Science
(Don’t) Stick to the Science
Exploring the Interdependence of Science, Politics and Society
Science is the pursuit of knowledge, knowledge is power, and power is political — thus, science is political.
Science and politics are like two poles of our society — inseparable but seemingly unrelated.
We have consistently enforced the line between science and politics. After all, science is supposed to be “unbiased” and “objective”, utterly untainted by emotions. But first we need to establish the distinction between Science and Scientific methodology.
Scientific methodology is a tool to create verifiable information. Science, on the other hand, is surrounded by a political concept — funding. Science has depended on politics from the minute someone decided to do research and ask others to help fund the process.
Science and Society: The Dynamic Duo
For decades, society has controlled who can be a scientist. There are countless examples of women excluded from textbooks and stages despite their crucial contributions to various fields. For example, Rosalind Franklin discovered DNA’s double helical structure. And while you can find this diagram in any science textbook worldwide, her name is most likely not included in the same texts. Moreover, the poor treatment of some socio-economic groups, including refugees and immigrants, robs many bright minds of the chance to show their true potential.
Furthermore, society decides how research is conducted. Researchers often resort to unethical or immoral methods in their pursuit of knowledge. The polio vaccine was developed on unethically gathered HeLa cells. There are also numerous cases of non-consensual experimentation on patients. Today these bring with them harsh punishments, primarily thanks to lawmakers.
Society also controls what research is valuable. In most democracies, the party in power determines what fields see more funding and acceptance. There are numerous examples of such practices, even in history. The Soviet government helped Lysenko rise to popularity. He was a pseudoscientist who rejected basic biological rules because his theories supported the principles of Marxism. This gave rise to the term Lysenkoism, referring to manipulation of scientific results to justify ideologies. Unfortunately, the term is becoming increasingly relevant today.
All around us, we see policymakers blatantly deny data-based scientific findings simply because it does not support their ideology. Just take a look at all the anti-vaxxers or climate change deniers. This phenomenon is because of the lack of distinction between personal and objective truths.
Each individual has a belief system, meaning they have their own philosophies. These are their truths. These could include the God(s) they believe in or the political party they support. But to impose these on others is an attack on their freedom.
Policies need to be made on objective truths — backed by scientific research — and not on the policy makers’ personal truths.
The Government: The Third Musketeer
But what do we do with all these objective truths science gives us? This is a deeply political question. Finding out how pollution harms people and the environment is scientifically motivated; but what we can do to combat this and ensure the situation doesn’t worsen is a political question.
Politics is composed of numerous scientific questions, but in the end, it is the policymakers who decide how the knowledge is used. Advancement in science is of no use without an enlightened government willing to use the available facts and figures to positively impact the masses’ lives.
Thomas Malthus famously said that an exponentially growing population would eventually outstrip the food supply, which only increased linearly. This formed the basis of society until people realised they could have the food supply grow exponentially, thanks to scientific advancements. Today we are producing more food than ever before. Science has successfully solved the problem. However, thousands are still starving because the distribution channels are biased, corrupt or inefficient.
In an ideal democracy, society forms politics, politics controls science, and science informs society. Finding the balance between these three forces is one of the biggest challenges for humanity.
Regulatory Science: A Middle Ground?
Somewhere at the intersection of politics and science lies regulatory science.
Regulatory science is built on scientific and technical foundations and sets regulations for various industries. Ironically it is the most distrusted science division for a good reason. In regulatory science, there are always winners and losers. For example, an upper limit on mercury content in a particular product will mean some manufacturers spend more, causing a dent in their overall profits. On the other hand, this is a win for all the consumers.
This win-lose situation, combined with powerful forces on either side, makes it highly susceptible to harmful decisions being taken.
This phenomenon is also seen among independent scientists. One famous example is Ivan Pavlov. Pavlov stopped openly opposing Joseph Stalin towards the end of his life to protect the scientists in his lab from Stalin’s purges.
A less forgiving example is that of Wernher von Braun. Braun played a vital role in publicising space travel and building some of NASA’s earlier rockets. He has, however, been excluded from NASA’s history because he used slave labour from concentration camps to build his rockets.
Thus, scientists can sometimes ignore their moral obligations to continue their research, and thus create the need for a system of checks on scientific bodies. These checks can not be done through another official body as that would soon follow a similar path; instead, this role has to be taken up by the public.
An inspiring example comes from a small village in Argentina where a group of mothers began suspecting the sudden increase in cancer cases. They doubted the pesticide brand Roundup but were dismissed by doctors due to the lack of proof.
They then began conducting their own research by annotating a map with coloured markers to show various conditions like suspected cancer cases, deaths due to cancer, deaths due to unknown causes, etc. The map showed clear signs of more people having cancer near agricultural fields. They then formed a hybrid forum, i.e. a group consisting of lay people (unable to convince experts due to inefficient methodologies) and experts (who had yet to come to conclusions due to lack of evidence). Together they filed lawsuits and, after a long struggle, got regulations in place.
In Conclusion
While it is essential to place faith in our scientists, it is important to not blindly trust them. As a society, we have decided to pool our hard-earned money together and entrust it to those who work tirelessly to expand our collective knowledge. And that is political.
