For Science!
- Thread starter Printimus
- Start date
ya well, at this rate.... might as well live out 1984 as well.
DarthMatter
Space Marshal
Not the ones I watch for entertainment, but there are other channels for news.
GeneticPredator
Space Marshal
While there is some political charged science like global warming and GMO's there is still vast areas of science pushing boundaries, from AI learning, robotics, life extension, utilizing the retrovirus for genetic manipulation and finding cures.
So we can get bogged down with the debate over creation/evolution. Does humans have a measurable impact on the global environment and should we be concerned about the use of GMO's. And while they are important we shouldn't loose focus on the fact that technology and science continue to race forward. And perhaps what we are seeing is a reaction to the unknown due to how fast we are moving and the huge uncertainty it brings and not a truly anti science mentality, just fear of the unknown because they cannot keep up.
So we can get bogged down with the debate over creation/evolution. Does humans have a measurable impact on the global environment and should we be concerned about the use of GMO's. And while they are important we shouldn't loose focus on the fact that technology and science continue to race forward. And perhaps what we are seeing is a reaction to the unknown due to how fast we are moving and the huge uncertainty it brings and not a truly anti science mentality, just fear of the unknown because they cannot keep up.
Radegast74
Space Marshal
lol, I hadn't heard it called the Dunning-Kruger effect before. I read their article years ago, and it is one of my FAVORITE articles of all time. I thought it was really well done.
Warning: boring psychology article ahead...ready at your own risk...I always hate experiments using colleges students as the experimental & controls, but their methodology was excellent.
"Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One's Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-Assessments"
Abstract:
People tend to hold overly favorable views of their abilities in many social and intellectual domains. The authors suggest that this overestimation occurs, in part, because people who are unskilled in these domains suffer a dual burden: Not only do these people reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their incompetence robs them of the metacognitive ability to realize it. Across 4 studies, the authors found that participants scoring in the bottom quartile on tests of humor, grammar, and logic grossly overestimated their test performance and ability. Although their test scores put them in the 12th percentile, they estimated themselves to be in the 62nd. Several analyses linked this miscalibration to deficits in metacognitive skill, or the capacity to distinguish accuracy from error. Paradoxically, improving the skills of participants, and thus increasing their metacognitive competence, helped them recognize the limitations of their abilities.
DarthMatter
Space Marshal
Sure, there are political scientific topics.
However, Global warming is a bad example as there is nothing political about it, in of itself.
It's happening, it's humans and it's measurable.
If you want I could go through all available parameters (that I remember) and go into detail why it's humans and not the Suns cycles, volcanoes, Earths tilt changing and so on.
But that might warrant it's own thread.
Where it could (or rather the only place that debate should) be political is in debating how governments should react. Should they punish corporations that are large sources of green house gases, or should we just let the market sort it self out.
(IMO, we tried letting the market sort itself. It didn't do it quick enough. Now governments have to take action as a last resort to minimize the damage.)
GMOs I agree with you more.
The technology itself should not be politically charged, and we should definitely use it in controlled environments. If nothing else to continue studying different techniques pros and cons.
Using the methods available correctly will result in changes to genome, yes. But that is something humans have done for centuries. Look at the Belgian Blue cow. It's not GMO, but has been created through breeding. But breeding is like taking two genomes and making them combine using a sledge hammer. You can't tell what the end result is going to be, unless you have the complete genome mapped and know how every gene is affected by each other and so on. And even then you can only use it to calculate statistics of what the mix will be.
On the other hand, you can extract exactly what genes you want and put them in where you want with modern gene editing.
The hard part is, again, to be able to completely know how a small change changes the big picture. And this is something that should and is continually studied.
Where this should get political is in the techniques different uses. And this is much of where I see the political side of the debate also taking place. (Compared to the Climate change debate, in which "What is our fault" is debated. Which is a scientific debate that people are trying to debate like it's a political issue/debate.)
Should corporations be able to stop farmers from planting seeds that the farmers has gathered from crops they grew, because the corporation has a patent on the seed?
Should you be able to get at patent on genome?
And so on.
There is also the ethical side of the debate on GMO, if you want to count it as political. Gene editing humans and so on. Good debate to have.
This might have become me just rambling again. Sorry!
I'm glad you brought up these two questions
For me as much as I am on the fence over Gene manipulation due to the vast uncertainty in regards to the long term effects of messing with our food. The very real and present issue is genome patents and how they are effecting the markets here and now. How farmers are not able to use seeds from their fields due to GMO cross pollination resulting in the seeds now being restricted due to patents.
If you wish to take this to another thread we can. But I think you have proven my point that it is still very much a hot topic while very important causes such a strong emotional reaction that limits discovery.
DarthMatter
Space Marshal
It is a hot topic, yes. But it shouldn't be, was the point I was trying to say.
The point that makes me... go off... about it, is the debate itself, not the topic the debate is about
