Science societies have long shunned politics. But now they're ready to march.

["Dave Farber" <dave () farber net>]

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne () warpspeed com>
Date: Sat, Feb 25, 2017 at 7:30 AM
Subject: [Dewayne-Net] Science societies have long shunned politics. But
now they're ready to march.
To: Multiple recipients of Dewayne-Net <dewayne-net () warpspeed com>


Science societies have long shunned politics. But now they’re ready to
march.
By Sarah Kaplan
Feb 24 2017
<
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2017/02/24/science-societies-have-long-shunned-politics-but-now-theyre-ready-to-march/
>

Some of the nation's biggest scientific organizations, including the
American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American
Geophysical Union, are partnering with grass-roots organizers to plan the
March for Science, an Earth Day rally in Washington and cities around the
world aimed at defending "robustly funded and publicly communicated
science."

The news signals that the effort, spawned from social-media musings in the
days after President Trump's inauguration, has officially gone mainstream.

Such coordinated activism is a big change for scientists and the societies
that represent them. Researchers have long been reluctant to dive into
political debates out of concern that their work will be perceived as
partisan. But the community is increasingly worried about eroding public
support for science, and it's ready to speak up.

"I've never seen anything like this," said Rush Holt, chief executive of
the AAAS. "In the past, there have been marches for one aspect of science
or another or for rallies for funding for medical research. ... But this
was not organized by any interest group. It's a spontaneous display of
concern about science itself."

The March for Science is slated to take over the Mall in Washington on
April 22. The Earth Day Network is co-organizing the event, which will
involve speeches, a teach-in, musical performances and a march through
Washington. Supporters from nearly 300 cities in 30 countries will hold
satellite marches on the same day.

The people behind the march are mostly scientists and educators at the
beginning of their careers. Few have activist backgrounds, and none has
organized an event on this scale. But in the month since the event's
conception, they've managed to get some of the biggest names in the
American scientific community on board. The march's other major partners
are Sigma Xi, the 100,000-member honor society for scientists and
engineers, the Entomological Society of America, the climate action
advocacy group NextGen Climate America, ScienceDebate.org and the Union of
Concerned Scientists.

In addition, organizers say that more than 50,000 volunteers have signed up
to help with the event. In a private Facebook group, more than 800,000
people have said they'll be attending.

“This started as an idea, but it’s rapidly actualizing into a global
movement,” Valorie Aquino, one of the march’s three national co-chairs and
an anthropology PhD candidate at the University of New Mexico, said in a
statement. “Scientific integrity serves everyone, and we need to speak out
for science together."

That AAAS and others have joined the effort is a sign of the community's
growing dissatisfaction with the "stick to science" mentality.

"Some people for a long time believed that if scientists would just
dispassionately provide data, that science would not be politicized," said
Michael Halpern, deputy director of the Center for Science and Democracy at
the Union of Concerned Scientists. "That turned out to be a misjudgment of
colossal proportions."

At the American Geophysical Union's meeting in December — the first major
conference of earth and atmospheric scientists after the election — there
was a pervasive sense of anxiety about what the Trump administration would
mean for science. The transition team had already sent a letter to Energy
Department officials, asking them to name employees who worked on
climate-change research. Several of Trump's nominees had previously
expressed doubt about the reality of man-made climate change.

Colleagues stood in clusters during the meeting's poster sessions,
discussing the developments, debating what they should do.

[snip]

Dewayne-Net RSS Feed: <http://dewaynenet.wordpress.com/feed/>



-------------------------------------------
Archives: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/247/=now
RSS Feed: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/247/18849915-ae8fa580
Modify Your Subscription: https://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=18849915&id_secret=18849915-aa268125
Unsubscribe Now: 
https://www.listbox.com/unsubscribe/?member_id=18849915&id_secret=18849915-32545cb4&post_id=20170225073132:5253B6AA-FB56-11E6-B1EA-1980BDDDB970
Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com