Thursday, November 12, 2009 | Science : In the News | print version

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The Eureka breakfast: Lord Rees on the values and value of science

by Mark Henderson - TimesOnline

http://timesonline.typepad.com/science/2009/11/the-eureka-breakfast-lord-rees-on-the-values-and-value-of-science.html

To the Royal Institution this morning, for the first in a series of science breakfasts organised by The Times to celebrate the launch of Eureka, our new magazine devoted to science, life and the planet. For those of you who have missed it, Eureka will be appearing in The Times on the first Thursday of every month, and you can also read articles from the first two issues at Times Online.

Today's speaker was Lord Rees of Ludlow (pictured above with James Harding, the Editor of The Times), the President of the Royal Society and Astronomer Royal, who recently wrote a fine column for the first issue of Eureka. He took as his subject "The Value and Values of Science".

Familiar figures in the audience included Colin Blakemore, the neuroscientist, Simon Singh, the science writer, Mike Stratton, the cancer geneticist, Lucy Hawking, the author and daughter of Stephen, and Frank Skinner, the comedian and Times columnist.

It was a thought-provoking lecture, and I thought I'd share a few of the highlights here.

One of Lord Rees's first observations seemed especially apposite this week, given the row over the sacking of David Nutt as the Government's chief drugs adviser. Scientists, he said, are not the only people who should have a say over the direction and regulation of science: society as a whole has a stake in issues such as global warming, nuclear power and designer babies. Scientific advice, however, is critical to good government, and he chose one of my favourite Barack Obama quotes to make the point:

"It's a duty of advisers to government, and of scientific academies, to ensure that policy decisions are based on the best science, even when that science is still uncertain and provisional. When President Obama announced the names of the scientists who would join his administration -- a real 'dream team', incidentally -- he said that their advice should be heeded 'even when it is inconvenient -- indeed especially when it is inconvenient.'"

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Posted: Thursday, November 12, 2009 | Permalink

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1. Comment #431492 by Sally Luxmoore on November 12, 2009 at 11:06 pm

In the question and answer session, the highlight came from Evan Harris, the Liberal Democrat science spokesman and Oxford MP. Lord Rees had earlier taken issue with Richard Dawkins's suggestion that astrologers be sued, on the grounds that this represented scientists as humourless, and Dr Harris sprang to the defence of his constituent. That sort of accommodation with the forces of unreason, he said, was "typical of a Gemini".

Of course they should be sued! But I would say that - I'm a Scorpio.

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2. Comment #431495 by Jos Gibbons on November 12, 2009 at 11:12 pm

Harris pwnd Rees there. Of course we should make astrologers pay for the consequences of their misleading others. Scientists are not showing humourlessness in caring about these effects. One observation due to RD (in Unweaving the Rainbow IIRC) is that, by telling people some star-signs are romantically incompatible, they cause believers to reject anywhere from 1/12 to 11/12 of potential partners, thus leading to unnecessarily many lonely people. Even if that was the worst of it, it's already pretty bad.

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3. Comment #431532 by DocWebster on November 13, 2009 at 3:36 am

I think I prefer anyone dumb enough to leave a decision like finding a life partner to a huckster doing something no more predictive than reading chicken entrails to be lonely and celibate thereby letting natural selection weed out the unsuitably ignorant. Of course if by some stroke of luck they do manage to find there absolute perfect mate that way, both should be required to attend a lecture by James Randi to determine if the Woo Woo that brought them together is harmless enough to allow their union.

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4. Comment #431546 by godsbelow on November 13, 2009 at 6:13 am

"When President Obama announced the names of the scientists who would join his administration -- a real 'dream team', incidentally -- he said that their advice should be heeded 'even when it is inconvenient -- indeed especially when it is inconvenient.'"

I'd bet good money that Obama, despite his predictable rhetoric, would just as readily drop a scientist from his advisory team as Gordon Brown did, if the advice the scientist gave was likely to alienate voters.

Particularly if that scientist, like David Nutt, made statements about the safety of marajuana and ecstasy relative to alcohol and cigarettes - I'm just remembering how casually dismissive Obama was of the idea of legalisation earlier this year. Like Brown, he's probably just scared of alienating more conservative voters.

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5. Comment #431554 by flying goose on November 13, 2009 at 7:38 am

Now I am Pisces, which according to http://www.astrology-online.com/pisces.htm
means that I am.

Imaginative and sensitive ,tick
Compassionate and kind tick
Selfless
unworldly tick
Intuitive and sympathetic tick

On the dark side....

Escapist and idealistic tick
Secretive
vague tick
Weak-willed and easily led.

and that I

LIKE
Solitude to dream in tick
Mystery in all its guises tick
Anything discarded to stay discarded
The ridiculous tick
like to get 'lost' tick
DISLIKE
the obvious tick
being criticized tick
feeling all at sea about something
know-it-alls tick
pedantry

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6. Comment #431570 by rod-the-farmer on November 13, 2009 at 10:38 am

If you have that many ticks, you may be at risk of Lyme disease. There is medication we give our dog. Not sure it will work on humans.

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7. Comment #431591 by F_A_F on November 13, 2009 at 4:16 pm

I'm also a Pisces. My other half believes in all this crap. I've tried to point out to her that....as a Pisces....I am compassionate and kind, but then how many people would describe themselves as dispassionate and nasty? Not many, and those that do certainly wouldn't waste their time proving it to others with astrological gibberish.

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8. Comment #431618 by WizenedSage on November 13, 2009 at 6:24 pm

I too am a Pisces and I was once a student/practitioner of astrology. When I finally realized why I could never be very specific in any astrological analysis or prediction I gave it up. You might say I finally realized that the whole endeavor was fishy.

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9. Comment #431651 by flying goose on November 13, 2009 at 8:31 pm

I think I should make it very clear that I do not believe in astrology.

Just in case anyone was getting the wrong impression.

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10. Comment #431714 by megacephalanthropus on November 14, 2009 at 12:41 am

Astrologer: "Which star sign are you"

Me: "It's bull"

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11. Comment #432150 by nalfeshnee on November 16, 2009 at 1:21 pm

On a pseudo-scientific note, has any research been done into the idea that the time of year you are born in (i.e. simply the season, not the position of some random celestial objects) affects you in any way at all?

Just as an extremely tentative hypothesis: presence/lack of light, dark, cold and heat produce slight but noticeable effects in the population at large?

Maybe the whole astrology thing is an arse-backwards way of explaining a much less detailed set of traits which equate roughly to the seasons and only apply to large groups but not individuals? (Meaning that if you know enough "summer babies" you'll recognise their supposed traits but faced with a friend who is one you'll be hard-pressed to locate the entire set of features in this one individual).

And yes, I am aware that our species spent its formative years so to speak in Africa, which doesn't even have seasons in parts of the continent and, ah, there's my coat --- bye-eee!!

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12. Comment #433139 by John Locke on November 19, 2009 at 12:25 pm

nalfeshnee

taken the words out of my mouth

although far from a believer in astrology i have long considered that the time of year that a child is born MUST affect its development and hence its personality, especially in countries with reasonably dramatic seasonal changes.

as to what extent could only be hinted at through research.

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