Scientific American's departing editor and the politicization of science

"In the process, SciAm played a small but important role in the self-immolation of scientific authority—a terrible event whose fallout we'll be living with for a long time."

Which is it - small or important? All that seems like a bit much.

For want of a nail the shoe was lost. For want of a shoe the horse was lost. For want of a horse the rider was lost. For want of a rider the message was lost. For want of a message the battle was lost. For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.

Was the nail small or important?

Why does a person want a nail and then lose a shoe? Why does a person want a shoe and then lose a horse? Why does a person want a message but lose the rider? Why does a person want a message and lose the battle? Why does a person want a battle but lose the kingdom?

I don’t understand the point or reference being made.

They're talking about a horseshoe on a horse which was being used to deliver an important message

"For want of" is a preposition meaning "because of the absence of"

https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/for_want_of#English

“for want of” in this context means “because of not having” or “for lack of”

It’s an older way of writing English. But not like super old. Basically the kingdom was lost because of 1 missing nail.

There are too many leaps of abstraction, which to me, proves the missing horseshoe nail is irrelevant in the big picture. Too many other things could have transpired positively for the kingdom in a space so expansive. It’s classic scapegoating. “Bro my controller totally didn’t work that time! We would’ve won the match otherwise I promise.”

If a tiny problem can cascade like that, it seems that there’s a systemic logistics issue going on here, the problem wasn’t the nail it was some high-level problem in the overall organization.

One nail is small and unimportant but the general problem of getting enough nails is a big important one.

And anyway, the messenger also could have been shot, the horse could also have tripped on a rock, the battle could have been lost even with the message getting through. If their plan hinges on everything going right, the kingdom has put themselves in a position where they don’t have any small problems, just big ones.

It’s so contrived and yet needs so many leaps of abstraction that I don’t think it makes its point well at all. “Bro my controller totally didn’t work that time! We would’ve won the match otherwise I promise.” Do you really think it was the controller that lost the match?

It was a data point not a horse shoe in a critical chain of events. I think people will get a taste of promoting “alternative facts”when it comes to the current “let’s hit the reset button” crowd. then they will regret it and maybe reassess “alternative facts” like government grand schemes to create autism with vaccines and “make America fat” like are being touted. Most Americans need to only look in the mirror to see the source of their life’s problems.

I think the argument the poster is making is as root cause analysis.

The root cause of the messenger failing was the missing nail. Sure it could have been many other things, but in this case it was the nail. And if it was a pitched battle that was narrowly lost by one message, sure, they could have won or lost because of a dozen other factors, but in this case it was the missing message. There are likely many other important things to worry about, but in the system as it is today, it failed for want of a nail.

Plenty of large engineering outages were because of single keystroke typos. Should these systems be less prone to human error? Of course. Are they? Some of them are, but right now some of them aren't.

The point being made is that small things can be important if other things go wrong. We should fix the other things, but often they are much harder to fix than the small thing. And really, we should care about both, since humans are capable of that.

Tbh it seems entirely plausible to me that a messenger being unable to deliver an important message could have an outsized effect on that outcome of a battle. What if they're letting their side know about a surprise attack?

That's "systemic" thinking (a la "systemic" racism). Which makes it political. TFA would have us avoid such thinking.

If you look at the problem as a swiss cheese model and not just a teleological propagation from one root cause, then there are many things that need fixing, not just a cobbler being short one nail.

It is a well-known proverb that is centuries old [1]: it's essentially a canonical way of refering to the concept of something small having big consequences.

Proverbs are often contrived (e.g., "Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones" - who lives in a glass house?).

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/For_Want_of_a_Nail

you can be small role yet still provide significant contributions. Or are you just upset about the content of the article?

Seems also plausible that risks might apply to the messenger that wouldn’t apply to the troops in garrison—that is, the thousands of other horseshoe nails in inventory could have gone unmissed or doomed a less important horse.

This is a very well thought-out comment. I commend you for it.

Sometimes the problem really is tiny. Ill look for the link, but I read an article about how Valve, the company, was saved by an intern.

I think details matter.

It's an ancient proverb demonstrating early understanding of complex systems. Not an in depth philosophical argument.

However there are plenty of real life examples of a single small detail causing outsize impact. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska_Airlines_Flight_261

It's kind of absurd to think otherwise.

See https://80.lv/articles/valve-steam-the-entire-pc-gaming-indu...

You can't really blame one magazine going lame on the whole culture going bad, yet there is a way that's contagious.

Maybe it's like cheese because culture goes bad the way cheese goes bad?

have you ever heard of a lynchpin? They're small and usually extremely important. For example, lynchpins hold the backhoe on to the back of my tractor.

In fact, lynchpins are so small and important that the term is used when there's something that is small but so important that missing it would ruin a project, because the lynchpin ties it all together into a cohesive whole.

Also the replies to my sibling have me confused if i am even awake... who hasn't heard "for want of a nail"?

A more robust treatment of risk factors in both ideas.

You want to ask whether the system needs to be tracking nail quality if the kingdom relies on nails that much. You also want to be asking why critical information is being sent by only one messenger.

What a strange bit of pedantry. 'Small but powerful' is a very common phrase that I don't really see any problem with.

> I think details matter

For me, this is the moral of horseshoe nail story. It's something I preach to my team - details matter. I’ll add that unfortunately we often don’t know which details will matter ahead of time.

I hate everything about this, thank you for sharing the context