Framers vs Educators

The other night (Friday), I was fortunate enough to attend the Bell Museum's Speaking Science 2.0. The speakers discussed the issue of framing science, which I have commented on and posted numerous responses on other blogs. On the pro-framing side was Chris Mooney and Matt Nisbet, the two authors of a policy forum on Framing science in the journal Science a few months ago. On the pro-education side was PZ Myers and Greg Layden, two scientists who have been critical of the framer's message.

The discussion, while advertised as a cage fight, was much more sedate. (Needless to say I would have taped Smackdown if I had known how pleasent this forum would be.) The framers took the stage first and gave a well-oiled presentation outlining their main points. After a couple of days reflection, my recollection of their points are: 1. Scientists suck at communicating science, 2. The public is stupid and will always be stupid, 3. The right-wing has embraced this stupidity and taken a marketing approach to get the public to think about issues from their perspective, 4. The scientists need to use this marketing strategy if they want to compete, 5. If we take the framers' advice, magic will happen and we will win.

The framers left much unsaid to avoid some problems with their position, but Layden and Myers were kind enough to state the unstated, more about that later.

First, I want to go through my responses to my rather snarky interpretation of the framers' position.

1. Scientists suck at communicating science. Well this time I am not being snarky. This stereotype is well propagated in the framing debate and, as far as I can determine, just accepted without any real information to back it up. I asked the first "question/long winded statement" after the panel presentations, and one point I wanted to make was this stereotype is bullshit. Sure, there are bad science communicators who are scientists, but by and large I think scientists are pretty effective. Currently, we are getting hosed by the right-wing, is this due to scientists being poor communicators or the army of right-wing non-scientists being effective. When industry (with an economic bias) or religion (with a self-preservation bias) gets involved, they can use dedicated resources to promote their viewpoint. Scientists actually have jobs, its hard to find time to disseminate information (lies in the case of the right-wing) when we have to teach, do research, write manuscripts, write grants, etc. So I will agree we do not get our message across as effectively, but this is not IMO due to poor communication but to being outnumbered.

2. The public is stupid and will always be stupid. Snark #1. Mooney and Nisbet obviously did not say this, but the conclusion is distilled from the following points that were made. First, people are "intellectual misers." I won't disagree with this in general terms, but I will disagree with the defeatist attitude it instills. You know people don't want to think about hard stuff too much, so there's no sense trying to educate them. Better is coming up with a 15-30 second sound bite that is vacuous and trite but pulls at some emotional heart string. Second, popular science isn't working. The traditional approaches like magazines such as Popular Science, Discover, etc aren't cutting it. While the subscription rates to these mags may be dropping, I expect this is true across the board. Thank the internet not mental miserness. One person (panelist or audience member, I forget which) noted that there are a number of dedicated sience channels on cable, this means at least some % of the public is tuning in. So the current attention span of the public may be short, but that doesn't mean the public is not educatable. Mooney and Nisbet basically said that science education through the popularization of science is a good thing, but then turned around and noted how it doesnt work and basically cant work, so just resort to framing.

3. The right-wing has embraced this stupidity and taken a marketing approach to get the public to think about issues from their perspective. Well, I can't disagree with this one. The marketing/resources used by the right-wing is profound and works pretty well. Sadly, I do not know an adequate response to this. Lawsuits, by the general public, do not seem to work, case in point the tobacco industry. There really are no reprecussions for lying, presenting false information, etc. After the Dover trial, it was not the Discovery Institute and Michael Behe that paid, it was the school district that paid and is still paying in massive legal fees. I think the only approach is to teach the public how science works, skepticism and critical thinking skills are a powerful tool that only serve to help our side. Of course, the framers have given up on this approach and ask us to follow suit. Actually, they pay lip service to the education approach but immediately follow up with why it won't work.

4. The scientists need to use this marketing strategy if they want to compete. Here is where the framing position truly sits. Layden and Myers both acknowledged that the framing strategy can be a short-term band aid on a problem and I concur there is a place for framing. When the discussion is on global warming, it is useful to note the ecomonic ramifications, the loss of polar ice (polar bears as well), potential climatic changes, etc. This really goes hand in hand with point 1 and during my oration I noted that the reason we have a clean water act is because the frame was made that no one really wants to drink poison. The point I want to make is that we have always been framing. However, here is where I think one of the biggest problems with the framing position lies. When it comes down to framing, both sides do it. So the result is who has the most compelling sound bite? Who has the biggest star representing their message? Is Oprah on our side (global warming is a pressing issue episode) or theirs (everyone in the audience gets a new car!!)?

5. If we take the framer's advice, magic will happen and we will win. Again, if we go with the frame perspective, it comes down to who makes the best sound bite. There is no magic here, if our frame is stronger, we win; if there's is stronger, they win. Notice there is no mention of where the truth lies.

The educators' position was about education and religion. The montrosous brachiosaur sitting in the room that Mooney and Nisbet didnt notice.....maybe the stage lights were too bright?

Layden made some extemporaneous remarks noting the problems in K-12 education which were carried on by Myers. Layden pointed out that there is, in fact, a culture war going on in this country whether the framers want to admit it or not. Myers went on linking the power of the religious right to affect education, thus generating more stupid people who are easily swayed to become religious, increasing the clout of the fundamentalists, who are now able to further affect education, generating more stupid people, repeat until schools are more about indoctrination and not education.

I will note Mooney and Nisbet had more elegant slides; Myers had informative slides.

While Mooney and Nisbet were talking, I realized a problem with their idea of framing is that they have a one size fits all approach, this was the crux of my question/statement. In the case of global warming, environmental issues, etc, the framing position holds water. Here is a good way to get the scientific ramifications out to the public, of course the other side has their frame, but at least there are messages that can be put-forth. However, with evolution the frame perspective fails IMO. The other side has the frame "If you believe in evolution, you will go to hell." What is our frame? Nisbet took the teach evolution in schools specific issue and gave me three possible frames.

1. Teaching evolution will make our town more attractive to economic development. No way does this hold water in my mind. Im sure Dell computer is not setting up their next assembly factory in Dover because of the 21st century monkey trial. Frames need to appeal directly to your audience. You do not connect evolutionary biology with industrial development directly.

2. Trying to get ID-creation "science" in school will make us look bad. Bad to who? The secularists? I mean come on, frame it the other way, if we succeed in our efforts we will be a beacon of light to other oppressed schools in our christian nation. Who cares, if the supreme court will strike it down, that's far down the road and god will be happy.

3. Trying to get ID-creation "science" in school will waste public resources in the legal fight. Yeah, the fundies are worried about wasting public resources (can you say Iraq war). Your pretty scientific talking head says, this is a bad idea because the law is against you and it will waste huge quantities of resources, sounds good. You go to church and your pastor says, we can't have these liberal elitists who don't live here tell us we must expose our children to this heretical teaching. Resources, schmesources, what resources will help you in hell? In heaven you'll have all the resources you want including 50 virgins oops, wrong fundies. The fundie leaders are the ones who, on accident, say we don't need to worry bout the environment because the rapture, its a comin'. They can generally keep that vitriol off the pulpit when engaging the sheep masses and the masses are more than happy to overlook any slips.

So what it comes down to is our frames in this issue are not remotely sufficient or appropriate. The framers want the educators to back off and not offend the religious. You hurt our message they say. In an odd sense, the framers are correct, the educators could cause damage. The fundies have cast the argument as science vs religion, not the educators. The educators are more than happy to smack them down, and rightly so. When a fundie says if you believe in the science of evolution, you are going to hell, the fundie made it science vs religion not the scientists. If your personal message is dealing with global warming, great! If you want to embrace the religious in your message, I say Great again, you are doing the right thing. If you want us to shut up about our message so yours doesnt suffer, I say you are putting a gun to your own head and just asking someone to pull the trigger. If evolution falls to the fundies, then biology becomes meaningless classification, biology is science, if one entire branch of science is now suspect, why not all the other areas? Why is physics immune to a christian perspective? Why is geology immune?

Summary statement. Framing in specific issues is warranted and done. More is always better, and more scientists should be encouraged to get involved to offset the army of darkness. Suggesting that the religious want to be on our side is false, the religious, by definition, cannot tolerate science (not everyone of course, there are scientists who are religious, but it should be clear to those with neuronal function Im talking about the fundies). I do not want them excluded from the global warming issue, I want them helping to deal with any problems we have. However, I will not cow tow to those fundies. If they decide that we have to choose between their belief based on a suspect book (Ill blog about it later) and the evidence, then Ill choose the evidence. If they try to get the evidence suppressed, Ill state that their religion is a bad thing that has no true merits. If it did, suppression would not be necessary. There is no frame available to deal with fundies, only education.

The Scientific Method: Facts

Science is an approach, a methodology. In short, it is a way to study the world around us. In that sense, it is philosophy. Science is not a set of knowledge, although it is often confused as such. Science is the knowledge generated using a specific method. Here, the term "specific method" is not the most definitive, because different areas of scientific research depend on different approaches. The power and limitations of the methods associated with spectral analysis of distant galaxies is distinct from the power and limitations of the methods associated with transcriptional profiling analysis of organismal responses.

Regardless, there are terms associated with science and terms dissociated with science. Here, are my thoughts.

Associated with science:
Fact: This is a point of reality. A fact is something that is. Generally, scientists do not use the term fact in articles, but do use the term observation or data. Facts are objective. "The basketball hoop is high." While this may seem like a fact, it is not because it is subjective. From my vantage point the hoop is high, but from Manute Bol's perspective it is not. Now if we say "The baskbetball hoop is 10 feet off the ground." That is a fact. This leads to another aspect of facts, they must be verifiable and/or reproducible. If I say the basketball hoop is high, you cannot confirm that because the term high is subjective. However, if I say the hoop is 10 feet high, we can measure it and check. You do not have to take my word for it.

One thing to realize, regardless of whether you care about science or not (and you do even if you dont know it), is that people often speak about facts or in a way that sounds factual without that being the case. For example, "Our intelligence shows Sadam has weapons of mass destruction." (verifiability issues) or "Men are better in math and science than women." (objectivity issues) "4/5 dentists surveyed prefer Dentyne." (reproducibility and objectivity issues).

My personality defect results

Your Score: Smartass

You are 100% Rational, 57% Extroverted, 71% Brutal, and 71% Arrogant.

You are the Smartass! You are rational, extroverted, brutal, and arrogant. In fact, you could very well be the anti-Christ, as you are almost the exact opposite of everything Jesus was supposed to be. While Jesus says love your enemy, you say love beating the crap out of your enemy. While Jesus raises the dead, you raise hell. While Jesus walks on water, you tend to sink. You probably consider people who are emotional and gentle to be big pussies who are obviously in lesser stature than you. You have many flaws, despite your seeming intelligence and cool-headedness. For instance, you aren't very nice. In fact, you're probably an asshole. And you are conceited and self-centered. Not only that, but you are very loud and vocal about all this, seeing as how you are extroverted. There is no better way to describe you than as a "smartass", I'm afraid. Perhaps just "ass" would do, too. But that's a little less literary and descriptive. At any rate, your main personality defect is the fact that you are self-centered, mean, uncaring, and brutally logical.

To put it less negatively:

1. You are more RATIONAL than intuitive.

2. You are more EXTROVERTED than introverted.

3. You are more BRUTAL than gentle.

4. You are more ARROGANT than humble.

Compatibility:

Your exact opposite is the Emo Kid.

Other personalities you would probably get along with are the Capitalist Pig, the Braggart, and the Sociopath.

If you scored near fifty percent for a certain trait (42%-58%), you could very well go either way. For example, someone with 42% Extroversion is slightly leaning towards being an introvert, but is close enough to being an extrovert to be classified that way as well. Below is a list of the other personality types so that you can determine which other possible categories you may fill if you scored near fifty percent for certain traits.

The other personality types:

The Emo Kid: Intuitive, Introverted, Gentle, Humble.

The Starving Artist: Intuitive, Introverted, Gentle, Arrogant.

The Bitch-Slap: Intuitive, Introverted, Brutal, Humble.

The Brute: Intuitive, Introverted, Brutal, Arrogant.

The Hippie: Intuitive, Extroverted, Gentle, Humble.

The Televangelist: Intuitive, Extroverted, Gentle, Arrogant.

The Schoolyard Bully: Intuitive, Extroverted, Brutal, Humble.

The Class Clown: Intuitive, Extroverted, Brutal, Arrogant.

The Robot: Rational, Introverted, Gentle, Humble.

The Haughty Intellectual: Rational, Introverted, Gentle, Arrogant.

The Spiteful Loner: Rational, Introverted, Brutal, Humble.

The Sociopath: Rational, Introverted, Brutal, Arrogant.

The Hand-Raiser: Rational, Extroverted, Gentle, Humble.

The Braggart: Rational, Extroverted, Gentle, Arrogant.

The Capitalist Pig: Rational, Extroverted, Brutal, Humble.

The Smartass: Rational, Extroverted, Brutal, Arrogant.

Be sure to take my Sublime Philosophical Crap Test if you are interested in taking a slightly more intellectual test that has just as many insane ramblings as this one does!

Link: The Personality Defect Test written by saint_gasoline on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test

Well not too surprising there, realizing and accepting that it is statistically likely I could also fall in the sociopath group. Glad to have my deep antipathy for emo kid.

Surgeon Private

Well who can say they are surprised at this point (more Bullshit-R-Us).

Just for a point of reference the Surgeon General of the United States is charged with the following (this from the Surgeon General's website)

The Surgeon General serves as America's chief health educator by providing Americans the best scientific information available on how to improve their health and reduce the risk of illness and injury. The Surgeon General is appointed by the President of the United States with the advice and consent of the United States Senate for a 4-year term of office. In carrying out all responsibilities, the Surgeon General reports to the Assistant Secretary for Health, who is the principal advisor to the Secretary on public health and scientific issues.

Let me rephrase the salient point in bold "The Surgeon General serves as America's chief health educator by providing Americans the best scientific information available on how to improve their health and reduce the risk of illness and injury."

Seems reasonable enough but apparently Dr. Richard Carmona was prevented from expressing sound justifiable scientifically supported opinions regarding issues that President Bush's policies are at odds with. Take for example sex education and abstinence. His holiness, president Bush, has embraced an abstinence only policy, a carry over from his gubernatorial days in Texas. Dr. Cameron states that he was not allowed to promote comprehensive sex education that only included abstinence. In Texas, abstinence only policies that were initiated have since been shown to be failed policies. But never one to take data and evidence over blind faith, Bush has tried to push national and international abstinence only poicies. Worse, he has inhibited professional discussion of sex education by his own Surgeon General. Bush doesnt want to surround himself with the best, get the best possible advice, make hard decision, and live with the results of those decisions. No, Bush surrounds himself with yes-men (either voluntary yes-men or coerced yes-men), gets advice that confirms he is right, makes the decision he was going to make anyway, and makes sure the results of those decisions are always good at least in his own mind. I have said it before and Ill say it again: Bush is not a leader, Bush is a coward. Anyone who has to hide contradictory evidence and suppress dissent does not have good policies. Even if reality was wrong and Bush was right, by being unwilling to stand tall in the face of opposition he is not fit to be president. In fact, those qualities are better suited for anonymous blog trolls than president.

So, I can almost understand how this ideologue got reelected, I cannot understand why this country isnt at the door of the white house protesting for his resignation. Bush is a crank in every sense of the word (I would use the term fanatic, but Bush is beyond that at this point) and sadly his actions affect directly and indirectly every person in this country and many people globally. Even sadder, his actions will continue affecting people for years after this fiasco of an administration is gone.

Damn Atheist had it Coming!

This just in atheists are the same as everyone else! It turns out there is no reason for athiests to be concerned about civil rights, because unlike women, African Americans, and gays and lesbians we got it easy.

But do unbelievers really suffer comparable harm? Atheists are not denied equal access to housing for lacking belief in god, nor are they kept from seeing their partners during life-threatening scenarios in hospitals. Atheists don't earn sixty-five cents for every dollar earned by believers, nor are they prevented from voting. To our knowledge, there is no such thing as "atheist bashing." If there were cases of such harm, one would expect to hear about them in the media and the courts, or at least in the common knowledge of unbelievers. So, where are the cases? On many occasions we have put this question to leaders in the nonreligious community and have never been presented with a single compelling example.

Well there you go. Atheists have not been evicted, nor has there been reason to believe atheists could lose their jobs.

Sure, it would be hard to be elected to higher office in America as an avowed unbeliever, but it would also be impossible for a socialist or a Mother Earth spiritualist. And being barred from the Boy Scouts hardly affects one's basic life prospects. Besides, most experts agree that Scouting is not a "public accommodation" in which everyone has a right to be included.

Hard? Did they actually say hard? Well, I guess this would make it hard in Arkansas Constitution Of The State Of Arkansas Of 1874. You'll notice no mention of socialists or Mother Earth spiritualists. Its good to see Grothe and Dacey did the fact-checking you expect when making such sweeping statements, too bad they didnt try google.

I should point out there is the flip side viewpoint published by the Council of Secular Humanism two issues after one in which the Grothe Dacey article appeared.

Hat tip to Framing Science, which brought this to my attention. And an especially big thank you to Nisbet for raising my bloodpressure 20 points just before bed with his offensive support of the original article and flippant dismissal of dissenters in the comments. I particularly enjoyed "If there were cases of such harm, one would expect to hear about them in the media and the courts, or at least in the common knowledge of unbelievers. So, where are the cases?" Look up any prayer in school law suit, creationism/ID law suit like the recent Dover trial, "under god" law suit, etc these are all separation of church and state issues, but I think it is pretty easy to see how state sanctioned religious favoritism is effectively discriminatory. Also, while you're looking up those cases, try and find out about the fall-out and abuse the plantiffs inevitably had

Final snark coming, Hey Grothe and Dacey, with a large proportion of the country religious and even more afraid of offending the few most virulent of the religious, are you surprised this isnt getting more press? When a homosexual man gets dragged to death behind a Texas pick-up truck its big news, but those who actually survive an assault are generally not making headlines. Similarly, when a Kansas professor is hospitalized after being beaten by ID proponents it is news....I guess Grothe an Dacey forgot because Mirecki lived.

Although based on his defensiveness on the "Framing Science" debate, Im not surprised.

Books....My must reads

Alright I thought I would spend some time discussing books I love or those that have had a lasting effect on me. At least initially, these books will be about biological science, including the history of science, philosophy of science. However, I will also include other books that have had an intellectual effect on me. So you won't hear about Crichton's Jurassic Park, only impact was some spectacular special effects in the movie.

The Growth of Biological Thought: Diversity Evolution and Inheritance. Ernst Mayr.

Today's installment is a rather thick book by the late great Ernst Mayr. This epic book is really the history of biology. It is broken up into 4 parts, the first is really a 131 page introduction in which Dr. Mayr discusses the how he approaches writing the history of science, discusses the scientific method and how the scientific method impacts on biology, and discusses the brief intellectual history of biology. This latter issue is recurrent in the other 3 parts, so its helpful to lay out the intellectual history and contributors early in broad strokes.

The second section discusses Diversity, although it is truly a discussion of the history of taxonomy and the species concept. Ultimately this is a mystery with no resolution as the species concept is still a moving target. The criteria used to define a mammalian species is not sufficient to define a bacterial species. Further, what a molecular biologist may define as a species, an ecologist may defnie as multiple species. This is not to suggest the species concept is not useful, simply that it is extremely complex.

The third section discusses Evolution. This section should be read by all creationists as the history of evolutionary thought significantly predates Darwin and many of the foundations were worked out by Christian "scientists" working to demonstrate the existance of their god. The growth of evolutionary thought and its culmination with molecular biology are discussed as the impact of evolution in speciation.

The final section discusses Variation and Its Inheritance. Here Dr. Mayr describes early thoughts on inheritance, Mendelian genetics, and the identification of DNA as the source of variation and inheritance. Again this is from a historical perspective, and was the section I was least impressed with. My diminished enthusiasm had more to do with this being an area I was already quite familiar unlike the earlier sections.

Word of Warning....The is not an exciting read and my addition comes in at >990 pages. I do not suggest you read it before bed (I did, but admittedly I am off.) It is clear amd well-written, including many notes and references for each section. These are real references from original works published in the 1700, 1800, and 1900s. This always lends a bit of intellectual honesty in my opinion. Also, I expect it was exceedingly difficult to write. The sections do not lend themselves to be separate entities as there is much overlap between them and these areas are heavily intertwined.

The important thing is that these areas are intertwined with all areas of biology and having knowledge of these areas is important to have a strong appreciation of the other areas. Myself, I never took an evolutionary biology course in college, although I was a Biochemistry major and obtained my PhD in Molecular and Cellular Biology. (I am not saying we never discussed evolution, simply that I never took it as an entire course.) This, I think is a mistake, and maybe the requirements have changed since I was a student (doubt it), however understanding evolution, species, variation are central to all areas of biology. I spend a good chunk of my time bashing genes for a living. Do these areas really help me intellectually? Absolutely. Understanding evolution allows me to compare my work with that of other organisms to either generate novel hypotheses or suggest explanations to distinct results. Variation? Well, my organism is found in people all over the planet, do they all behave the same? are the genes Im interested in doing the exact same thing at the exact same time in all of these isolates? (Maybe, but is alcohol dehydrogenase expressed the same in all people on the planet?) What about species? Interesting question, how is my organism classified as a species? It is an asexual (as far as we know) organism, so there is no meiotic recombination that we know of. It can scramble its chromosomes and handle aneuploidies (a different number of copies of its chromosomes from the "wild-type") quie well. My point is, knowing about these issues does not hurt my research and makes me a better scientist because I can think about these issues in relation to my work.

Finally, Dr. Mayr wanted to write a second compendium on the area of molecular biology. Sadly, this never was completed. However, another of my favorite books The Eighth Day of Creation by Hoarce Freeland Judson does just that, but we will leave that until next time.

(BTW alcohol dehydrogenase is expressed less in many people of Asian decent hence their ability to enjoy Friday nights a lot more cheaply than I can. Another word of warning, never hang out with a friend that overexpresses alcohol dehydrogenase unless you have nothing to do the next day.)

What kind of Atheist am I?

You scored as Scientific Atheist, These guys rule. I'm not one of them myself, although I play one online. They know the rules of debate, the Laws of Thermodynamics, and can explain evolution in fifty words or less. More concerned with how things ARE than how they should be, these are the people who will bring us into the future. Scientific Atheist 100% Apathetic Atheist 83% Militant Atheist 67% Angry Atheist 58% Spiritual Atheist 42% Agnostic 25% Theist 0% What kind of atheist are you? created with QuizFarm.com

Well damn, I took this quiz yesterday and scored 83% as an angry atheist compared to a militant atheist also rolled in at 7% theist. Less angry and less godly today...Must need more coffee this morning.