The Republican War on Science 0
Ed Quillen of the Denver Post sends a dispatch from the front:
He notes that there can be justification for skepticism, listing “Social Darwinism,” eugenics, and several other areas where scientists went wrong.
I would note that the persons who promoted those movements were not physical scientists (such as chemists, physicists, biologists, and climatologists); they fancied themselves “social scientists,” but were actually activists with axes to grind.
In the case of Social Darwinism, the ax was justifying the wealth of the robber barons and the poverty of the working class; for eugenics, it was rationalizing racism.
Click to read the whole thing. Mr. Quillen’s concluding paragraph is a gem.
