incidental. They were not promoting one party or president over another. I'm sure many of them would have been perfectly happy for Bush to remedy the issue and remain in office.
I was a bit irked at such a casual and empty dismissal of such an authoritative group and on the subject of their own feild. I cannot imagine a more credibible source on the subject of science than Nobel science laureates. There are less than 200 living Nobel science laureates world wide. I seriously doubt your claim "there are just as many who support Bush" in terms of disputing the integrity of that joint statement, that it was nothing but "partisan".
They included numerous examples to back their claim. Since that joint statement I have only been seeing more such examples coming to light, not a refutation of those examples.
I actually did find well written, long, and plausible response
don't care to look it up again for you.
If you change your mind I'd be most interested in reading it.
written by several political professionals
If you do come up with a link I'll try not to hold that against them. Even polititians can tell the truth occationally
A scientist who abuses the reputation and integrity of science for political ends is far worse than a polititian currupting science for political ends. If that joint statement was honestly citing an issue of scientific integrity, if the current scientist lobbying group is genuinely addressing a science problem, then dragging science into politics is merely degrading. If a second comparable group of scientists came out and said the first group were lying then I'd dispair at the appalling violatation of scientific integrity by one or both groups.
Bush is against Science is absurd
You only show how ignorantly blinded by anger you are with such a statement.
That is not the statement I made.
I said bad on science, not "against" science. I said he - or at least his administration - has little or no respect for science. A large number of the most highly respected and credible people within the scientific community made a joint statement that this administration has engaged in *unprecidented* levels of suppression and manipulation and curruption of science. Assuming they weren't lying, that is being very bad on science.
Hmmm.... I guess you COULD say Bush is "against" science, but in
- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.