Do you think we need more scientist politicians?

Question

I'd feel bad for the scientist that got plucked out of his lab to go and serve but the political community is in desparate need of a scientific perspective.

Right now it's just ideology vs ideology, broken promises, pandering, and lies.

The scientific method values evidenced based conclusions and is inherently non-partisan. So people who work in this environment have a much different perspective than those who spend their careers sucking up to those in power and pandering to those of lesser power.

Take a problem such as drug use. Instead of doing research on which strategy will most effectively deter use, they simply make the ideological decision that "drug prohibition = less use" implement that policy and then refuse to fix it because they don't want to admit they were wrong.

Or climate change, this issue has gotten so partisan I can't even tell what's legit information anymore.

So politics is not only hurting politics by ignoring science, but it's hurting science too.

Answer 1

Perhaps, but your thought(s) appear to be naïve. Here is why: When scientists graduate form school after 4 years of undergraduate school, 2 years (at least) for masters and another 2 years for PhD. They typically have a lot of student loans to pay off. Additionally, they probably want to enjoy some of the money they (hope to) make. And finding a job is tough. So when they are finally hired by the Sierra Club or Greenpeace or whomever, you better believe the results of any and all research WILL conclude that global warming is getting worse. Despite the result. Imagine one of these guys discovering that the polar ice caps were not melting at all. Do you seriously believe that the Sierra Club would allow the results to become public? And how do you think they would react if the intrepid scientist proclaimed the results? Get Fired! Same with scientists hired by Exxon. If they started finding that the burning of fossil fuel conclusively caused global warming they would get canned faster than you can shake a stick at it. Then they have to hit the pavement looking for a new job.

As for getting scientists to be our leader(s). You better believe Al Gore wants a Greenpeace scientist. But how do you think he would feel about an Exxon scientist?

The scientific method values the people who pay for the science. And the results of that science will be politically in line with the company signing the check.

Answer 2

God yes.

By 'scientist' I just mean a general definition of a person who investigates using empirical research and draws conclusions from that rather than using prepackaged opinions from their personal ideology.  Not necessarily someone who has had some kind of specialized training in a specific field.

But YES!

Some would say the last president we had who was even scientifically literate was Thomas Jefferson.  How sad is that?

I once read a quote that the only people fit to govern are the people who don't want it.

Maybe a better answer is to decentralize the power structure of the government as much as possible.  Science's power comes from the fact that no person or group is 'in charge' of science and thus no particular ideology can take over.

Answer 3

Yes, we do.  Most scientists, myself included, wouldn't be interested in entering politics, but fortunately there are a few that are.  And we need more of them.  Our current government seems oblivious to the fact that there actually are facts out there to work with, and you don't get to contradict them by being really, really loud or really 'believing' you're right.  Climate change is happening, whether you like it or not.  Abstinence doesn't work, no matter how much money you throw at it.  Alternative medicine wouldn't be considered alternative if it actually worked.  Fortunately, the FDA is starting to catch on to that.  But we need more people training in logical and critical thinking in charge, and fewer people who think that some god is telling them what to do.

Answer 4

- A politician is a specialist who works with the law and adapts it to meet with public demands and opinion.

- A scientist is a person who works to discover new facts about the natural world, or to prove existing ideas.  Scientists should not be politicians and it is a waste of a scientist to make one into a politician.  However, most university administrators start off as scientists and become politicians.

The best thing to do is to have a scientific counsel that will advise the politicians.  This is why the Presidential Cabinet was formed.  However, the needs of politics often override the facts and needs of science.  The Bush administration has used its scientific advisors to attempt to wipe out any references to global warming in government documents because they don't want to spend the money or force business to spend the money to correct the problem; hoping that if they stick their hand in the sand and deny the problem then it will go away.  Or it will become a problem for our ancestors to handle (Iike the national debt).

In this case scientists were corrupted by politicians to ignore the science that is as plain as the nose on your face.  Those scientists who tried to rebel and publish the truth got fired, lost funding, became unpopular with the administration and faced other problems.  Since the work of Al Gore and others almost all mainstream scientists believe in global warming and that man has had an active influence in it, but few republicans will claim to believe that.  John McCain is a maverick and he is only just beginning to announce that he believes in global warming and that it can be reduced by the activity of man.  I am not sure if he has admitted that mankind and our industrial practices may have incited it though.

A lot of science is done in Universities and the scientists hate that the administrators have to please the politicians to get the funding they need to do the work.  Companies involved in research and development face the same problems.

The governor of California listened to scientists and sponsored research into stem cell research, even though he is a republican and republicans oppose it.  The problem is that to create a stem cell you need to let a sperm cell fertilize an human egg.  The sperm and eggs are due to be tossed and so would never be used to create life; but the act of combing the two creates a few cells that could form a human life.  The cells are harvested long before an animal, never mind a fetus forms, but the Right to Life crowd insist that this is murder.  The political issues have slowed down a lot of research on stem cells and retarded the field.

Science should be independent of politicians, but they need to listen to scientific advisors.  I think that the training of each profession makes one not very well equipped to do the other.  A scientist would want to ignore public opinion, where a politician would be ruled by it, and have to do that to keep his job.  A scientist would want to go no matter where their research took them to the eventual conclusion and to the heck with the public pressure.  A politician would be influenced by politics and so only investigate popular notions and they would bend there science to bow to the public opinion.

We need to keep science free to explore, develop and research; but we need to have politicians listen to what they are doing and advising.  Then the politicians can enact it.