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Scientific American's departing editor and the politicization of science

(reason.com)
473 points Bostonian | 1 comments | 18 Nov 24 22:04 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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tlogan ◴[19 Nov 24 13:33 UTC] No.42183230[source]▶
The issue isn’t that Scientific American leans “pro-Democrat” and it is political. It always has, and that’s understandable.

The real problem is that the modern Democratic Party increasingly aligns with postmodernism, which is inherently anti-science (Postmodernism challenges the objectivity and universality of scientific knowledge, framing it as a social construct shaped by culture, power, and historical context, rather than an evidence-based pursuit of truth).

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wolfram74 ◴[19 Nov 24 13:38 UTC] No.42183266[source]▶
We have such low standards for republicans, it's amazing. We complain that democrats are increasingly acknowleding that science is done by humans and humans will tend to ask questions based on what phenomena they've encountered and what explanations they've been given in their lives up til then, but totally give the republicans a pass on catering to groups that deny global warming, evolution or even that the world is more than 6000 years old.
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Philorandroid ◴[19 Nov 24 13:44 UTC] No.42183332[source]▶
Tu quoque; Republicans harboring fringe beliefs in some cases isn't a response to Democrats' mainstream acceptance of beliefs that the scientific method doesn't accurately reflect reality.
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UncleMeat ◴[19 Nov 24 14:05 UTC] No.42183546[source]▶
This is not "some cases." This is core policy of the party. You can see major leaders within state and federal legislative and executive bodies actively denying climate change research on a daily basis.
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Philorandroid ◴[19 Nov 24 14:18 UTC] No.42183692[source]▶
So biological denialism is a morally superior position to hold, then? Democratic leaders can't ever seem to acknowledge biological differences between the sexes, certainly not with regards to competitive advantages.

As for it being "core policy", I'd need to a see a citation, otherwise it's conjecture. The 2024 GOP platform [1] doesn't mention climate change, global warming, IPCC, et al. once, whereas the DNC's platform [2] discusses it at length.

[1] https://ballotpedia.org/The_Republican_Party_Platform,_2024 [2] https://democrats.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/FINAL-MASTE...

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pfdietz ◴[19 Nov 24 15:23 UTC] No.42184432{3}[source]▶
> biological denialism

What is this? I would have thought that the idea that some people who are outwardly one sex have brain wiring for the other sex is quite plausible. Development is very messy.

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1. jandrewrogers ◴[19 Nov 24 16:37 UTC] No.42185341{4}[source]▶
I don't think I've ever seen anyone deny the plausibility of the brain being wired differently than the body. What I believe the poster is referring to, and which I've seen in the media many times, is denial that physiological sex-linked characteristics are fully expressed even if doesn't match the one the brain is wired for. If brain wiring can mismatch physiology, it demonstrably is not determinative of the biology the brain is attached to in any meaningful way.

I understand the motivation for this denialism: most social institutions that segregate by sex are motivated by the practical effects of physiological sex-linked characteristics, brain wiring isn't a relevant criterion for determining "sex" for these purposes. It is currently impossible for the physiology to match the brain wiring in such case as a matter of science. Since the social institutions around sex segregation are widely viewed to exist for good reason, it motivates denial that physiological sex-linked characteristics actually exist for people that want to be segregated according to their brain-wiring sex.