Culture War By Proxy

John McCain thinks he’s hit on a good strategy for the upcoming Presidential campaign: make fun of scientists.

WEST GLACIER, Mont. — If you’ve heard Sen. John McCain’s stump speech, you’ve surely heard him talk about grizzly bears. The federal government, he declares with horror and astonishment, has spent $3 million to study grizzly bear DNA. “I don’t know if it was a paternity issue or criminal,” he jokes, “but it was a waste of money.”

A McCain campaign commercial also tweaks the bear research: “Three million to study the DNA of bears in Montana. Unbelievable.”

Three million whole dollars! Just think what we could do with so much money.

The Washington Post article goes on to note, what should come as no surprise to anyone reading here, that the grizzly bear study is actually very interesting and worthwhile science. The researchers, led by Katherine Kendall of the U.S. Geological Survey, performed the first accurate survey of grizzlies in the Northern Continental Divide ecosystem. They discovered the happy news that this formerly endangered species had substantially rebounded, thanks in part to three decades of conservation efforts. The kind of thing that you actually have to go out and collect data to discover.

Completely beside the point of course. John McCain doesn’t care about grizzly bears one way or the other, and to him 3 million dollars is chump change. What he cares about his the symbolism — enough to highlight it in his stump speech and TV commercials.

McCain is tapping into a deep strain of anti-intellectualism among American voters. Some of us tend to take for granted that questions about the workings of the natural world should be addressed by scientists using scientific methods, and that attacks on science must be motivated by external forces such as economic or religious interests. What scientists tend to underestimate is the extent to which many people react viscerally against science just because it is science. Or, more generally, because it is seen as part of an effort on the part of elites to force their worldview on folks who are getting along just fine without all these fancy ideas, thank you very much.

In the old-time (1980’s) controversies about teaching creationism in schools, pre-Intelligent-Design, one of the most common arguments was that school boards should have “local control” over the curriculum. Defenders of evolution replied that this was clearly a ruse to disguise a religious anti-science agenda. Which may have been true for some of the national organizations behind the movement; but for many school boards and communities, it really was about local control. They didn’t want to be told what to teach their kids by some group of coastal elitists with Ph.D.s, and creationism was a way to fight back.

Don’t believe me? They are happy to tell you so to your face. Consider the case of John Derbyshire, columnist for the National Review Online. Derbyshire is admittedly a complicated case, on the one hand writing books about the Riemann hypothesis and on the other proudly proclaiming that he reads Blondie and Hagar the Horrible for “insights into the human condition.” And he is also generally pro-science and pro-evolution in particular. But nevertheless — despite the fact that he is smart and educated enough to understand that evolution is “right” in the old-fashioned sense of right and wrong — he will state explicitly (and quote himself later in case you missed it) that

I couldn’t care less whether my president believes in the theory of evolution. In fact, reflecting on some recent experiences, I’m not sure that I wouldn’t prefer a president who didn’t. [Emphasis in original.]

And why is that? I wrote a whole blog post explaining why it is important that the President understand and accept the workings of the natural world, but obviously Derbyshire disagrees. The reason why is that scientific understanding is too often the bailiwick of elite leftist snobs.

Possibly as a result of having grown up in the lower classes of provincial England, I detest snobbery. I mean, I really, viscerally, loathe it. This is one reason I hate the Left so much…

Invited to choose between having my kids educated, my car fixed, or my elderly relatives cared for by (a) people of character, spirit, and dedication who believe in pseudoscience, or (b) unionized, time-serving drudges who believe in real science, which would I choose? Invited to choose between a president who is (a) a patriotic family man of character and ability who believes the universe was created on a Friday afternoon in 4,004 B.C. with all biological species instantly represented, or (b) an amoral hedonist and philanderer who “loathes the military” but who believes in the evolution of species via natural selection across hundreds of millions of years, which would I choose? Are you kidding?

The real point is not who you would choose in such a situation — it’s that Derbyshire sincerely believes that these are the kinds of choices one typically needs to make. One the one hand: character, spirit, dedication, and pseudoscience. On the other: amoral, hedonistic drudges (sic) who believe in real science.

Derbyshire is not alone. Conservative commentator Tom Bethell has published a Politically Incorrect Guide to Science in which he takes down such Leftist conspiracies as evolution, global warming, AIDS research, and (um) relativity. At Tech Central Station, Lee Harris pens a passionate defense of being stupid more generally:

Today, no self-respecting conservative wants to be thought stupid, not even by the lunatics on the far left. Yet there are far worse things than looking stupid to others—and one of them is being conned by those who are far cleverer than we are. Indeed, in certain cases, the desire to appear intelligent at all costs can be downright suicidal…

In a world that absurdly overrates the advantage of sheer brain power, no one wants to be seen as a member in good standing of the stupid party. Yet stupidity has been and will always remain the best defense mechanism against the ordinary conman and the intellectual dreamer, just as Odysseus found that stuffing cotton in his ears was his best defense against beguiling but fatal song of the sirens.

Again: most sensible conservative commentators are quick to say “of course, all things being equal, it’s better to be correct/intelligent/scientific than otherwise.” But they truly don’t believe that all things are equal. The real fight isn’t against science, it’s a much broader culture war. Science is being used as a stand-in for a constellation of things against which many Americans react viscerally — elitism, paternalism, snobbery. Presenting better science and more transparent evidence isn’t going to change this attitude all by itself. We need to address the underlying cause: the relic anti-intellectual attitude that still animates so many people in this country.

The grizzly bears will thank you.

91 Comments

91 thoughts on “Culture War By Proxy”

  1. The extract from John Derbyshire’s diatribe which Sean quoted makes perfect sense (allowing for some comical overstatement to emphasise his case) if the word “snobbery” is replaced by “officiousness”.

    One might argue that having written books, Derbyshire should be expected to choose his words with surgical precision. But if his diatribe was a press article, it’s more than likely that the words you read are not all his own but have been
    messed around and “simplified” by some oaf of an editor who may have feared the longer word would be less widely understood!

    With that change, I’d agree entirely: If a teacher with character can instill basic skills in their charges, and inspire them to be confident, self-reliant, patriotic, moral, and an asset to society, (and, yes, good Christians to boot 😉 then what does it matter if half of what they learn is rubbish?

    They’re more likely to challenge _that_ “orthodoxy” in due course, if it troubles them, and thereby learn to think outside the box than perhaps they would if educated from the cradle up by a bunch of right-on trendy mediocrities careful to spoon-feed them only approved dogma from our own time!

  2. Hi tacitus,

    To pay for the bear research the scientist should appeal to those who are interested in funding that type of work, clearly you and I are examples of such people. The scientist should apply the same techniques that business and non profit organizations use to generate funding. It’s a common practice and it works.

    I don’t agree with the statement that government has a duty to preserve wildlife. I believe the citizens have that responsibility.

  3. > To pay for the bear research the scientist should appeal to those who are interested in
    > funding that type of work

    If the same argument were to be applied to the LHC….

    There is a non-trivial fundamental group to these things – go too far to the left and you are effectively the best friend of the far right. Bush did not beat Gore, Nader did.

  4. Would you agree on adding the following question to the PhD application?:
    Do you beleive in God?

    I extrapolate that may be 20 years from now, PhD applicants might have to answer that questions while applying
    😉

    Byebye freedom of beleif!

  5. Hi senderista,

    It appears that the USA spends close to 300 billion a year on RD , with ~%70 coming from the private sector. Those numbers, as I understand it, have been steadily increasing since the 50’s. 50 Billion seems to be for basic research and around 60 Billion is on applied research. It also appears that the USA spends more then any other country on science. [1] ( I hope I’m not messing up the numbers!)

    I would use these numbers to argue that the USA is a major supporter of science.

    [1] http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/seind04/pdf/c04.pdf

  6. Just looking at these comments, you can see quite a bit of arrogance. Oh, they are just resentful of our intelligence, they’re just stupid, what a bunch of cavemen, etc. These are the types of comments that drive people to hate intellectualism.

    I agree. Sean is off in the weeds with this. He’s made assumption after assumption, all piled high atop assumptions. In short, he’s full of shit. Carry on, Rant Boy, but you’ll do it without me reading from now on. I’m done with the kneejerk arrogance here.

  7. John Derbyshire is hilarious. He is an enigma, wrapped in a contradiction, drizzled with shoulder-chips and steamed in a crackpot. He has the wonderful British talent [1] of saying something without saying something but then getting confused and saying it anyway. Best example (practically a test mass through his bizarre psychological field):

    http://www.nationalreview.com/derbyshire/derbyshire122001.shtml

    Summary: I love ballet, except that sometimes it makes people think I am gay. Not that I hate gay people. Not at all! It is freakish and wrong. Gay people, not ballet, which I like. I’m just being contrarian, don’t mind me. Also: where are the lesbians?

    [1] I am British! Sort of. Dual citizen? Born there? Said “naff” a lot, called homework “prep”, make the cricket (third-eleven, created and disbanded the same year) and tried to imitate a working-class accent on the ride back to South Kensington? Yeah, kinda.

  8. Politically speaking (as ambiguous and relative as that is), that “relic anti-intellectual attitude” stems not merely from adamant religious beliefs or a class-based ethos, but from elite manipulation and appropriation of science throughout the course of history. Where’s this line between scientific inquiry and power? Or science and power for that matter? That elusive and contentious line reveals ways in which we may further develop “progressive” scientific institutions and “progressive” masses of voters.

  9. I think that the criticism may be a little misguided. I’m a scientist, and strongly support science. And I’m a naturalist, and strongly support research into Grizzly Bears. Still, I think McCain may have inadvertently raised a good point.

    There is a very good mechanism for selecting which science gets federal funding – the NSF review process. I think the NSF should get more funding, and wish it were able to support more research. It has experts who review research proposals, and prioritize research funding. This is a very good system, which uses well-informed people to deliver federal dollars for research programs.

    I DO NOT think that Congress should be selecting which science to fund through the earmarking process. I trust the NSF to select appropriate science much more than I trust Joe Congressman. It turns out that this particular Grizzly study was an earmark, not an NSF-funded project. This time, it did turn out that the earmark was useful and funded good science. Do you think that’s true of all earmarked research money?

    So it may be a mistake on his part, but I think McCain raised a good critique of pork, though he did so badly.

  10. Ben–

    “I don’t know if it was a paternity issue or criminal,” he jokes, “but it was a waste of money.”

    That’s not a critique of the appropriations process; it’s a cheap shot against a scientific research project that he didn’t bother to understand. The appropriations process is certainly worthy of critique, but making fun of research proposals with funny-sounding names isn’t the way to do it.

  11. The crux of the issue to me is that McCain supports spending even more on the misguided war and it’s ultimate price tag of well north of a trillion dollars. He has no ground criticizing any other government expenditures however frivilous, particularly if they don’t kill and maim American soldiers and Iraqi civilians, until he can justify this boondoggle. And the simply fact is he can’t…

    e.

  12. Hello all — a couple more cents into the pot…

    One element I’ve not seen in the thread is the politicization of science, and particularly evolution, from the political left. Take the hot-button issue of abortion, for an example: the pro-choice side, which tends to trumpet itself as a group of pro-science smarties endangered by the monolithic, looming religious right, drops science when abortion is the issue at hand. Suddenly, the discussion is waged in terms of ideology, or a dry sense of utility; or worse, the pro-choice people throw in scientific-sounding terms — it’s not a baby, it’s a fetus, you ignorant cretin! It’s not life, it’s a blastocyst!

    So in one of the most gut-wrenching, and public-riling, topics, science is used ideological propaganda. To those who have honest, existential opposition to abortion, this associates dead fetuses with science — with the idea that intellect is hostile to moral imagination.

    Not exactly the sort of association that helps conservative people embrace research science.

    Much the same thing has happened in recent years with evolution. Yes, it’s central to modern thought, and yes, people should understand that. I get that. But when any science is used as a shibboleth, it’s shorn of its facts as facts. Wielded to inflict political damage, it becomes a political issue. And science has gotten partially co-opted in the public mind, transformed from the engine of human thought and creativity, into a weapon for the culture war.

    This isn’t to dismiss the anti-intellectualism, etc., on the political right; I merely note that science is under-appreciated on the right, but that it is often abused by the left to inflict damage and sometimes emotional hurt. It’s not enough to THINK correctly, we must also ACT humanely; because no one changes their mind by being mocked.

    Science must be defended from politicization front and rear, from ignorance and arrogance. We ought not let the McCains of the world hit scientists with cheap shots. But those who see scientific terms and ideas as a way to advance their political agenda, especially by using them to crack people over the head, are doing it maybe greater damage.

    dan s. (a different dan)

  13. A cousin of mine worked on this particular grizzly research project and after sitting listening to him talk about it for hours on end, I’ve concluded the $3M was well spent.

  14. Summary: I love ballet, except that sometimes it makes people think I am gay. Not that I hate gay people. Not at all! It is freakish and wrong. Gay people, not ballet, which I like. I’m just being contrarian, don’t mind me. Also: where are the lesbians?

    Against my better judgment, I clicked the link you provided and as a result, a small part of my soul just died. I could spend time refuting his obvious bullshit, but this is choice:

    What irritates and annoys me is the dishonesty of homosexual propaganda — the massive campaign to pretend that human nature is something different from what it, in fact, is.

    Homosexuality, as far as all the research I’ve read on it can tell, has existed across all human cultures, in all time periods. So, Mr. Dah-bi-shire, it *is* part of human nature, it’s not something that arose at Stonewall in 1969. Or English public schools! 🙂

    imposing the stain of salacity on perfectly decent old English words like “gay”

    I’ll assume he has no problem with “perfectly decent old English words” like faggot or queer being “stained”.

  15. For all sense what you say undoubtedly makes, we should also be aware that the Democratic candidates sometimes trash scientific consensus as well. A paramount example is the NAFTA issue. Consensus among reasonable economists is that NAFTA has been overall positive. However, the candidates play to the deep strain of “anti-intellectualism” of protectionism.

    Not too different from the skepticism about evolution theory, if you think about it.

  16. Excellent post (#64) dan s.

    On a lighter note, now these guys have finished their grizzly bear study, perhaps they should start another investigation this time into how to curb criminal behaviour by bears.

    On the BBC news website today “Bear convicted for theft of honey”
    [ http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7295559.stm ]

    The taste of honey was just too tempting for a bear in Macedonia, which repeatedly raided a beekeeper’s hives. Now it has a criminal record after a court found it guilty of theft and criminal damage.

    ::

    The case was brought by the exasperated beekeeper after a year of trying vainly to protect his beehives.

    For a while, he kept the animal away by buying a generator, lighting up the area, and playing thumping Serbian turbo-folk music. But when the generator ran out of power and the music fell silent, the bear was back and the honey was gone once more.

    ::

    Because the animal had no owner and belonged to a protected species, the court ordered the state to pay for the damage to the hives – around $3,500 (£1,750; 2,238 euros).

    The bear, meanwhile, remains at large – somewhere in Macedonia.

  17. The leftist blogospheres irratating attempts to portray every republican as antiscience is beginning to stink of desperation.

    Not only b/c McCain is generally proscience and has very reasonable views on 80% of important science, but also b/c the corresponding democrat often has just as many bizarre views as well (Hilary’s communion with the dead, Obama’s views on ethanol subsidies) that we must never talk about.

    Totally lame and transparent.

    (Incidentally 3million dollars is a ridiculous price tag for this research and could be far better appropriated for far more deserving research)

  18. Reginald Selkirk

    The leftist blogospheres irratating attempts to portray every republican as antiscience is beginning to stink of desperation.

    It’s unfortunate that it seems well-founded in fact. During the last election cycle, at least six state GOP parties had support for intelligent design and/or other forms of creationism.

    For all sense what you say undoubtedly makes, we should also be aware that the Democratic candidates sometimes trash scientific consensus as well. A paramount example is the NAFTA issue

    That would only be relevant if one considered economics to be a science.

  19. This discussion is starting to resemble those perennial arts funding debates with the usual preening self-regard on the part of those with their hands out. No, you’re not arrogrant, but anyone who balks at subsidizing the the (n+1)st “Elephant Dung on the Madonna” wall hanging is an uncultured boob, and probably a “rethuglican” to boot. Of course, this pose by the scientific elite conveniently absolves them of the need for any introspection on the stagnant condition of their discipline. For example, when the finishing touches were put on the Standard Model the leisure suit was in style. Whatcha been up to lately? Right: 10^500 alternative universes and counting. Cool. The check’s in the mail.

  20. Anti-knowledge might be a better phrase than anti-intellectual, and it is also something of a top-down phenomenon.

    The fact is that science and technology can cause all kinds of problems in stable, feudal societies based on inherited wealth and power – which is, historically speaking, why the “British aristocratic disdain for science” was so common. There you are with your coal monopolies and your giant horse stables and buggy whip factories, and along comes some technologically trained peasant with an internal combustion engine and liquid fuels. Highly disrupting.

    That’s not a new phenomenon. The Roman Emperor Diocletian had all the alchemists persecuted and their texts burned c.290 AD – all because he believed they really had figured out how to make gold, and he feared such knowledge would destabilize his empire. That might have put chemistry back a thousand years.

    What if, for example, every U.S. citizen had a good understanding of electricity and could read their own meter, or even set up their own rooftop solar system? That’s not too good for the established electricity utilities – who try to convince the public that electricity is “just too complicated to understand – leave it to us.”

    In the worst cases, as societies drift towards authoritarian or even totalitarian structures, creative thinking and scientific innovation are replaced by rote memorization and extremely narrow training. This is because science is one of the primary threats to “authority” – one doesn’t need the sanction of the god-king to publish papers. Science, socially speaking, also doesn’t really exist without the free and open exchange of information – a notion that can be a real threat to all kinds of authoritarian structures.

    Maybe we can put it this way: if scientists are the new high priests of society, then they, just like the old high priests, will jealously guard their authority and their knowledge – and the general public will snigger about the snobby and corrupt high priests. However – shouldn’t we leave the high priest function to religious and political figures? Scientists should be focusing on research and education, anyway – not providing “expert testimonials” for the public relations industry, for example…

    Another thing: the most rabid anti-intellectual can suddenly change their tune once they realize that scientific and technical (for example, medical) knowledge can save them a lot of trouble. Appeal to people’s sense of enlightened self-interest, maybe?

    Meanwhile, here in California a good chunk of our public teachers are currently getting pink slips… which doesn’t seem to be the case for prison guards.

  21. The leftist blogospheres irratating attempts to portray every republican as antiscience is beginning to stink of desperation.

    It’s well known that the media has a very liberal bias.

  22. dan s.,

    I don’t disagree that people on the left have “mis-used” science as well. In particular, I believe that the left attack some aspects of sociobiology unfairly on the basis of ideology and disregarded the science.

    That said, I am not sure the abortion issue is one of those areas where the religious right, most notably the catholic church has completely disregarded any attempt at scientific discourse and declared “life begins at conception”. The simple fact is that nobody is pro-abortion. But the reasons for most abortions is sadly economic. When the Right is prepared to divert money from killing people in Iraq and create a solid economic safety net for all Americans which should decrease the number seeking abortions then we will be making progress.

    As I said nobody is pro-abortion. As a white male, I cannot possibly understand the agonizing choice that women go through. As such, I believe it should be up to the woman, her doctor, her god, or whoever she chooses to involve in the process to make that determination.

    e.

  23. ike (#72) wrote:
    >
    > Anti-knowledge might be a better phrase than anti-intellectual,
    > and it is also something of a top-down phenomenon.

    Every person I know of limited education adores TV quizzes and marvels at the “intelligence”, as they interpret it, of players who reach the later rounds or win.

    They don’t make a distinction between having a head stuffed full of trivia and being able to acquire and put to good use a body of structured knowledge. The fact that smart people usually have both, so that the second tends to imply the first, reinforces this common belief that the converse also holds and the two are
    synonymous.

    Even easier to confuse is the distinction between intelligence (a measure of ability to make meaningful connections? – people argue endlessly about the definition, but I think that captures at least some of its meaning) versus an intellectual (a person preoccupied with mental constructs, often idealistically and to the detriment of pragmatic and moral considerations).

    Intellectuals may be beneficial in abstracts sciences and maths and suchlike. But in politics, where the above mentioned considerations come to the fore, idealists and intellectuals, or worse still those who fancy themselves as such on no sound basis, can cause terrible and entirely avoidable disruption and suffering.

    Why do you think the UK has had no revolution for the best part of 500 years, and even that was largely rolled back within a few years? Because we distrust political intellectuals. Always have.

    Why did the French have a revolution 200 years ago, and four (or is it five?) new republics since? Because they love their political intellectuals.

    Why tens of millions of people die in China, Russia, Cambodia during revolutions throughout the 20th century? Because people were swayed by self-styled intellectuals.

    See what I mean? There’s a definite pattern there.

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