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Scientific American's departing editor and the politicization of science

(reason.com)
473 points Bostonian | 2 comments | 18 Nov 24 22:04 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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alistairSH ◴[19 Nov 24 14:33 UTC] No.42183843[source]▶
Does the author not understand the concept of "opinion piece"? Every "article" he takes issue with is NOT a scientific article, but an opinion piece.
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someuser2345 ◴[19 Nov 24 15:07 UTC] No.42184198[source]▶
Scientific American isn't a social media platform; by publishing these opinion pieces, they implicitly support them. Would you be ok if they published an opinion piece bashing evolution and defending creationism?
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1. crackercrews ◴[19 Nov 24 15:20 UTC] No.42184381[source]▶
> by publishing these opinion pieces, they implicitly support them

This would seem to be true if they tend to run opinion pieces that are all from one "side". If they ran pieces that espouse conflicting viewpoints, it would not imply that they support all of the opinion pieces they publish.

From the look of it, they stick to one team. They wouldn't be taking this heat if they had a broader diversity of thought.

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2. philipov ◴[19 Nov 24 16:14 UTC] No.42185071[source]▶
Depends on what you consider diversity of thought. "Bashing evolution" is not diversity of thought, it is crackpottery. Diversity of thought exists in opinions about, e.g. what evolutionary mechanisms are most important, how to interpret old evidence, what are the best opportunities for new research... A Creationist will look at that and call it "all one team" because none of them believe the universe is only 5000 years old, but that's nonsense. It's important to keep an open mind, but not so open your brain falls out.