Tuesday, week 7

• Arney on Income Inequality

• Zita on connections and transformations

• Looking ahead

Zita: connections and transformations

•Reason > Rules

•Gullibility can kill

•Liberatory ethics for science

Reason > Rules

Kuhn: Rules include laws, network of commitments (instrumental, methodological, metaphysical, to understanding)… but …

Paradigms are primary (40-46)

Gigerenzer: Doctors are taught to memorize formulae, but they forget or do not understand. Instead of blindly following rules, LEARN TO REASON (240)

Gullibility can kill

Sagan: smoking (218), faith healing (233), Christian science (236)

Gigerenzer: smoking campaigns as “manufacture of ignorance” (236), convictions based solely on DNA evidence (Ch.10), HIV false negatives

Is public education the answer?

Ethics for scientific programmes

Sagan (283) “When [human] weaknesses [plus new technologies create] a capacity to do harm on an unprecedented scale … an emerging ethic … also must be established on an unprecedented planetary scale… [Teller vs. Oppenheimer]

Harding (vii) “Is it possible to use [mainstream] sciences … for liberatory ends?’

Nuclear energyFISSION

FUSION

Http://www-linux.gsi.de/~wolle/TELEKOLLEG/KERN/IMAGES/fission_fusion.gif

http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/ http://www.ecoworld.org/earth

Nuclear energyFISSION FUSIONSplits heavy particles Combines light particlesAtomic bomb H-bomb (Teller)Nuclear plants Sun and starsEstablished technology Active researchRadioactive fuel Hydrogen & helium fuelRadioactive waste in Helium ash & Low-level liquid, gas, sludge form solid wasteRisk of meltdown Fail-safeShutting down in Germany International science goal

Liberatory ethics in mainstream science?

•Bulletin of Atomic Scientists

http://www.thebulletin.org/index.htm

•Union of Concerned Scientists

http://www.ucsusa.org/

•National Academy of Sciences

http://www.nationalacademies.org/

Bulletin of Atomic Scientists

History and Mission:

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists was founded in 1945 by scientists who worked on the Manhattan Project at the University of Chicago and were deeply concerned about the potential future use of nuclear weapons and nuclear war.

"The American people," said the Bulletin's first editorial, must work "unceasingly for the establishment of international control of atomic weapons, as a first step toward permanent peace.“

http://www.thebulletin.org/index.htm

The “Doomsday Clock” reflects the global level of nuclear danger and the state of international security.

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Union of Concerned Scientists

UCS was founded in 1969 by faculty members and students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who were concerned about the misuse of science and technology in society. Their statement called for the redirection of scientific research to pressing environmental and social problems.

From that beginning, UCS has become a powerful voice for change. Our core groups of scientists and engineers collaborate with colleagues across the country to conduct technical studies on renewable energy options, the impacts of global warming, the risks of genetically engineered crops, and other related topics. We share the results of our research with policymakers, the news media, and the public.

National Academy of Sciences

The National Academies perform a public service by bringing together committees of experts in all areas of scientific and technological endeavor.

These experts serve pro bono to address critical national issues and give advice to the federal government and the public.

The National Academies rely on private funding …to initiate key studies and projects that are important for the future well-being of our society.

Work funded by private sources is conducted according to the same strict, rigorous, and impartial processes that

guide every National Academies activity.

National Academy of Sciences

Liberatory ethics for scientific programmes

Harding (301) “… changes in labs and science councils can only be partial … unless liberatory movements can also change the social order for which science is such an important resource.”

Whose science? Whose knowledge?

Looking ahead