UK seeks to censor scientists that disagree with them

steddyeddy

The UK government is putting forward a directive that scientists in receipt of government money should limit their outputs in towards those in favour of government policy. In another words scientific censorship. This is a frightening move and one that could impact anything ranging from healthcare to climate change. David Nutt who writes this opinion piece in the Guardian has experience with government censorship. He was commissioned by the government to objectively talk about the real dangers of drugs, published peer review data stating the dangers of drugs were exaggerated and threatened with sacking when the government didn't like his results. This is a bad move.
UK seeks to censor scientists that disagree with them.

One of the many frightening aspects of life under Joseph Stalin was the
central direction of science by the Communist party. This led to
egregious scientific data, disregarded in the west, but celebrated in the Soviet
Union. One of the best examples was the nonsensical doctrine known as Lysenkoism,
which rejected concepts such as genes and natural selection in favour of
“natural cooperation” and the belief that physical changes imposed on one
generation of organisms would pass down to the next – for example that plucking
the leaves from a plant would encourage leaflessness in its descendants.
Scientists who questioned the official view, such the geneticist Nikolai
Vavilov, were denounced, exiled and in many cases sentenced to
death.

The British government now seems to be moving in the same direction, trying
to limit scientific outputs to those that support its policies. Hard to believe?
That’s the effect of a recent, largely misunderstood move by the Cabinet Office.
When it announced plans
to prevent any person or institution in receipt of government money from using
those funds to argue (“lobby”, if you prefer) against official
policy, this was widely interpreted as an attempt to silence unruly charities.
As the minister Matthew Hancock put it, a clause to be inserted in new and
renewed grant agreements would mean that “taxpayers won’t be made to foot the
bill for political campaigning and political lobbying”.


But the move has wider and even more worrying ramifications – it could
significantly censor scientific debate. Almost all scientists in the UK get some
form of funding from the government, which is most commonly in terms of salary
from universities or the NHS, but can also be specific grant funding from
government research charities such as the Medical
Research Council or the Biotechnology
and Biological Sciences Research Council.


Even more chilling is the potential impact on our leading scientific
institutions, the Royal
Society and the Academy
of Medical Sciences, both of which receive very significant amount of
their funding from government. Will they no longer be able to review health and
science policy if their findings might challenge government policy?


And who will decide what constitutes “lobbying” and is therefore banned and
what is simply scientists talking about the implications of their research
findings? Censorship would irreparably damage scientific enquiry and debate in
the UK and make the country a much less desirable destination for scientists and
scientific investment. It would also lead to the growth of US-style anti-science
“thinktanks”, as described in Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway’s recent book


If the new directive has the effect of sending
scientists back into their labs, then taxpayers will be the big
losers

It is not clear what sanctions could be applied to anyone who ignores the
anti-lobbying “directive”. They couldn’t be prosecuted, but it has been rumoured
that researchers found culpable of lobbying would be made to pay the money back.
Of course, this would be impossible as the grant money would have been spent. In
reality this directive appears to have been designed to scare researchers away
from issues the government doesn’t want explored. It will have a chilling effect
on researchers, especially those already reluctant to speak out because their
findings are contentious and inconvenient for ministers, whether they concern
alcohol pricing, climate change or psychoactive substances.


I have direct experience of how ministers dislike having to deal with
scientific evidence that contradicts their policy. I was threatened with
dismissal by two Home Office ministers and then
sacked after publicising the findings of my peer-reviewed research
into the
relative harms of drugs in 2009. Rather than hearing that evidence,
assessing it and honestly rejecting it on the grounds that it clashed with party
policy, ministers instead sacked
me from my role as independent adviser on drugs.


The message to other scientists with inconvenient evidence was clear, and it
saddens me greatly that this is the same message being sent by this new missive:
the awkward squad should stay out of the debate. It’s likely that a secret
blacklist of “dissident” scientists will be kept.


New rules could stop
state-funded scientists advising ministers and make it easier for companies and
campaign groups to sway government decisions

Why has this directive been developed? The argument goes that it is wrong to
use taxpayers’ money to lobby against the elected government. But it’s only by
examining all the evidence – which could be for as well as against – that we can
be certain that current policies are the best they can be.


If the new directive has the effect of sending scientists back into their
labs and preventing them from talking publicly about their research, then
taxpayers will be the big losers. They will have less access to fully
independent research on key issues of health and welfare and environmental
change, making it easier for them to be hoodwinked by political and commercial
interests.


All scientists should support their parent institutions and professional
colleges in lobbying to oppose this appalling insult to freedom of thought and
research. They can start by signing Bob
Ward’s online petition to “exempt grants for academic research from
new ‘anti-lobbying’ regulation”. And if you’re not a scientist but care about
research being censored, you should sign it too.

Samaris

I don't like this at all. We saw far too much of this during the Bush administration in the US during those years and the damage done to the government scientist pool is immeasurable. (I can give examples and sourcing if anyone is thinking I'm having a go at some Republican :P)

Science is about narrowing down the possibilities towards a coherent answer to a question by specific methods. A government or political think tank may be entitled to its own opinions, but it's not entitled to its own brand of science, nor its own facts.

Note about the petition - can only sign it if you're a UK resident or British citizen. Alas, I could have signed it last year.

The_Valeyard

This has been happening since the cold war.

Probably even longer.


Lot of bad science out there. Especially with corporations and businesses trying to promote their product.

Some scientists are no better than mystic Meg.

steddyeddy

The_Valeyard wrote: »

This has been happening since the cold war.

Probably even longer.


Lot of bad science out there.

So you think government of the day should decide what is bad science and what is good science?

The_Valeyard

steddyeddy wrote: »

So you think government of the day should decide what is bad science and what is good science?

Of course not. Ridiculous notion.

steddyeddy

The_Valeyard wrote: »

Of course not. Ridiculous notion.

It is but unfortunately that is what's happening.

Samaris

The Valeyard - Yes, bad science happens. But the examples you specifically cite include big business and corporations which is a private venture and to some extent down to the personal integrity of the scientists and the corporations.

Scientists have to value their integrity or they will become known as mere shills. It doesn't take much for their research to be discredited if there's any dubiousness about their methods or findings and that can have a career-long effect on the person. Still, the lure of money can be damaging and private ventures are more likely to not challenge a favourable answer or, more to the point, not hire a second time a scientist that doesn't give that favourable answer.

This absolutely should not happen in publicly funded science.

The_Valeyard

steddyeddy wrote: »

It is but unfortunately that is what's happening.

But I think on its already been happening for a long time now. Certain interest groups want the results in their favour so they hire dubious scientists than can give them those results. Scientists are no different from anyone else really, greed can be a motivator. Corruption in all walks of life

One eyed Jack

Samaris wrote: »

A government or political think tank may be entitled to its own opinions, but it's not entitled to its own brand of science, nor its own facts.

steddyeddy wrote: »

So you think government of the day should decide what is bad science and what is good science?

Hasn't this always been the way though? That politics and science were always related, and whoever funded the research called the tune - "Come up with results that validate our agenda... or else!"

Been happening back and far as Galileo and Confucius I'd say, when patrons funded scientific ehh... "discovery", in the same way they funded the arts.

Look at how science is being influenced by political lobby groups already. The only thing that surprises me about this move is that anyone is surprised by it!

RDM_83 again

There is a counter argument in support of this measure.

Its very easy to publish a research paper to support your particular views, look at the paper that got Prof Nutt removed from his government role, it does appear to have a ideological slant, look at how he positions alcohol in terms of harm to individual users (4th most harmful drug) yet meta analysis shows that alcohol consumption (even to fairly high levels) correlates with longer life expectancy, even at the huge levels of use alcohol overdose deaths are less than opiates AFAIK, whats the comparison on persistent low level use between drugs on mood and health.
Having read the paper (ages ago) it seems designed to make an ideological point about policy dependent on rather than make a neutral statement or testing of hypothesis, its experimental method was in effect to ask a number of experts (10) to rate the harm of drugs. I would hold the (probably controversial view) that the study wasn't a scientific analysis of harm but rather a survey of how harmful a small group of experts perceive substances to be.

If a researcher is in receipt of public funding I don't believe that it is wrong for them to be held to a high standard of neutrality in terms of their research designs and public statements. I believe that this should work both ways and researchers should also not make statements that are in support of government policy, they should simply present their data rather than using it as a personal platform.