Because I can
Politics & Science: @CNN's Rhetorical Overreach
CNN's headline from yesterday "Obama moves to seperate politics and science" is a stunning rhetorical reach. It illustrates the public's definition of politics and by extension, rhetoric. It seems to me that most people think of politics only as the venal machinations of politicians, rather than the inherently rhetorical act of making policy in a democratic society.
The stem cell controversy required some sort of political action - and any political action, permissive or restrictive, would mix politics and science. When science and ethics meet, policy makers must get involved. This is one of the many decisions we empower them to make by voting for them. Whether you agreed with former President Bush or President Obama, it seems naive to contend that one side's actions are "mixing politics and science" and the other side is separating them. L.M. Ceccerelli points out in a 2005 special issue of Argumentation and Advocacy on Science and Argumentation that the “claim that science is being politicized is a standard topos in science argumentation.” It is also a standard, and regrettable topos in science-based political argumentation.
While I argue that politics must play a role when science and ethics meet in the public policy arena, it seems beyond dispute to me that politicians should not meddle in the publication of scientific research, as the Bush administration seems to have done.
What do you think?
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