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A mood of scientific self-righteousness has broken out in the UK. The 'geeks' - professional scientists committed to evidence-based policy - are on the march. What has brought this on? Two things seem to have combined. First a protest and second a manifesto. Both have important implications for the debate about the relationship between science, society and democracy - and the role of biotechnology in all three.
The protest has been provoked by a field trial of genetically-modified wheat at the public research station at Rothamsted. A protest group called 'Take the Flour Back' committed to destroying the trial in a carnivalesque protest last weekend. The 'decontamination' didn't happen, but the publicity storm certainly did. The normally media-shy scientists have been shoved into the spotlight and, under the direction of the articulate and down-to-earth Professor John Pickett, Rothamsted scientists are defending their decision to carry out the trial in a very public way. For the first time the debate is being led by public sector scientists in a balanced and informed manner. Monsanto and its disastrous PR machine, thankfully, is nowhere to be seen. The protestors, meanwhile, continue to press their charges, with fears of contamination high on their list of potential risks. Meanwhile politicians, leader writers and other commentators have weighed in, suggesting that this is a turning point in the GM debate and the valiant Rothamsted scientists are on the right side of history this time around.
The manifesto is a pithy new book written by Mark Henderson, the very effective head of communications of the Wellcome Trust, a global medical charity based in London. It is titled: 'The Geek Manifesto: Why Science Matters'. It too has been give a lot of air time and favourable reviews in the press are piling up. The book argues, through a range of cases - including GM crops - that scientists need to stand up and be counted, and that evidence-based policy is losing out in favour of emotional, ideological or plain ill-informed debate. The scientists - the geeks - need to fight back and, if possible, take over; making in-roads into politics to ensure that ill-informed policies are banished forever in favour of science-led enlightenment.
Is all this moving the debate on or backwards? I believe the latter, and I will explain why. I think there are three reasons why the current debate is deeply problematic and potentially dangerous.
First, we should reject the idea there is a 'march of unreason' or a 'return to the dark ages' when there is dissent, debate and deliberation in society about major technological and scientific issues, no matter what the source. Those raising concerns should not be condemned as ill-informed zealots; they are concerned citizens who may just be wrong (or perhaps sometimes even right). No-one should have a monopoly on the truth, and debate within and outside accredited science should always be a good thing. But when such views challenge mainstream visions of progress, and in particular certain technological elements with huge vested interests and political commitments associated, then it all becomes a bit more tricky. Solid, well-grounded evidence is of course essential - and this must be rigorous, transparent and well documented, and so open to scrutiny and challenge - from whatever source. The anti-GM campaigners clearly need to engage with the arguments of Professor Pickett and colleagues more fulsomely, but this also needs to be reciprocated. When dealing with issues of uncertainty (which means nearly all science, certainly at the cutting edge), plural and conditional knowledge and advice must necessarily result. This means that policymakers and publics must debate the implications. The job of scientists is to provide the data, in collaboration with other knowledge holders and experts including the public, and let a more open, democratic process be the judge and make the decisions. This is not a dark age of unreason, but a mature democratic approach to science and policymaking.
Second, the argument of the geek manifesto is that more scientists should be in politics. Only one of 650 Members of Parliament (MPs) in the UK is a scientist, Henderson claims. More scientists need to be politicians, he argues, and then better policy will result. A linear, technocratic vision is laid out where science leads politics. This is a potentially highly dangerous view. A democratic political process, surely, should have a more accountable relationship with scientific expertise. Scientists should be 'on tap, but not on top', as was famously said by Winston Churchill. It seems this is not the idea behind the Geek Manifesto. It states "As those of us who care deeply about science and its experimental method start to fight for our beliefs, geeks have a historic opportunity to embed critical thinking more deeply in the political process. But if we are to achieve anything, we need to turn our numbers and confidence into political muscle." It continues: "Let's create a political cost for failing science. Politics has had it too easy for too long. It's time for a geek revolution." Bizarrely, the Chinese politburo is seen as a model. Because it is full of highly expert engineers, this is seen as a good thing. It seems issues of representation, accountability and democracy are of lesser importance for the revolutionary geeks! Science is of course an important contributor to contemporary societies, and indeed the new GM wheat varieties from Rothamsted may be an example, but it is essential to have a proper debate about what directions of science for whom, and this needs to be carried out in an informed, respectful and inclusive way, as the STEPS Centre argued in a rather different manifesto for innovation, sustainability and development.
Third, in the current hubbub there is much talk of the great Enlightenment tradition, and how the 'geek revolution' can ensure that it is revived and sustained. However, a very limited view of enlightenment is trotted out - see for example the usually excellent Will Hutton in the UK broadsheet, The Observer or the item on the flagship Today Programme of the BBC. It seems essentially to involve a narrow, rationalist technocracy, dominated by accredited scientists who know what's best for the rest of us. This of course is a far cry from the Enlightenment vision of the great thinkers of that time, described in 1784 by Immanuel Kant simply as the "freedom to use one's own intelligence". The Enlightenment was of course an escape from the hegemonic grip of a narrow view of world dominated by powerful religious institutions and the monarchic state, opening up the opportunity for debate in the public sphere. A pluralistic view was celebrated that saw science, the arts and the humanities as liberating, creating new freedoms. The vision was one of free and open debate, with dissent and discussion absolutely central. The currently prevalent misreadings of Enlightenment instead appear to create a new theocracy in the form of a controlled and policed science-led technocracy, where alternative views are dismissed as belonging to quacks and mavericks and being non-scientific and unreasonable. Who will be the new popes and bishops, and where will those who don't comply be burned at the stake, I wonder?
Of course John Pickett and Mark Henderson would not go that far. But some of the implications of the arguments being bandied around in response to their interventions are quite extreme. Of course science has a vital place in modern economies and societies, and with this biotechnology. But when protests emerge and debates arise, the reaction should not be one of hysterical retreat, but one of engagement and discussion, accepting that given contending values and diverse uncertainties, there are going to be no easy answers and so no clear agreement on what is progress and what science for what purpose fits.
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For example, thetalldesigner argues: “a manifesto for the geeks is both essential and welcomed, we built this world you are all living in and we'll damn well have a say in running it”. It is this sort of response that is dangerous: the arrogant and undemocratic rejection of alternative views. Sadly this is a perspective implicit in much media commentary on this issue, and one that the blog was reacting to.
Yet fernicle responds effectively: “It is not just a question of doing good science and then good politics, it is understanding the politics involved in deciding what counts as good science”. This is a vital message, and an important lesson from the on-going GM debate. It also suggests, as I tried to explore in the blog, a more fundamental rethinking of the relationship between science and democracy than so far outlined in the ‘Geek Manifesto’
http://www.corporateeurope.org/
UK - I am not a scientist but have read widely around the general issues. I recently tried to engage some scientists into a debate about African food sovereignty, moncultures, toxic soy and the impact of roundup spraying - I know from the responses I got there is so much some scientists (just like some members of the general public) don't actually know about geopolitics and vested interests, corporate influence on science etc. I wasn't sure they knew too much about some aspects of science either lol. Am I really joking?
For example they demonstrably have not reasoned themselves into the position they are in, so it stands that they cannot be reasoned out of it.
They do not engage in debate, merely in isolated cells of likeminded protestors that act as echo chambers.
We are subject to 'march of unreason' or a 'return to the dark ages', constantly from the rubbish published in daily newspapers to the lies trotted out by mainstream TV, a manifesto for the geeks is both essential and welcomed, we built this world you are all living in and we'll damn well have a say in running it.
Apart from any other considerations, it's a ridiculous statement, which I presume you do not believe. You did not actually create the Earth, design the carbon and hydrogen cycles, or turn teosinte into maize - and furthermore science still has not fully elucidated how these things came to be.
You pick up on Mark's point that there is only one scientist-MP, and then seem to claim that anyone making this point is calling for a scientific technocracy.
Having more scientist running for parliament does not make a technocracy.
If scientists were represented proportionally in Parliament there would be 13 scientist-MPs [1].
Encouraging "geeks" to vote for the science-minded, to challenge their MP on scientific issues or even to run for public office will help ensure scientific evidence remains a key tenet of political decision making. Scientific evidence should, by no means, be the only information taken into account (as Mark quite rightly points out), but it should be considered, disseminated, and debated before political decisions are made.
Getting more "geeks" into politics is one way to get more science into politics.
P.S. these issues have been important and at the forefront of peoples minds long before the Rothamsted protests, see: science funding at the last general election; libel law; the ACMD; alternative medicines...
[1] http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2012/may/11/kicking-down-doors-scientific-advice-governments
It is not just a question of doing good science and then good politics, it is understanding the politics involved in deciding what counts as good science.
But I think it's also fair to be irritated by responses to The Geek Manifesto that completely misrepresent what the book actually says.
"It is exceptionally rare for scientific evidence to mandate a single solution to a policy problem; rather, it informs the range of solutions that might be feasible, and predicts what the outcome of each is most likely to be. Questions of ethics, law, public acceptability, fairness, personal liberty and economics are usually relevant too, and scientific experts are often no better placed than anyone else to judge these. If we value democracy, advisers should advise and ministers should decide.
"The degree to which pesticide residues potentially damage health is a scientific question which science can answer. Science can also help to explain whether the higher cost of vegetables that would result if pesticides were more strictly controlled or banned would lead to better or worse overall public health. It can’t, however, decide how society should balance risks and benefits: that is a political question for elected representatives to take."
"Ministers are entitled to take all sorts of factors into account when they reach decisions – indeed they must do so – and science will usually be just one of them. They are democratically elected; their advisers are not. They are right to think about the expectations and aspirations of the people who voted for them, the promises they have made and the ideologies they espouse, when they weigh how to act.
"Tracey Brown, who campaigns for greater use of evidence in public policy as director of Sense About Science, is clear on its limitations. 'There’s strong evidence that a 9pm curfew would cut crime, but it’s clearly an infringement of civil liberties,' she says. 'It’s as important to me that politicians are democratic as it is that they respect science.' Evan Harris, the former Liberal Democrat MP who now runs the Centre for Evidence-Based Policy, agrees: 'It’s reasonable to expect questions of ideology, social justice and, yes, politics to feature in political decision-making.'
"In his book The March of Unreason, Lord Dick Taverne, who founded Sense About Science, argued that politicians should leave independent experts alone to decide on fundamentally scientific issues, such as safe levels of pesticide residue in vegetables, public health measures such as vaccination schedules, or the best method of storing radioactive waste from nuclear power plants. He’s right that ministers and civil servants without specialist expertise have little of note to contribute to the technical aspects of such questions.
Do I think science could contribute more usefully than it does to public policy? Yes. Do I think more scientists in politics might help to achieve this? Yes. Do I think geeks and scientists should engage more actively with politicians, and that this would ultimately benefit both groups? I do. But the book decidedly does not make, as Ian suggests here, an argument for technocracy that overrides democracy. In fact, it explicitly argues the opposite.
There is no "linear technocratic vision". The engineering credentials of senior Chinese leaders are described, not held up as a model. The Geek Manifesto is actually critical of Dick Taverne's argument in The March of Unreason, as this article is.
Ian writes: "It seems issues of representation, accountability and democracy are of lesser importance for the revolutionary geeks!" But I agree with him that "a democratic political process, surely, should have a more accountable relationship with scientific expertise" -- and I say so at some length in the book, particularly in a section entitled "The Limits of Evidence".
In case Ian has not read it, an extract appears in the next comment.