It’s simply not true, for example, that mathematics and other STEM fields are irredeemably racist and misogynistic, that Darwin and Mendel were racists, that the Jedi in Star Wars are toxically masculine white saviors, that SETI, the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, is implicitly racist and colonialist, and that denial of evolution is an expression of white supremacy. Let me speak frankly: some of the editorials I’ve criticized involve lying or distorting the truth for politics. SciAm readers go to your site to get straight science, not political commentary, and deciding that the “progressive” (i.e., extreme) Left has the correct positions on these issues is to essentially alienate over half the country, including moderate liberals like me being turned off by this risible political posturing. There are literally hundreds of magazines, websites, blogs, podcasts, and other media sources that cover those issues endlessly 24/7 from left, right, and center. But with limited resources, those are the sorts of issues we’re focused on in our opinion coverage.” But when is it the editorial policy of Scientific American to address those issues at all? Given its title, I thought your magazine was about science, even in its opinions, and not a program for enacting a brand of social justice that has either little or nothing to do with science. The telling part of your email is at the end when you assert that science isn’t really a target of your editorials, but politics is, and the “targets” you say the magazine has chosen include “the Supreme Court endorsed forced pregnancy, Florida is denying care to trans people, white nationalists are infiltrating every branch of government, and anti-vaxxers and conspiracy theorists are causing people to die. Science is supposed to be a debate in search of truth, with nobody barred from criticizing anyone, but yet you are placing much of that debate out of bounds because it’s “kicking down”! Sticking up for correct science in the face of ideological distortion is not “kicking down”: that phrase-or its alternative “punching down”-is used by every ideologue to immunize their ideas from criticism. Wilson of being racist, and SETI of being likewise and that denial of evolution is white supremacy and yet you refuse to publish rebuttals of that calumny because to oppose those ridiculous accusations would “feel like kicking down.” Do you really think that someone not as famous as Mendel is allowed to call him a racist because to deny that would be “kicking down.”įrankly, I find that response disingenuous. Seriously, you let one your writers accuse Mendel, Darwin, and E. When “progressives” are engaged in attacking science with lies or distortions (i.e., claiming there’s a spectrum of sex, not gender, in humans, or that Mendel was a racist), I would think that Scientific American would publish, indeed, want, some kind of corrective. That is your editorial call, but I disagree with it. I of course expected that you would accept editorials only from the “progressive left” point of view, even though, as you noted, we’re both on the Left.
It was a polite email, but the last bit-the invitation-prompted me to respond in this way, by suggesting that I write my own op-ed: Finally she urged me to contact her to discuss any ideas I had for stories or my own pieces for the magazine. She praised my criticisms of theocracy and emphasized that, politically, she and I were on the same side with respect to matters of reason and social justice. She was kind enough to be conciliatory, though she noted that I was unhappy with some of her coverage. I’ll just characterize what she said in a few words. I’ll give some of those links below.Īt any rate, since I told Laura in my response that I’d keep her initial email confidential. Michael documented the decline and fall of the journal in two Substack pieces, “ Scientific American goes woke” and “ What is woke, anyway? A coda to my column on ‘Scientific American goes woke’.” His columns, particularly the first, cite and link to a number of ludicrous pieces published in the journal. After he turned out a couple of columns that weren’t woke enough for the journal, and were rejected, he was given his walking papers. My critiques of the magazine have been similar to those of Michael Shermer, who wrote a regular column for Scientific American for eighteen years.
As you know if you’re a regular here, I’ve spent a lot of time criticizing their woke coverage and editorials, which make all kinds of accusations that don’t hold water (see emails below for some examples, or you can access all my posts here).
On August 14, I received a conciliatory email from Laura Helmuth, editor of Scientific American.
0 kommentar(er)
