Daniel Davies has the following blog on the Guardian web-site. [I don't know if this handsome guy is the same DD who contributes to pen-l or not.]
Republicans just don't like science Daniel Davies July 22, 2006 11:45 AM http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/daniel_davies/2006/07/the_war_on_science.html So it appears that the US is to continue to ban federal funding of embryonic stem cell research, and that there are moves afoot to drive it out of the European Union too. I am hopeful that these bad decisions can be reversed, but I think that in trying to get them reversed the pro-science lobby needs to be pretty clear about the nature of the enemy it is facing. There is not much point in trying to compromise with these people, to agree restrictions, licensing regimes and so forth. The reason for this is that at its base, this is a political movement that just doesn't like science. I've argued elsewhere, in the context of Chris Mooney's book, "The Republican War on Science", that it's fundamentally wrong to assume that the deleterious effects on scientific research of the religious-mystical lobby are an unfortunate consequence of their ethical and religious beliefs. I think it's at least as plausible to assume that they are actually the purpose; that fundamentally, the religious right hates stem cell research not because it involves stem cells, but because it involves research, and something similar for the anti-GM foods lobby. There are far more embryos destroyed in the normal process of IVF, and far more damage done to the environment by normal pesticides, but you don't get much lobbying against IVF and pesticides. This is because they are part of the normal business of life these days, whereas new technology holds out the possibility of "Frankenfoods" and "reproductive cloning". I don't think anyone has ever given a reason why such things would be intrinsically bad which doesn't boil down to a dislike of them because they're new. Scientific progress changes things. It creates economic upheaval and has the potential to shake up social structures ("All fast, fixed frozen relations are swept away, all that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned" as the Communist Manifesto has it). That is why people who are insecure about their own status don't like it, and since the status-insecure are in general drawn toward authoritarian politics, it is unsurprising that stem cell research and GM foods have become such incendiary political issues. There can really be no compromise with this kind of authoritarian irrationalism - the GM lobby have been trying to agree sensible licensing schemes for the last ten years with no hope. There is no point giving an inch; the battle may have been lost in the US but that doesn't mean anyone should be inclined to compromise in Europe. [there's not a reasonable case to make against genetically-modified foods? is it reasonable to simply reject critics of GM foods as luddite lunk-heads?] -- Jim Devine / "You need a busload of faith to get by." -- Lou Reed.
