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The latest issue of Scientific American, a popular science monthly published by Springer Nature, contains an editorial endorsing Kamala Harris. She is the candidate that anyone who cares about science should vote for, apparently. Her positions on issues such as “the climate crisis,” “public health” and “reproductive rights” are “lit by rationality” and based on “reality,” “science” and “solid evidence,” while her opponent “rejects evidence” in favor of “nonsensical conspiracy fantasies.”
There’s something a bit odd about a science magazine getting embroiled in the grubby world of politics
On the face of it, there’s something a bit odd about a storied science magazine getting embroiled in the grubby world of politics. Indeed, the editorial acknowledges how unusual this is, suggesting that’s all the more reason we should take the recommendation seriously. The editors have descended from Mount Olympus because the fate of America — nay, the world — is at stake: “That is why, for only the second time in our magazine’s 179-year history, the editors of Scientific American are endorsing a candidate for president.” True, the previous occasion was only four years ago when it endorsed Joe Biden, but the editors have a point. It is rather unorthodox.
So how can science tell us how to vote? My admittedly primitive understanding of the history of science is that it only really began to transform our understanding of the world when a firm distinction emerged between fact and value — between descriptive propositions, which depict the world as it is, and prescriptive ones, which tell us how it ought to be. That is, the Scientific Revolution occurred when students of nature eschewed politics and religion and embraced reason and empiricism. In that context, the editors of Scientific American, in seeking to muddy those waters again, seem to want to return to an era in which the evidence of our senses — “reality,” as they put it — tells us how to behave. In defiance of the naturalistic fallacy, they are smashing the “is” and the “ought” back together.
This seems a little unwise, to put it mildly. If believing in “the science” means you have to vote Democrat, how are you going to persuade Republicans to embrace your “evidence-based” policy on, say, Roe versus Wade? A paper in Nature Human Behavior last year found that the endorsement of Joe Biden in 2020 by Nature, the prestigious science journal, caused Trump supporters to distrust the publication, lowered the demand for Covid-related information it published (i.e. downloads of articles on the efficacy of the Covid vaccines fell substantially) and reduced Trump supporters’ trust in scientists in general. I can’t quite get my head around just how stupid this is. It’s a bit like a group of evangelical Christians telling potential converts that if they vote Democrat they’ll go straight to hell. If you’re in the proselytizing business, as Scientific Americanclearly is, it seems a bit daft to alienate roughly half the US population.
There’s also the fact that, in the event of Trump winning, he’ll be more likely to cut federal spending on scientific research and public health. In fact, this is one of the reasons given by Scientific American to vote for Kamala, but talk about a self-fulfilling prophecy! After all, why would Trump give billions of dollars to a community that’s aligned itself with his opponent? Wouldn’t it be more prudent for these panjandrums of the scientific establishment to remain above the political fray?
One explanation of why the editors of these high-profile science publications are behaving in such a bizarre way is that they’re just partisan hacks, determined to persuade people to vote Democrat. According to this theory, they don’t really believe science has anything meaningful to say about who to vote for — how could it? They’re just pretending it does to gull their less sophisticated readers into supporting Kamala.
But I don’t buy that. More likely, I fear, is that the editors of Scientific American really do believe in the snake oil they’re selling. It’s not science they’re committed to, but scientism — a weird hybrid of technocratic managerialism and radical progressive ideology. If the modern era was made possible by the separation of knowledge and morality, the worshippers at this new altar seem determined to usher in a new post-modern utopia in which science and religion are fused once again. In that light, they cannot help but endorse Kamala Harris because their consciences won’t allow them to do otherwise. It’s not a choice dictated by science, but by theology. Trump, who gleefully trespasses over their sacred values, is the devil and they must stop him. The title of their magazine should be changed to Scientistic Americans.
This article was originally published in The Spectator’s UK magazine. Subscribe to the World edition here.
