# Science is under attack from the right AND left **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 30, 2019, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751 "2019-05-30T02:08:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2019, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/41 "2019-05-31T16:53:56Z")
Oregon Republicans walk out from state Senate, denying Dems a quorum. [They did this over two bills](https://www.opb.org/news/article/oregon-senate-democrats-give-up-gun-control-vaccine-bills-gop-walkout-return/): one was a gun control bill, the other was a strengthening of Oregon’s vaccination requirement that would have eliminated religious and philosophical beliefs/stances as grounds for exemption from the shots. ETA: A [Politico article from last month](https://www.politico.com/story/2019/04/16/republican-reject-democrat-vaccines-1361277) describes how Dems in several states are tightening vaccination laws, and Republicans are fighting against them. More ETA: Seriously, just Google “republicans vaccination” for a quick survey. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2019, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/42 "2019-05-31T17:19:13Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > You’re expecting an _Atlantic_ article to be structured like one in a scholarly journal? :rolleyes: Nope, but before a Prof shot his mouth off, I’d expect him to have more backing him than a few anecdotes. This article proves nothing. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2019, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/43 "2019-05-31T17:22:09Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > While a student might disagree with causes of the American Revolution they generally won’t outright deny that it occurred. A student might hate Algebra but he probably won’t deny the existence of zero as a concept. A student might dislike reading but odds are she won’t claim that Shakespeare never existed. Biology instructors aren’t just facing students who are disinterested or having difficulty understanding the course material they are facing students who outright deny the validity of of the underlying tenants of the course. This is a problem that isn’t faced in most other fields. Here’s that the Prof said "_In class, though, some students argued instead that it is impossible to measure IQ in the first place, that IQ tests were invented to ostracize minority groups, or that IQ is not heritable at all. None of these arguments is true. In fact, IQ can certainly be measured, and it has some predictive value."_ and my cites showed that : 1. IQ tests are or were biased against minorities 2.that we cannot truly define, much less measure, intelligence. So, the prof is wrong, not the students. In fact the students were quite correct. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2019, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/44 "2019-05-31T19:13:38Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > Oregon Republicans walk out from state Senate, denying Dems a quorum. [They did this over two bills](https://www.opb.org/news/article/oregon-senate-democrats-give-up-gun-control-vaccine-bills-gop-walkout-return/): one was a gun control bill, the other was a strengthening of Oregon’s vaccination requirement that would have eliminated religious and philosophical beliefs/stances as grounds for exemption from the shots. > > ETA: A [Politico article from last month](https://www.politico.com/story/2019/04/16/republican-reject-democrat-vaccines-1361277) describes how Dems in several states are tightening vaccination laws, and Republicans are fighting against them. > > More ETA: Seriously, just Google “republicans vaccination” for a quick survey. I pointed that on post #31, 😛 > [@Jackmannii](#): > > You might be interested in where 2020 presidential candidates stand on vaccination - in particular ending “personal” and religious exemptions to mandatory vaccination. > > [Pete Buttigieg’s campaign](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2019/05/01/pete-buttigieg-clarifies-position-vaccines-after-buzzfeed-report/3637641002/) initially said he was for keeping personal and religious exemptions in places where there wasn’t a significant threat of disease outbreaks (um Pete, you want to wait until shit hits the fan before acting?), then he walked back that position to supporting only medical exemptions. Of [other candidates](https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/claudiakoerner/2020-presidential-candidates-vaccines-measles-health) who were questioned, quite a few ducked responding (yo, Joe Biden). Several (including Elizabeth Warren and Cory Booker) supported only medical exemptions. Trump of course has been notorious for dumb antivax positions, but recently supported measles vaccination in the face of outbreaks. > > My feeling is that personal and religious exemptions should be ended, while leaving a fairly liberal standard for getting medical exemptions (while closely monitoring the docs who grant exemptions and sanctioning those who sell mass medical exemptions for highly dubious reasons). **Jackmannii** I will have to point out that while I do appreciate your efforts against the antivaxxers, I have to be fair with Buttigieg by noticing that he did put a escape hatch by saying early that those religious exemptions can be allowed only if the level of vaccination in a region was over the level where herd immunity was effective. IOW, as seen in many areas, the religion exception is SOL by noticing that. But that is a moot point, as the clarification in your cite shows: > [@](#): > > On Wednesday, Buttigieg’s spokesperson made clear to BuzzFeed News that “Pete believes vaccines are safe and effective and are necessary to maintaining public health.” > > “There is no evidence that vaccines are unsafe, and he believes children should be immunized to protect their health,” the clarifying statement said. “He is aware that in most states the law provides for some kinds of exemptions. **He believes only medical exemptions should be allowed**.” > > Only nine of the more than 20 presidential candidates responded to BuzzFeed’s questions on vaccines. In addition to Buttigieg (after his clarifying statement), six other Democratic candidates explicitly indicated support for removing religious and personal exemptions: New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, former Maryland Rep. John Delaney, Massachusetts Rep. Seth Moulton, Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan, California Rep. Eric Swalwell and entrepreneur Andrew Yang. In the case of Biden, AFAIK he never declared opposition to vaccine policies during the Obama administration years and he also roughed the feathers of many conservatives on recommending vaccines that do deal with cancers like the ones that can happen with HPV. [https://bidencancer.org/issues/working-groups/prevention/](https://bidencancer.org/issues/working-groups/prevention/) > [@](#): > > Prevention > > According to the World Health Organization, up to 50% of all cancer cases are preventable. Prevention and early detection methods hold the promise of decreasing the physical, emotional, and financial burden of a cancer diagnosis and saving and extending lives. Therefore, the implementation of effective prevention strategies from healthy lifestyles to recommended vaccinations and screenings, is an impactful approach for the control of cancer. As me and **RTFirefly** (what was the T stood for Groucho’s character name?) noted, it is the Republican leaders who are picking the idiot ball and are in the process of institutionalizing it. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2019, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/45 "2019-05-31T20:23:06Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > As me and **RTFirefly** (what was the T stood for Groucho’s character name?) I asked My Beloved “You know that overbroad hammy scene-stealing character who thought he was in charge of everything, but fucked it up completely? What does the “T” in his middle name stand for”? The answer is “Tiberius”. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2019, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/46 "2019-05-31T20:51:05Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > I asked My Beloved “You know that overbroad hammy scene-stealing character who thought he was in charge of everything, but fucked it up completely? What does the “T” in his middle name stand for”? > > The answer is “Tiberius”. That was of course for James T. Kirk, but it seems that the middle “T” in Rufus Firefly was not assigned at the time of the Duck Soup movie, still looking for a cite but it may be just a letter “T” like the “S” for Ulysses S. Grant. [https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MysteriousMiddleInitial](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MysteriousMiddleInitial) (In the Live Action Film section) > [@](#): > > **Spaulding** : My name’s Spaulding, Captain Spaulding. > **Chandler** : And I am Roscoe W. Chandler. > **Spaulding** : I am Jeffrey T. Spaulding. I’ll bet you don’t know what the T. stands for. > **Chandler** : Uh… Thomas? > **Spaulding** : Edgar. You were close, though. You were close, though, and you still are, I’ll bet. > — Animal Crackers > > Many fictional characters’ names are shown as a first name, last name, and a middle initial in between. If this initial is short for a longer name, it’s never stated in Canon. A Mysterious Middle Initial could also be the entire middle name, or a joke about the character’s lack of an actual middle name, or an attempt to conceal an Embarrassing Middle Name. > > This is most likely because, it’s easier to remember a middle initial (e.g.: “Robert J. Smith”) rather than a full middle name (e.g.: “Robert James Smith”) regardless of whether or not said middle initial actually stands for anything. > > … > > Many of the characters played by Groucho Marx: > > ``` > Captain Jeffrey T. Spaulding in Animal Crackers. (And the T stands for Edgar.) > **Rufus T. Firefly in Duck Soup.** > Otis B. Driftwood in A Night at the Opera. > Hugo Z. Hackenbush in A Day at the Races. > > ``` ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2019, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/47 "2019-05-31T22:04:06Z")
Claiming that vaccines don’t work, or that they have effects that multiple studies have shown they don’t have? \*That’s \*anti-science. Opposing a government regime that (if I’m understanding you all correctly) would force people to have injections at the penalty of imprisonment? That’s not anti-science, just pro-civil-liberties. People have the right to be wrong, and dumb. If we are going to imprison people for creating impediments to public health, we’d better round up the executives at Coca-Cola and Frito-Lay, and the automobile execs who make cars that can go 100 mph, just for starters. > [@DrDeth](#): > > Nope, but before a Prof shot his mouth off, I’d expect him to have more backing him than a few anecdotes. Seriously, no one else objects to using “him” as the generic pronoun? 😕 I thought we were past this decades ago. > [@DrDeth](#): > > So, the prof is wrong, not the students. In fact the students were quite correct. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2019, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/48 "2019-06-01T02:42:21Z")
Earlier this evening I heard an NPR interview with some kind of social scientist. I will paraphrase what she said as accurately as I can. “There has been a move in recent years to shift from explicitly race-based programs to help African Americans, to class-based ones, on the theory that it will still disproportionately benefit black people, as long as they are overrepresented among the lowest socioeconomic tiers. But the data show that black boys raised in wealthy households are much more likely to become poor in adulthood than are white boys raised in similarly affluent families. Therefore, there must be something happening to those black boys that doesn’t happen to white boys, and which has a profound impact on their life outcomes. Our institution’s research is devoted to finding out what those environmental factors are.” Is that really a dispassionate, clear-eyed application of the scientific method? :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2019, 5:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/49 "2019-06-01T05:11:44Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > Earlier this evening I heard an NPR interview with some kind of social scientist. I will paraphrase what she said as accurately as I can. > > “There has been a move in recent years to shift from explicitly race-based programs to help African Americans, to class-based ones, on the theory that it will still disproportionately benefit black people, as long as they are overrepresented among the lowest socioeconomic tiers. But the data show that black boys raised in wealthy households are much more likely to become poor in adulthood than are white boys raised in similarly affluent families. Therefore, there must be something happening to those black boys that doesn’t happen to white boys, and which has a profound impact on their life outcomes. Our institution’s research is devoted to finding out what those environmental factors are.” > Is that really a dispassionate, clear-eyed application of the scientific method? :dubious: Yeah pretty much. I would not say “_must_ be something happening”, but then it’s your paraphrase anyway, so maybe he or she didn’t phrase it that way. But yeah, suspecting environmental factors and then actually doing the research to try to find what those environmental factors are, is great science. Presumably you think that black people is dumb is a better answer? Well, have you thought about why they might be talking about black _boys_ specifically? I don’t know about the US, but in many European countries black _women_ achieve the same or even better earnings than women of other ethnicities with parents at a similar level of wealth. Imagining that only big scary black men have the dumb gene, stretches credulity and is yet another reason to suspect it is not a good hypothesis. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2019, 6:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/50 "2019-06-01T06:00:11Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > Claiming that vaccines don’t work, or that they have effects that multiple studies have shown they don’t have? \*That’s \*anti-science. > > Opposing a government regime that (if I’m understanding you all correctly) would force people to have injections at the penalty of imprisonment? That’s not anti-science, just pro-civil-liberties. People have the right to be wrong, and dumb. If we are going to imprison people for creating impediments to public health, we’d better round up the executives at Coca-Cola and Frito-Lay, and the automobile execs who make cars that can go 100 mph, just for starters. You think refusing to be vaccinated is victimless? Just ask the kids who have good medical reasons to not get vaccinated, and are at terrible risk for getting a disease, and who cannot safely go to school because some moron parents don’t understand science and think they are experts because of what they read on the Internet. In many of these cases, no one is forced to be vaccinated - they are just not allowed in schools unless they are. Do you think people with contagious diseases should be allowed in public to spread them so their civil rights aren’t violated. This is pretty much the same. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2019, 6:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/51 "2019-06-01T06:35:02Z")
So you’re only saying it would be a requirement to go to public school. Not something everyone of any age would be forced to undergo? That isn’t nearly so problematic. And no, I never said it is victimless. But neither is making a car capable of 100+ MPH. > [@Mijin](#): > > Yeah pretty much. I would not say “_must_ be something happening”, but then it’s your paraphrase anyway, so maybe he or she didn’t phrase it that way. > > But yeah, suspecting environmental factors and then actually doing the research to try to find what those environmental factors are, is great science. > > Presumably you think that black people is dumb is a better answer? Well, have you thought about why they might be talking about black _boys_ specifically? I don’t know about the US, but in many European countries black _women_ achieve the same or even better earnings than women of other ethnicities with parents at a similar level of wealth. > Imagining that only big scary black men have the dumb gene, stretches credulity and is yet another reason to suspect it is not a good hypothesis. Why does there have to be a single hypothesis? Ruling any avenue of exploration out due to political correctness is exactly what Steven Pinker so expertly calls out in his excellent book _The Blank Slate_. It not only might be fruitless, it’s a bad demonstration of how science properly works. If this were the practice beyond humans, you’d have people saying “It’s a mystery as to why even Pomeranians raised adoptively with Husky mothers and trained with their adopted siblings from birth, still cannot effectively function as part of a sled team. There must be some environmental factor we haven’t uncovered yet, but we’ll continue to devote all our resources to finding it.” It would also be reasonable, I think, to say “one of the avenues we might have to explore gets us into very uncomfortable terrain and is frankly rude and hurtful without offering any notable benefit, so let’s just not go there”. But that would also entail not making pronouncements like the one this researcher did on NPR, or wasting money on chasing down only one possibility while loudly treating it as the only possibility. This is similar to the complaint in the original piece, that the dearth of women in STEM fields is treated as, ipso facto, evidence of deep-rooted sexism among the gatekeepers of those fields. ETA: And the “must”, or something that meant the same thing, was definitely part of the statement. That was what set me off. Similar to the expert they interviewed a few years ago who said that the only explanation for the fact that kids who are suspended from high school end up more likely to be in prison later, is that the suspensions are somehow causing the later imprisonments–and therefore we should eliminate suspensions from the toolkit of public school administrators. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2019, 6:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/52 "2019-06-01T06:44:09Z")
This thread seems to be anti-scientific. You lack evidence for your hypotheses. So rather than accept that lack of evidence, you create this idea that someone is preventing that science from being done. Even the beginning of this thread was bad. You made a claim that should, if true, be backed up by testing. It would be trivial to put out a survey that checked for both political beliefs and tested for attitudes towards science itself or the existing consensus in various fields. Instead, all you had was an anecdote. That’s not scientific at all. You instead are acting like the climate deniers. The data doesn’t fit, so it must be that everyone is biased against it. It can’t be that the evidence doesn’t exist for your beliefs. And that is anti-science. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2019, 8:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/53 "2019-06-01T08:15:02Z")
There was literally nothing in those five short paragraphs I would call remotely close to being accurate, so I don’t even have a starting point to rebut you other than to marvel at the magnitude of your wrongness. In its way, that’s impressive! ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2019, 8:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/54 "2019-06-01T08:57:43Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > Why does there have to be a single hypothesis? Ruling any avenue of exploration out due to political correctness is exactly what Steven Pinker so expertly calls out in his excellent book _The Blank Slate_. It not only might be fruitless, it’s a bad demonstration of how science properly works. Looking for evidence of X is not the same thing as claiming X must necessarily be the (only) cause. In fact it can be good science or bad science, dependent on other factors: “My hypothesis predicts X, therefore I will look for evidence of X” – Good science, pretty foundational in fact “I can’t find evidence of X, but my hypothesis must be right so I will keep looking” – Bad science. Or at least, bad approach So the whole thing rests on your characterizing of what he said, not on the research itself. > [@](#): > > ETA: And the “must”, or something that meant the same thing, was definitely part of the statement. That was what set me off. Sure, and if I were to see that in a video or transcript I may also be set off. I have absolutely seen some research or even higher “education” institutes that are agenda-driven. When I hear about such things second-hand though, I tend to withhold outrage. Because it is like with political correctness: political correctness is definitely a real thing, and sometimes even rises to the level of being a problem. But instances of people getting outraged about something which has been misrepresented (or worse) seems to vastly outnumber real instances in my experience. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2019, 11:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/55 "2019-06-01T11:55:11Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > Claiming that vaccines don’t work, or that they have effects that multiple studies have shown they don’t have? \*That’s \*anti-science. > > Opposing a government regime that (if I’m understanding you all correctly) would force people to have injections at the penalty of imprisonment? That’s not anti-science, just pro-civil-liberties. People have the right to be wrong, and dumb. If we are going to imprison people for creating impediments to public health, we’d better round up the executives at Coca-Cola and Frito-Lay, and the automobile execs who make cars that can go 100 mph, just for starters. Maybe so, but I’d say, “I have a right to go around in public without having been vaccinated” is more on a par with “I have a right to drive on public roads without a license.” Either way, yes, the public has the right to restrict the harm one person can do to others. One can argue where the line should be drawn. But when you say, “my freedom to swing my arm around _doesn’t_ end where your face begins,” that goes beyond any reasonable conception of freedom I’m familiar with. There are, frankly, better arguments against gun control than against mandatory vaccination. At least the person with the gun can control what s/he does with that gun. The person who doesn’t get vaccinated can’t control whether they get a communicable disease, and can’t control whether they pass it on to someone who can’t safely be vaccinated. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2019, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/56 "2019-06-01T11:56:57Z")
Mijin, I can’t find a transcript of the show I heard, so that’s fair if you don’t want to take my word for it. I did however find a writeup of the study cited, which is very interesting and well-written, but does have some spots where it gets into unsupported territory, though not as egregiously as the woman on NPR. [http://www.equality-of-opportunity.org/assets/documents/race\_summary.pdf](http://www.equality-of-opportunity.org/assets/documents/race_summary.pdf) > [@](#): > > Both black and white boys have better outcomes in neighborhoods commonly > perceived to be “good" areas: Census tracts with low poverty rates, high test > scores, and a large fraction of college graduates. However, black-white gaps are > larger on average for boys who grow up in such tracts, because whites benefit > more from living in such areas than blacks do. Any time you put “because” in a scientific paper, you’d better have your ducks in a row. This one is either not supported by any evidence they discuss, or is trivially true (if it is interpreted simply as “both groups live in these areas but the outcomes of each are not the same”) and therefore misleading. They do find some environmental factors that matter, although only one of them is the kind of thing I would expect progressives to tout. That is the level of racial bias in the wealthy neighborhood in question. The other is the presence of black fathers in the community (interestingly, it doesn’t seem to so much matter whether any given boy grows up with a father in his own home). That’s the one that conservatives have been wagging their fingers about for decades. ETA: On vaccination, we can have different views about the civil liberties issue and where you draw the line. That doesn’t make my position “anti-science”. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2019, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/57 "2019-06-20T19:55:40Z")
One area of science is apparently no longer under attack from a left-leaning source. Democratic “megadonor” Albert Dwoskin (whose [foundation](https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/dwoskin-family-foundation/) bankrolled a bunch of poor quality antivax research) has seen the light: \*“After seeing a great deal of evidence, I have concluded that concerns about the safety of vaccination are unfounded,” he said in a statement to The Daily Beast. “The best way to protect children is to make sure they have all their vaccinations as recommended by scientists, doctors and other healthcare professionals.” “The CMSRI, founded by my estranged wife, has been closed. I regret my participation in the CMSRI’s work and disagree with her views on the dangers of vaccination,” he added. “My foundation no longer supports work on this issue.”\* > **[Dem MegaDonor Pulls Funding From Anti-Vax Group, Regrets Involvement](https://www.thedailybeast.com/dem-megadonor-pulls-funding-from-anti-vax-group-blames-wife-for-initial-involvement?source=email&via=desktop)** > > Albert Dwoskin says he is no longer backing the Children's Medical Safety Research Institute and has seen the light when it comes to vaccinations. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2019, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/58 "2019-06-20T20:25:35Z")
Cool. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2019, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751/59 "2019-06-20T22:12:17Z")
There have always been high school and college students who objected to being taught anything at all, much less anything they didn’t already believe in. In my day they were called “liberal arts majors.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/science-is-under-attack-from-the-right-and-left/834751.md?page=2)