The Scientific American published an editorial this week warning readers about Donald Trump’s “alarming” “lack of respect for science.”
Like WIRED, which gave its first-ever endorsement to Hillary Clinton, the Scientific American “is not in the business of endorsing political candidates.”
“But we do take a stand for science,” the editors wrote. “A respect for evidence is not just a part of the national character. It goes to the heart of the country’s particular brand of democratic government.”
The editors criticized the lack of respect for science in modern politics, which is demonstrated by anti-intellectual positions that have become mainstream in the Republican Party – denying climate change, rejecting the evidence proving that abstinence-only sex education does not work, supporting debunked religious practices such as “conversion therapy,” and citing partisan unscientific organizations to justify their social conservatism. The Scientific American editors, however, had harsh words for both parties:
“It won’t come as a surprise to anyone who pays even superficial attention to politics that over the past few decades facts have become an undervalued commodity. Many politicians are hostile to science, on both sides of the political aisle. The House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology has a routine practice of meddling in petty science-funding matters to score political points. Science has not played nearly as prominent a role as it should in informing debates over the labeling of genetically modified foods, end of life care and energy policy, among many issues.”
The Scientific American saved its harshest words for Donald Trump:
“The current presidential race, however, is something special. It takes antiscience to previously unexplored terrain. When the major Republican candidate for president has tweeted that global warming is a Chinese plot, threatens to dismantle a climate agreement 20 years in the making and to eliminate an agency that enforces clean air and water regulations, and speaks passionately about a link between vaccines and autism that was utterly discredited years ago, we can only hope that there is nowhere to go but up.”
The Scientific American concluded:
“We encourage the nation’s political leaders to demonstrate a respect for scientific truths in word and deed. And we urge the people who vote to hold them to that standard.”
