Still haven't slept in between (will right after that reply)
The problem is not really the fact that he made one mistake. Its the fact that this mistake can be explained sociologicaly by the way he see sciences.
Hm yes it is.
This is literally what eugenism stands for. And I know what I'm talking about... I had the same vision of this subject as Dawkins a few years ago. This was a statement based on eugenic ideas. Something very problematic.
In social science, this is indeed a very important bias yes. Not caring about the political context and the values entering in researches concerning political subject is literally opening the door to biased results.
In the cases of "hard" sciences you will see that more in the scientific process itself. For example, no caring about politics and values in scientific research will lead - in a patriarcal world - to a bias situation where it will be seen as normal that women are underepresented in sciences in both researches and publications which can lead to a lack of diversity of point of views. Something that can impact the process of creating good and efficient results.
This would be an strategic error, but you do what you want mate.
Then I ask you again :
Can you stop people from experimenting on human or animals to study medecine or launching nuclear warheads on countries to study their impacts on climate if you do not care about "values" and "politic" in the scientific process ?
I do not believe in that
Science simply can't existing without the act of seeking the understanding of the world. Therefore, there can't be no sciences without a moral action.
The act of seeking discovery is therefore a act driven by values. Values by themself are just values. Its when values are entering in conflict that the paradigm becomes political.
Since we are human we are driven by a lot of values but also by a lot of biases and those biases can be the sign of "sub values" (values that are hidden under the rest, not really values but not really biases either) For example we live in a patriarcal society, we all have therefore sexist "sub values". Another example is that we live in a capitalist and liberal world, which means that we all have meritocratic and individualistic "sub values".
In sciences, this means that this interactions between the values we are defending and the sub values can sometimes leads toward internal conflicts. This therefore create a political paradigm (a conflict of values) in the context of our internal everyday lives. For example, I may be loving social sciences, that describe the human behaviors mostly has product of our environment.. I'm still very influenced by my education on the value of merit and I need to remind myself everyday that this construction is no based on reality.
In science, this political paradigm can lead toward biases depending on the way the conflict leans. This is why we must always counter our potential biases with other values. Values that are based on reality and not based on mythological narratives we are educated with during our lives.
For example : There is a tendancy in leftist militantism to think that what we call in France "high intellectual potential diagnosed individuals" aremostly just something invented by members of the bourgeoisie to feel superior while keeping the imaginery narrative that they are in fact suffering.... But in reality its a lot more complicated than that and this is something that can be explained by sociology.
In short this is indeed a fake diagnosis, but the reasons behind the creation of this (new) diagnosis are not so clear. Its in reality the result of long tradition of institutionalization of the elitist (and false) notion that "gifted" people are in scholar failure (when its not really the case) added to the fact that middle and upper (cultural and economic) classes tends to put (in order) a lot more cultural and competitive pressure on kids. By doing that, they are giving their kids a strong "cultural capital" (through cultural activities with the cultural part of those classes and a more competitive approach for the economic side) which gives the kids an advanced and quite "sophisticated" comprehension of cultural aspects of society.. The problem is that schools are structured to be universal for all. This creates a disconnection between what those kids knows (a quite advanced comprehension of a few subjects, mostly scientific and cultural because the kids had a lot of occasions to do cultural activities and study science on the contrary to popular classes) and the way the knowledge is delivered.
This is why parents from middle and upper classes will often feel that school is not stimulating enough for their kids and the kids will often feel like those discipline are "too scholar" and feel a sensation of disconection with their scholar environment (that can lead toward antisocial behaviors). Those parents will often try to rationalize this by explaining that their kids are "high intellectual potentials" when in reality they are (often) just in dissonance with their environment because of the "cultural capital" given by their educations.
I gave you here one example where leftists values and sub values can lead toward a missinterpretation of reality. But it can happen with rightist values as well.. In fact, those tends to lead toward a lot more bias than the other side.
I don't remember why I was talking about that, I just wanted to share my thoughts on a video on sociology I just watched.
And I agree with that.
Why are you talking about "politicians"?
Do you think that when I say "science is also political", I mean that there must be politician behind the curtains checking on science ?
No. That's not what I'm saying.
My point is that to do science, we will have ourself to deal with our own value system and biases. It means that we must do the job of checking the balances between our value system (and the ethics of society) and our own sub values and own biases. This is what differenciate someone that will experiment on humans because they just want to make science progress by any means necessary, and a scientist that will refuse to experiment on animals because of their own values.
Its means that researchers needs to be the gardians of the balances between their own values+positive ethics of society and their sub values/biases if we want to keep science as the biggest representation of human progress.
Its means that scientists must absolutely have a political vision about their work.
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