Rodrigo Neely - September 27th, 2008 in Commentary Uncategorized 5 votes Vote Up! Vote Down!

Alright, so lets talk about the 1st presidential debate of the current U.S. election.

I should start out with a big fat disclaimer that I am unapolagetically liberal. At least, that’s what they tell me. I favor higher taxes for the wealthier portions of the population, and I think issues of public interest require public involvement in the form of government.

I also think gay marriage is splendid and that tree hugging is an admirable pass-time.

With that said, I also understand that the secular humanist movement is wonderfully bipartisan. In fact one of my biggest heroes in the movement, Bob Price, is as unapolagetically conservative as I am liberal. So I will try to honor that bipartisan spirit and try to focus my analysis of the debate on factors that would appeal to secular humanists from all ends of the political spectrum.

Okay, so now lets talk about bear DNA. Or rather, lets begin with McCain’s comments on bear DNA.

“…and we have former members of congress now residing in federal prison because of the evils of this earmarking and pork-barrel spending. You know, we spent $3 million dollars to study the DNA of bears in Montana, I don’t know if that was a criminal issue or a paternal issue. But the fact is that it was $3 million of our tax-payers money and it has to be brought under control. ”

This comment is one that should concern all secular humanists who think that funding basic scientific research should be a high priority of civilization. Unfortunately I don’t know what specific study McCain was talking about, but I do know from working as an undergraduate researcher in four primary research labs with ties to biomedical research, that right now all biology is starving for funding. Funding for basic research in the U.S. is at a historic low, as can be confirmed by articles in primary research journals, such as Science, addressing lack of funding for basic research.

The way that funding is going these days, whatever those brave researchers in Montana are examining, it had to compete for that funding in a hostile environment. Meaning that it had to beat out lots of other projects, and demonstrate a high amount of priority to the peer review process by other scientists.

McCain could have listed any basic research science project as an example of pork barrel spending, simply because basic research is scientific research which does not have an immediate promise of marketable technology. He could have easily made the same argument about any basic research project, like sending robotic rovers to Mars.

Ironically, nearly all scientists agree that we need basic science in order to produce better technology.

This kind of comment is anti-science, and anti-intellectual.

Now to try to be fair to my conservative brothers and sisters, Obama is a son of a bitch for not pointing this out.

Even worse, Obama may have not said anything because he doesn’t understand that what McCain was describing as potentially criminal pork-barrel spending was, more than likely, badly needed funding for basic scientific research.

Obama does make some comments which I was happy to hear:

“We’ve got to make sure that we are competing in education. We’ve got to invest in science and technology. China had a space launch, and a space-walk. We’ve got to make sure that our children are keeping pace in math and in science, and, one of the things I think we’ve got to do is make sure that college is affordable for every young person in America.”

These are all priorities that should resound with every secular humanist committed to a scientifically literate society.

Now, I tend to see a big heart around Barak Obama’s head every time he’s on screen, so take all that with a grain of salt.

McCain made some positive statements when he said:

” First of all, by the way, I’d eliminate ethanol subsidies. I oppose ethanol subsidies. ”

From what most of my engineering, chemistry and physics buddies tell me, ethanol is not an efficient fuel option. At least not the corn ethanol variety. There was a good presentation on this with my local CSICOP chapter.

In the left, concern over climate change sometimes causes us to cling to anything that we think will reduce our dependence on oil and octane. Yet, it seems that corn ethanol production uses more oil than it can replace.

Obama talks a lot about alternative energy throughout the debate, but I do worry that he may be guilty of liberal pipe dreams about inefficient technologies, simply because they are not oil or octane.

Obama makes me see the heart around his head again when he brings up “Google for government,” which makes me pop a freethinking synaptic stiffy.

“Google for government” is a program to make it information on which members of congress are tied to what spending practices easily accessible to the public. Any good freethinker should be a strong advocate for ease of access to information on anything related to government.

McCain makes me lose my synaptic stiffy when he suggests a “spending freeze on everything but defense, veteran affairs, and entitlement programs.”

Most science is funded by tax payer money. Hence, I would have to say that this is more troubling anti-science hogwash. If you want a more scientific society, then you cannot endorse the halting of the vast majority of scientific research.

But McCain makes me love him again by bringing up nuclear power. From what my physics pals tell me, nuclear power is the best way to tackle climate change. This is no small matter. Nuclear power could be a realistic down to earth solution for our energy needs that does not produce greenhouse gases. This is something that we should, at least, be discussing. I appreciate McCain’s enthusiasm for this issue.

McCain said that Obama was opposed to nuclear power, I don’t know if this is true, but he certainly does not show the kind of support for it that I would like to see.

There was a great deal of talk on the war. For me there is one issue which I cannot ignore regarding this war: Islam.

I am solidly in the Harris/Hitchens camp on Islam. Essentially, I think Islam is intrinsically designed by its scriptures to be a theology of conversion through violence. This causes me to be a little right of center. What we do in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, will have drastic consequences for Islamic violence all over the world.

Neither McCain or Obama discuss the problem in these terms, indeed it would be political suicide to do so.

I fear that if we leave Iraq prematurely we will have one more Islamic theocracy in the world.

I did appreciate Obama’s focus on Al-qaeda when discussing the Iraq/Afghanistan wars which puts Islamic extremism in the cross hairs.

I wrote this piece mostly to highlight the issues which are pertinent to secular humanists who seek to promote a more science based society.

I am a political junkie. As I listen to the analysis of the debates on NPR, and other news sources which I am fond of, I see these issues largely ignored.

Things said in this debate which affect science funding, science-based solutions to climate change, education, increased ease of access to government information, and the increasing prominence of radical Islam have been largely ignored by the media.

I don’t see this as some conspiracy, but rather as a symptom of a poorly educated and largely anti-intellectual electorate. The failures of political reporters on science related issues are well highlighted in Chris Mooney’s book The Republican War on Science.

I also see the secular humanist movement as a largely political endeavour. The work that I am trying to do in writing for Edger, in being a friend of the Center for Inquiry, as being a leader in a C.F.I. student club is largely to try to influence society to embrace a worldview which is friendly to secular humanism, and to give science its well deserved prominence.

I hope this piece was informative.

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