Pubdate: Wed, 03 Dec 2003
Source: Philadelphia Inquirer, The (PA)
Copyright: 2003 Philadelphia Newspapers Inc
Contact:  http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/340
Author: Alan I. Leshner
Note: Alan I. Leshner used to head NIDA.

RIGHT WING TAKES BAD AIM AT SCIENCE

The moralizers are trying to muck with U.S. science again.

A flurry of activity over the last few weeks has followed the effort of the 
Traditional Values Coalition, a right-wing religious group, to call into 
question almost 200 National Institutes of Health (NIH) grants focusing on 
behavioral and social aspects of issues such as sexuality, HIV/AIDS 
transmission, and drug abuse.

This incident could have been written off as noise by a fringe group had it 
not come almost on the heels of the near-passage in the House of 
Representatives last July of what came to be known as the "Toomey 
Amendment," after its author, Rep. Patrick Toomey (R., Pa.). By a vote of 
212-210, the House just missed defunding four NIH research grants on sexual 
behavior that had already been through rigorous scientific peer review and 
approval by NIH Institute National Advisory Councils.

This is not the first time the scientific enterprise has been threatened by 
political or ideological intervention, nor will it be the last. Many of us 
recall, for example, Sen. William Proxmire's grandstanding "Golden Fleece 
Awards" in the 1970s and 1980s. They were passed out with much media 
fanfare to research projects with titles Proxmire considered silly, and 
which were therefore ridiculed as a frivolous waste of the taxpayer's money.

Of course, the Golden Fleece "awardees" often turned out later to be 
important and useful projects. One example is the study of the physical 
characteristics of flight attendants. The study ultimately led to the 
development of life-saving safety belt configurations for them.

We are not concerned that Congress wishes to exert oversight over the U.S. 
research agenda and research priorities. That is its job, and we want our 
representatives to do it well. We also believe that the scientific 
community should be fully accountable to the public, because much science 
is publicly funded and the public is the ultimate beneficiary of our work. 
By nature, science is an open enterprise that invites examination and 
criticism - and more often than not, it is actually strengthened by public 
scrutiny. Oversight bolsters public confidence in the scientific enterprise 
and provides incentives for scientists to interact with the public, explain 
the importance of their research, and spread an ethic of intellectual 
curiosity and critical thinking that helps make our society more innovative 
and dynamic.

On occasions like the present one, however, healthy scrutiny gives way to 
irresponsible attack. The recent assaults on science were not directed at 
broad research questions or national research priorities. Instead, they 
were aimed at imposing ideology and religious doctrine on the awarding of 
individual research grants, intervening in and thereby subverting the 
scientific peer review system that has served both science and national 
needs so well.

The moral judges who are doing this don't like the fact that HIV is spread 
through sexual contact, and they believe that drug addicts have made bad 
personal choices that have led to addiction. Is their disapproval of these 
behaviors a justification for stifling research on the diseases that 
result? Do they suppose that some form of national denial will make these 
problems go away? Regardless of personal feelings about the etiology of 
these illnesses, we need to understand their causes and transmission 
patterns if we are ever to get a handle on some of society's most pervasive 
public health problems.

Whenever science is attacked on ideological grounds, its integrity and 
usefulness are threatened. Society cannot afford for moralistic dogma to 
replace scientific judgment when the public's welfare is at stake. We have 
all been heartened in the last few weeks by the responses of many 
scientific and academic organizations, including the American Association 
for the Advancement of Science, and by the protests of many people who have 
written in the popular press to defend science.

But rising up in protest as a community after the fact can protect us only 
for a while. Retaining control of the integrity of our enterprise requires 
that we engage more regularly and broadly with the public. We should make 
our objectives and strategies more transparent to our fellow citizens, and 
we must expand our efforts to educate both policymakers and the broader 
public about how science works. Science has served society well in tackling 
some of the world's greatest problems - but only as long as it has evaded 
capture by narrow-minded interests.
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MAP posted-by: Larry Stevens