“Nothing will corrode public trust more than a creeping awareness that scientists are unable to live up to the standards that they have set for themselves.” Daniel Sarewitz worries that over-selection and over-reporting of false positive results will increasingly put the value of science into question.
Tag: society
How doctors die
“Doctors die, too. And they don’t die like the rest of us. What’s unusual about them is not how much treatment they get compared to most Americans, but how little.” Meanwhile, Ken Murray is determined to go gently into that good night.
The curse of TINA
“Think Tanks surround politics today and are the very things that are supposed to generate new ideas. But if you go back and look at how they rose up—at who invented them and why—you discover they are not quite what they seem.” Adam Curtis looks at the history of the Think Tank in the UK and asks why modern politics, for all its Think Tanks, seems so paradoxically short of new ideas.
Is aviation security mostly for show?
“Despite fearful rhetoric to the contrary, terrorism is not a transcendent threat. A terrorist attack cannot possibly destroy a country’s way of life; it’s only our reaction to that attack that can do that kind of damage.” In the wake of last week’s failed bombing of an airplane over Detroit, Bruce Schneier asks us to leverage the inherent strengths of our democracies.
How to tell someone they sound racist
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“When you say ‘I think he’s a racist’, that’s not a bad move because you might be wrong. That’s a bad move because you might be right.”
There’s probably no god. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.
“The Atheist Bus Campaign began when Ariane Sherine wrote an article in June 2008 about Christian adverts running on London buses. These ads featured the URL of a website which said non–Christians would burn in hell for all eternity. Ariane suggested that atheists reading her article could each donate £5 to fund a reassuring counter–advert.”
Update: Christian religious groups are about to respond with ads stating that “there definitely is a god”.
Robin Cook is dead
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Robin Cook, one of few political figures to command my lasting respect, has suddenly died on August 6, 2005. If you are only ever going to read one personal statement made to the House of Commons, read Robin Cooks’s resignation speech from 17 March, 2003.
Darwinian markets
“I’m struck by the work of some of the anti-globalization protesters, which has been admirably out-of-the-tunnel in terms of motivation, but naively ill-informed about how the world economy works.” Economist Paul Seabright on how human beings developed a complex system of cooperation and specialization between unrelated individuals.