Science and politics, that is. In recent years, the politicization of science by the left has become a serious problem. Michael Fumento cites three examples, all involving top science journals and important public issues. The first is global warming, probably the subject of more "scientific" misinformation than any other topic:

Last September, after Hurricane Katrina, activists in lab coats saw a grand opportunity to tie the exceptionally violent hurricane season to global warming. A study in Science declared, "A large increase was seen in the number and proportion of hurricanes reaching categories 4 and 5."

But the researchers simply cut off their data at 1970, though public statistics go back to 1850. Using the full data set would have reversed the conclusion. Why did the editors and peer-reviewers at both JAMA and Science not insist on use of the full data set? Because slicing off inconvenient data is a time-honored tool of advocacy science.

Global temperatures fell during the 1970s, and many scientists (including some who are now leading global warming advocates) worried that the next ice age was on the way. There was even a proposal to paint the ice caps black so the earth could soak up more sunlight and avert catastrophic cooling. No doubt the editors of Science know this.

Fumento's second example is embryonic stem cell research, where the most important "science" underlying public enthusiasm for cloning turned out to be fraudulent:

Even Science's awful stem-cell embarrassment wasn't purely a matter of fraud. I have written repeatedly on how both Science and Nature have turned themselves into cheerleaders for any supposed advance in ES cell science, while opening their pages to laughable attacks on what many see as both medically and ethically superior — namely adult stem cells.

Perhaps the best explanation for why the Korean paper slipped by is that the editors so desperately wanted to believe it was real that they missed all the warning signs of fraud.

Then we have the notorious "study" in Lancet purporting to show that 100,000 civiilians died during the Iraq war:

Some journal editors are completely unabashed about their chicanery. In 2004, The Lancet released ahead of publication and right before the 2004 U.S. presidential election an outrageous report claiming 100,000 Iraqi civilians had been killed since the U.S. invasion. Yet other calculations showed a range of 15,000 to 24,000 — and even Osama bin Laden claimed just "over 15,000."

No matter, the Lancet's editor took the opportunity to blast "democratic imperialism" and said "the evidence we publish today must change heads as well as pierce hearts."

The moral of the story is that the leading scientific journals have been taken over by liberals who value politics over truth. So any time you see a news report on a "scientific" journal article that ostensibly has political implications, you should greet it with skepticism.

Posted by John at 07:48 AM  |    |