Monday
Much garbage has been written about the Professor Nutt affair. The notion that governments hire scientists to make informed decisions is laughable and the fact scientists are outraged that the government fired Nutt for contradicting the official line on drugs is a measure of their self-absorbed pomposity.
Governments hire scientists for the same reason companies often commission consultants to study some aspect of their business and make a report... i.e. to justify a course of action the board already wants to do but which they need to justify to investors. Similarly the job of a scientist on the government lists is to remain torpid until wheeled out in front of a camera to drone the government line with the caption "This man is a SCIENTIST and therefore the government's edicts are incontrovertible and must be OBEYED".
Professor Nutt was a stage prop, nothing more, and he is a fool to be surprised he was canned for being off-message. Of course what he said about marijuana and alcohol was true, any fool can see that. But how is that relevant?
Glad you mentioned boards of directors. The CEO's are the front men,who can take credit or blame, for which they are paid well in either case.
The hiding of the boards and overlapping directorships
and other information about them is a media-wide practice. The little men who are not there.
And, what branch of government will solve a problem, thus putting themselves out of work? Crime? Too many prisons, courts, police, social services, lawyers, etcetera
depend upon it for expanding authority and budgets,
which mean not only job security, but promotions, not to mention outsourcing to buds in some biz.
Posted by cjf at November 2, 2009 11:25 PM
We had a similar fiasco here! Bob Hawke, when he was Prime Minister, had a panel of judges look into the feasibility of nuclear power, and when they gave a favourable report, he was obliged by politics to ignore it completely! The people concerned were quite put out, and wouldn't pass him the sugar-bowl at meetings. He belongs to the 'No nukes is good nukes' school.
Posted by Nuke Gray at November 3, 2009 02:30 AM
I applaud Professor Nutt. He took the government at face value, and proved that they are the mendacious, deceitful shills we always knew. He took a theory, subjected it to an empirical test, and proved its validity by way of public experiment. The man is a scientist after all.
Posted by John K at November 3, 2009 11:18 AM
Regretfully, most political education begins with adults telling lies to small children; and, by the punishments that derive from disobedience to a dishonest norm.
Even religious dogma is in less conflict with science than political dogma.
Religion is faith in what is not known. Science is a faith that something can be known. Politics, dealing in plausable deniability, tries to keep anyone from finding - out.
Posted by cjf at November 3, 2009 12:23 PM
Funny how Governments take the advice of some scientists but not others, isn't it?
I wish some Govt would say to the scientists at the IPCC that their views are not helpful, and will be ignored.
Posted by RAB at November 3, 2009 03:41 PM
Perry,
I assume the post was written tongue-in-cheek?
Of course Professor Nutt knew that scientific advice is a prop, and that you only get the job, and keep it, if you give them the answers they want. Anyone who works for the government knows that - you couldn't possibly get to head a committee without knowing it.
But few scientists like it, and Professor Nutt evidently decided to make a point of it, and start a fight, at the time when he thought it would do the most damage.
Not only have the government's credentials (such as they are) for rational decision making taken a hit, but their interference with supposedly impartial evidence has been exposed. It's not nearly as good as the expenses scandal, but it's still pretty good.
The only way it could be made more perfect is if someone were to ask a sceptical question of the minister on climate change, for them to bring up the scientific evidence as justification for overriding the public will, and then for the comparison with the rejected scientific evidence concerning the harmful effects of drugs to be made. "Did the scientists who gave that climate change evidence know they would be sacked if they gave answers conflicting with government policy?" Delicious!
Or indeed smoking, obesity, alcohol, or any of the other stuff they want to ban on spurious "scientific" grounds. It wouldn't stop them, of course. But annoying them would be fun.
Posted by Pa Annoyed at November 3, 2009 07:19 PM
The headline made me pee a little:
Scientists quit government drugs body over David Nutt sacking
Posted by M4-10 at November 3, 2009 07:38 PM
I assume the post was written tongue-in-cheek?
Moi?
Posted by Perry de Havilland at November 3, 2009 08:10 PM
On getting rid of the drug laws:
Everyone should remember that the libertarian position is for drug addicts to be given no government help whatever.
No free needles, not welfare benefits - NOTHING.
This is not exactly what the pro drug left is in favour of.
Posted by Paul Marks at November 3, 2009 09:29 PM
Being anti nuclear in Australia one of the biggest uranium deposit areas in the world.
Leftist bleepers, bleep, bleep, bleep, bleep..................
Posted by Paul Marks at November 3, 2009 09:37 PM
Any scientist can prove anything, given the time and the tools. Nutt's "horseriding versus ecstasy" calculations etc. may have been immediately mathematically true, but certainly don't stand up to any sort of scientific scrutiny.
The trouble as, as we all know, that once those views are out there and published by the Daily Mail, it's extremely hard to get people to forget them, even if they are complete BS.
Wakefield and his despicable MMR hoax springs to mind as a good example.
Posted by 6000 at November 6, 2009 02:40 PM
