Republican Congressman Introduces Bill To Require Political Approval Of Scientific Papers

[Scuba]

http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/05/02/republican-congressman-introduces-bill-to-require-political-approval-of-scientific-papers/

Congressman Lamar Smith of Texas really does not understand science. Not scientific method, not scientific theories or laws, none of it. Which is why he submitted a bill draft titled the “High Quality Research Act” which would in effect add a politician into scientific studies.

The bill says that any research done using federal funds (which is the majority of research done in the United States) must have its results and finding approved by the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation of the Senate and the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology of the House of Representatives. If the findings are not agreed to, the research is taken from the researchers and disposed of by Congress as it sees fit.

Congressman Smith has already landed himself in scientific hot water over his April 25th Letter to the National Science Foundation where he demanded that the NSF conduct an investigaton into five research programs which contradict policies his donors want passed. This is what was expected when the noted anti-science Texan was appointed to the Congressional Committee on Science, Space and Technology.

...

One must ask, how does making peer review accountable to politicians an “improvement?” The scientific method has proven itself over centuries. This “improvement” is nothing but a way to attempt and strong arm scientists into pushing political agendas, typically those held by whomever donates the most money to a politician during the campaign.

Did Smith also suggest that the agency that would release approved studies be called "Pravda"?

[geckosfeet]

1. He seems to not be grasping the concept of free speech either...

[malaise]

2. Ignorance is bliss with these jackass ReTHUGS

[11 Bravo]

13. Then Lamar Smith must be one of the happiest mother-fuckers on the planet.

[Historic NY]

3. How Fascist of him.

[marshall]

4. Maybe he thinks the US government is a private foundation

I can see a private foundation wanting to fund projects that follow their political expectations, and even wanting to control the output to some extent. But it's over reaching to have the government do this.

[Wounded Bear]

11. Well, it is becoming a wholly owned subsidiary of Corporate Amerika...

[muriel_volestrangler]

5. Reading his draft bill, it's not actually as dumb as that

http://big.assets.huffingtonpost.com/HQRA.pdf (that's the link the addictinginfo blogger gave)

The requirement is for the NSF to certify that any project it funds is "in the interests of the United States", "is the finest quality", "ground breaking" and "answers questions or solves problems that are of utmost importance to society at large", and not a duplicate. The NSF has to then report to the committees after a year on how this is going. But there'd nothing there about the results or findings being sent back to a committee for approval.

Now, this still may be political interference, because they have to justify why all the grants are going to super-duper patriotic projects of vital interest to the country, rather than saying "it's science", and the committees will get a chance to grandstand as they complain about the science being done. But they're not vetting the results of projects.

[Vinnie From Indy]

6. Thank you for your post!

The OP should change the title.

Cheers!

[Scuba]

8. Title came from source. Please also see my Post # 7.

[CreekDog]

10. tell us how the title should be changed?

it does require certification of results by political appointees.

[muriel_volestrangler]

16. No, it requires certification of *aims*, by the NSF, not results

and the congressional committees then get to criticise the NSF. Here's a better report (which the blogger did link to, but didn't quite understand):

Republicans in Congress, long skeptical of the value of some taxpayer-supported research, have taken aim at the National Science Foundation with a bill that seeks to limit the scope of its grants.

A draft bill by House Science Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas), which was obtained by Science magazine, would require the foundation's grants to “advance the national health, prosperity or welfare” or “secure the national defense.” The current National Science Foundation criteria are broader and allow the foundation to weigh the “intellectual merit” and “broader impacts” of the proposed research.

The bill would also require that projects are not “duplicative” of other federally funded works.

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-lamar-smith-federal-research-funding-20130501,0,78113.story

[CreekDog]

17. no, by the director of the NSF. be careful, your shilling is getting obvious now.

[muriel_volestrangler]

21. You know where you can stick your 'shilling' crap

I'm not shilling for anyone. Yes, it's a dumb bill, because it limits research to things of use to the USA. What it doesn't do, but which you seem unwilling to even think about, is tell the scientists to submit their results to the congressional committees for approval. Which was what the blogger claimed.

You need to realise that trying to be accurate is not 'shilling'. You need to realise that science needs basic facts, such as what was actually proposed. You need to keep your rude comments to yourself.

The director of the NSF is is charge of the organisation. They already have responsibility for what the NSF does. When it says "the Director of the National Science Foundation shall publish a statement on the public website", it doesn't mean that the director has to personally upload the statement. They are responsible for running the organisation that publishes it, and they are responsible for the organisation that would have to jump through the hoops of the bill. Jeez, all you have to do is remember how bills are expressed, for fuck's sake.

[Scuba]

7. The Director of the NSF is an appointed (e.g., political) position, and he/she would have veto power

... over any research seeking approval.

[muriel_volestrangler]

20. That's not "must have its results and finding approved by the Committee"

Yes, I know "he/she would have veto power over any research seeking approval" (they already do, because they're in charge of the NSF; but the criteria they must use are not as narrow as "benefits the United States" etc.); but that isn't "if the findings are not agreed to, the research is taken from the researchers and disposed of by Congress as it sees fit".

[atreides1]

9. As you say this is just a draft.

Do you really trust this clown not to put a poison pill into the mix?

[Johonny]

15. All the points list are all poison pills

Poison pills
1) "in the interests of the United States"

WTF does that mean? If you show evidence that ocean water levels are rising that is bad news for many big cities in the US. Is it in the best interest to know this or live in ignorant bliss? It is a vague meaningless term meant to suppress research in areas that might cause companies to have to rethink practices. More to the point the US has all kind of laws already to make sure secret or national security type information is not released for the good of the country.


2)"is the finest quality"

Almost all research $ now goes through a peer review process. Scientist spend lots of time writing proposals to different funding agencies. If he is claiming some mysterious better mechanism for judging the vast areas of science I'd love to hear it. Many studies sound low quality until you actually read the proposal and understand the field deeply. Which is why the peer part of the review is so important.

3"ground breaking"

999.99% of all research ever done ends up not being ground breaking. No one * knows if the thing they are working on today will 100 years from now be the lynch pin to ground breaking ideas. The term is vague and frankly not helpful.

4"answers questions or solves problems that are of utmost importance to society at large"

How do we know a question will have huge importance to society at large? When people started looking at carbon dioxide release there was no way to know how important the question and answer would be to society in 2100. It was just an interesting question. While a lot of research is directed to towards problems that exist today, many times what you learn today becomes vastly important only in light of something yet to be discovered.


5)and not a duplicate.

Part of the point of science is that my lab can reproduce your labs results. If the science is one of a kind and the experiment can not be reproduced then how do you test 2 and 3. Magic? More to the point isn't competition supposed to be good. Some of the best ground breaking ideas come when researchers are working to one up each other. Science project monopolies are a great way to produce stale, non-ground breaking drudge work.

The whole point of this bill is to create a poison pill to sink selective research aimed at politically sensitive research areas which frankly is the reason to not have politicians involved in the peer review process.

[longship]

14. Sorry, it's still dumb.

I don't want politics to poison scientific research anymore than it already is.

This is a bad bill.

[datasuspect]

19. "not a duplicate"

duplicated efforts are necessary for scientific research.

falsifiability separates the scientific from the unscientific. generally speaking, of course.

[ladjf]

12. What a terrible idea! nt

[nadinbrzezinski]

18. What is the term I am looking for? Oh yes...soviet science

The irony on this red blooded American, who is also anti commie...will be completely missed.

[upaloopa]

22. Welcome to the new dark ages