Should Earth Scientists take a "Hippocratic Oath?"

[tinrobot]

Two researchers think it’s about time their discipline made a public commitment not to harm the patient they study: Earth.

Like the Hippocratic oath doctors swear, the “Oath for Earth Scientists” would provide a set of agreed-upon ethical norms for geoscientists, at a time when they are increasingly being called upon to pass judgment on massive human alterations to the Earth’s carbon, nitrogen, and water systems.

“Grand proposals for ocean fertilization, orbiting mirrors, genetically engineering biofuels, painting rooftops white, cloud-generating ships and the like all point toward the future of Earth science as an applied discipline with the human future in the balance,” wrote Erle Ellis and Peter Haff, Earth scientists at the University of Maryland, Baltimore and Duke University, respectively, in Eos, the member newspaper of the American Geophysical Union.

Ellis and Haff take their cue from Sir Joseph Roblat, a Nobel Prize-winning physicist who argued “the time has come to formulate guidelines for the ethical conduct of scientists.” Their call to action is particularly timely with the Copenhagen climate negotiations focusing attention yet again on the difficulties of climate change and politically dealing with it. Hacked e-mails from a British research center have also brought increased scrutiny of the world of climate science in the past few weeks.

“By formally recognizing our responsibilities as earth and environmental scientists in the Anthropocene, we hope to serve as better guides toward more successful stewardship of our planet,” Ellis wrote on his blog.

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/12/earth-science-oath/

[HeresyLives]

1. I think all scientists should!

I'm very pro-science, but we've had medical researchers reassuring us about cigarette smoke, climatologists calling global warming bunk, archaologists faking 'finds', biologists faking clones, and a lot of other things over the years. For pay, for fame, for whatever reason, but it's got to stop.

It harms us all, and in particular hurts the whole idea of science.

[Nihil]

2. Why not get politicians, economics & journalists take an honesty oath?

Maybe force CEOs to prove their humanity on an annual basis?

How about getting the general public to take an IQ test before
being allowed to breed?

:shrug:

[MH1]

3. Those "grand proposals" scare the hell out of me

I don't think any "Hippocratic Oath" is going to prevent a major f*-up.

Instead of geo-engineering why don't we just recognize that we have deforested too much of the land and need to reverse that quickly?