Ben Dulken7
Abstract: Censorship of science has been prevalent throughout the scientific and tech- nological development of modern culture. Ever since Galileo’s conjecture that the earth re- volves around the sun was rejected and censored by the Vatican church, issues of politics and religion have threatened scientific autonomy. Science, as defined by most prominent scholars and scientists, is the process of testing a hypothesis by implementing well defined techniques to acquire empirical evidence. True science is free of bias, opinion, or ideology, and, for the most part, modern scientists strive to achieve these ideals. Thus, science represents the purest manifestation of objective physical reality. Therefore, when a group or movement attempts to censor or silence science, it is not simply a rejection of a single individual’s opinion or ideol- ogy, but rather it is an assault on reality and the entire scientific method. Considering this argument, it seems that would be unethical to censor scientific findings under any circum- stances. However, in the last 20 years there have been several instances of scientific censor- ship, and the motivations for these instances have been varied. This report will assess two examples of scientific censorship, the censorship of climate change findings and the censor- ship of avian bird flu research, and compare and contrast the motivations and methods of censorship pursued in each circumstance. The comparison of these two instances of censor- ship will facilitate an ethical analysis of the censorship of science and the circumstances in which it may or may not be acceptable.
Keywords: censorship, science, climate change, avian bird flu, ethical analysis
Introduction
The rate of scientific advancement in the post-Industrial Revolution era has been unprecedented in human history. In a mere 100 years humans have gone from the development of the first combustion engine to deep space exploration, from the first electrical appliances to computers and worldwide networks of data exchange. All of these developments have come as the result of scientific research and experimentation. However, though the scientific accomplishments enumerated above have helped improve quality of life and the understanding of the world around us, science can also lead to developments which are dangerous and unsettling. The explosives, the atomic bomb, Nazi experimentation on humans during WWII, all of these scientific endeavors were also undertaken as exercises of scientific investigation. However, it is clear that
the dissemination of the methods or practice of these scientific pursuits could present a risk to security (in the case that the findings would get into the wrong hands), or could breach ethical boundaries. In such circumstances as these, it may be desirable to censor scientific findings so as to prevent the risk to security and ethics that may be associated with them. However, the nature of science and the scientific method makes the censorship of science a delicate endeavor that must be pursued with caution. In this report, the justification for and methods of scientific censorship will be analyzed with respect to two contemporary examples of censorship of scientific findings: the censorship of findings related to climate change by the US government, and the censorship of Avian Bird Flu research. Analyzing the approaches taken by the censoring party in each of these examples will help construct guidelines for the censorship of science, and circumstances in which it may be appropriate.
Principles of Science: Scientific Method
In considering the censorship of science it is necessary to first develop an understanding of the ways in which scientific findings are acquired and reported. This will facilitate a comparison of scientific censorship to other forms of censorship which are more common, such as censorship of art and literature. The modern scientific method, on which all credible modern scientists base their investigative pursuits, has evolved as a living methodology over the better part of 1000 years. In this approach to science, there are two prerequisites for genuine scientific viability: lack of bias, and an assumption of fallibility. The first of these prerequisites, the lack of bias, holds that a scientist must adhere to standardized techniques and methods and must not allow their own opinions to confound their results. Thus, science is not the expression of an individual’s opinions, but rather the use of standardized and methodical protocols to empirically test an individual’s ideas. Secondly, all science is subject to an assumption of fallibility. This is a fact which is not commonly discussed in the current political or social discourse, and which I believe is absolutely essential in framing discussions on scientific matters. Scientific findings can never verify a positive hypothesis (i.e. I predict that the sky is blue). Science can only negate hypotheses and support alternative claims (i.e. Evidence has shown that the sky is not pink, and evidence supports the hypothesis that the sky is blue). Thus, science is completely dynamic. All scientific findings are suspect to testing and nullification. There are no governing laws which determine which scientific findings should be adhered to. The scientific principles which hold up to rigorous analysis and testing by several researchers are used to build off of to pursue more complex findings, but they are still subject to testing and rejection. Therefore, the scientific landscape that exists today is not a modern phenomenon, but rather is the sum of all scientific pursuits that have ever been undertaken. Thus, science is unique from other aspects of published material such as art or literature, in that it is not simply the expression of a single individual’s beliefs or artistic whim. Science is rather the accumulation of decades and centuries of work which has been constantly repeated and verified.
Peer Review
Furthermore, it is also very important to understand the ways in which scientific findings are reported. When a research article is submitted to a scientific journal for publication, it is subjected to the practice of peer review. Peer review is a system in which other scientists in a researcher’s field review a piece research to make sure that it meets scientific standards. This practice prevents (for the most part) journals from publishing scientific findings produced from weak or faulty methodology. Furthermore, the scientific journal in which the research is published also has the right to deny publication to any scientific article on ethical or scientific grounds. The science that makes it to print has therefore already been subject to strict review to determine the merits of the work. On the topic of peer review, David Wasserman, in his essay “Public Funding for Science and Art” says, “…peer-review panels function like juries in assuring that decision making is decentralized and subject to only limited review. To impose content restrictions on the review process from outside is to compromise the independence that keeps this process from being dominated by propaganda and partisan agendas” (178). Thus, Wasserman argues that the presence of peer-review eliminates the need for censorship by the government by providing informed screening of scientific findings which is not subject to the partisan equivocation of political ideology.
Science vs. Art
The defining attributes of science which have been described above clearly differentiate it from other forms of published works which are frequently subjected to censorship. In summary, science is based on the principle of mitigating individual bias through the use of standardized methodology, whereas art and literature harness individual bias to produce works which are interesting and unique. Scientific findings cannot stand alone, but are reliant on all previous scientific work. This stands in contrast to artistic or literary works which can be interpreted as free-standing manifestations of creativity. Finally, in order to be published in a reputable journal, a scientific research article must be subjected to peer review, a practice which is not practiced in art or literature. Thus, scientific findings which are released to the public are largely insulated from random or deviant forces acting within the scientific community to spread false or malicious findings. Therefore, it follows that the censorship of science is a much more severe and bold endeavor than censoring a single art piece or even the work from a single author. The censorship of scientific findings is not simply a rejection of a single isolated manifestation of creativity or innovation. Rather, scientific censorship is a challenge to the principles of the scientific method and the practice of peer review. The progress of science is predicated by an open environment of shared information in which experiments can be repeated by several individuals to ensure their validity. If that free flow of information is blocked, the entire scientific method breaks down and the accumulation of knowledge stymied.
Potential Dangers of Science
However, the defining aspects of scientific research which mitigate bias and ensure high quality of scientific methodology are not designed to prevent breaches of national security or ethics. Scientists are often not attuned to the delicate matters of social, ethical, or national concern which may be very relevant to the public. As Wasserman points out, the process of peer review, as it is dominated by scientifically inclined individuals, may not be sufficient to prevent breaches in security and ethics by scientific research. He states, “At the same time, researchers may not be well equipped to assess the risks of social harm: they may be insufficiently sensitive to those risks or unduly optimistic about the prospects for reducing them” (187). Thus, it may be desirable in some circumstances to establish some oversight of the scientific process which can provide guidance with respect to these issues. However, the classification or censorship of scientific findings must be well informed and must not interfere with scientific progress. In the past, the US Government’s approach to scientific censorship been extremely varied in its transparency, approaches, and honesty. The following two examples will help elucidate the meaning of “well- informed censorship that does not interfere with scientific progress” and how this approach to scientific censorship can be guaranteed in the future.
Censorship of Global Warming Findings
Over the past ten or so years global warming and climate change have taken a dominant position in international politics. In 1997, Bill Clinton signed the Kyoto Treaty, a protocol which was generated by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change to combat global warming. The nations who signed on to the treaty committed to reducing their greenhouse gas emissions over a fixed time period. Though President Clinton supported the measure, it was ultimately rejected by Congress. In 2001, the signatories of the Kyoto treaty met again to discuss the timetables and goals of the program. The representative from the United States, Harlan Watson, sent by President Bush, refused to negotiate on even nonbinding emissions limits, and the US rejection of the revised Kyoto Treaty strongly indicated that the US would not be participating in any sort of emissions limits program, regardless of the nature of the proposed reductions. Following the Kyoto meeting of 2001, the message sent by the Bush Administration was clear: Nothing will be done about global warming. However, despite the hardline stance that the Bush Administration had taken on the issue, scientists at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) were busy gathering data that were verifying the upward trend in global temperatures and the potential climatic changes which could result from such a trend. It is important to note that both of these organizations are run directly by the government. Their administrators must be appointed by the Senate and they are completely subject to funding levels that are decided on by the President and Congress. However, they are also scientific
institutions. NASA and NOAA are the two most capable institutions for studying global warming in the world. They have control of expensive satellite arrays that are capable global analysis of ice shelves in the Arctic and Antarctic and they have access to the best technology available for assessing global temperature fluctuation. Very few independent institutions in the world have access to equivalent technology. Thus, this situation represents a case in which the majority of the ground breaking data in a given field is coming from a governmental source. It should be noted that this is a highly unique situation that is only applicable in a very small number of scientific fields. In other fields, independent academic institutions, which are not subject to governmental control, can balance out whatever excess control is being exercised in the governmentally controlled institutions. However, in this case, the state of the art work comes almost exclusively from government sources.
Jim Hansen, the scientific director for the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), which is an offshoot of NASA that studies the climate exclusively, was one of the scientists producing the data which was showing increasing global temperatures. In 2005, GISS reported that the global temperatures had reached the highest point since the measurement was first taken over 100 years ago. It had been standard practice for several decades that scientists at GISS could post data to their website or participate in press interviews without approval from press officials at NASA. However, when the 2005 temperature data was released, the NASA press officials began to crack down on the GISS scientists, requiring that all interviews or publications first be approved by them. The press officials immediately removed the 2005 temperature findings from the GISS website and blocked Jim Hansen from participating in an interview with National Public Radio (NPR) about the findings. This was the first in a string of acts of censorship perpetrated by the press officials at NASA and at its sister institute NOAA which are described in the book “Censoring Science”, written by Dr. Mike Brown. In the book, Dr. Brown analyzes the political apparatus which enabled the press officials at these two institutes to effectively silence the science of climate change.
The policy of having press officials review interview requests and publications was initially put in place to prevent the dissemination of classified government information. However, it should be noted that the press officials who were responsible for reviewing these requests were serving on behalf of the White House, and had been appointed by the president. Because the president had come out with such a strong stance against any policy which acknowledged or attempted to mitigate the adverse effects of greenhouse gasses, those press officials now felt an obligation to honor their allegiance with the White House and ensure that the governmentally associated institute which was producing the science on global warming did not contradict the President. Dr. Brown focuses on one individual particularly, George Deutsch, a 24 year old graduate of Texas A and M, who had served on President Bush’s inaugural committee. Mr. Deutsch, who had no knowledge whatsoever of the science behind the climate change findings, was responsible for blocking the NPR interview with Jim Hansen and for initiating the removal of the 2005 temperature
data from the GISS website. Dr. Brown discusses at length the tactics that Mr. Deutsch and his press staff colleagues would use to prevent the distribution of scientific findings from NASA and NOAA. For example, when they received a request for an interview for a scientist who they knew would not be sympathetic to the Bush Administration’s policy on global warming, they either delayed the approval of the interview for so long that the requesting press source was no longer interested in conducting an interview, or in some instances they approved the interview, but on the condition that a different scientist (who knew nothing about the specific interview topic) would instead be interviewed.
A few important characteristics stand out in this instance of censorship. First, the censorship was conducted by policy officials who were largely ignorant of the science behind the material which was being censored. Secondly, the censorship was undertaken by abusing a procedure (the review of interview requests and publications by press officials) which is designed to protect national security and the safety of NASA and NOAA scientists. Finally, the censorship was undertaken to achieve an underlying ideological goal, to align the perceived opinions of the White House, NASA, and NOAA on the matter of climate change.
Censorship of Bird Flu Research
The issue of the censorship of the climate change findings of NASA and NOAA was resolved as the result of whistleblowing by Jim Hansen and by other scientists at NASA and NOAA. The perpetrators of the unwarranted censorship resigned or were fired, and the scientists at the two institutes were ensured that such a breach of scientific autonomy would not happen again. However, this was by no means the last time that scientific censorship would make headlines. Recently, in January 2011, the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity (NSABB) recommended that the findings from two studies which were studying the very deadly H5N1 flu virus, also known as Bird Flu, not be published in the journals Science and Nature due to potential risks to national security which could be posed by information presented in the research articles. The H5N1 Bird Flu virus is a deadly viral strain that has killed approximately half of the people it has infected. The only way it can be spread to humans is through blood contact with infected birds. However, it is possible that the virus could mutate in such a fashion that would enable it to spread from human to human simply through the air, as more common variants of the flu are usually transmitted. The scientific work which the NSABB is suggesting should not be published describes a mutation that was made to the virus which enabled it to infect experimental ferrets via respiratory routes. The work was done by two different research groups, one at the Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, and the second at the University of Wisconsin – Madison (Grady).
The NSABB, the advisory council which originally recommended the censorship of these results, is defined by their own website as a “federal advisory committee chartered to provide advice, guidance, and leadership regarding biosecurity oversight
of dual use research, defined as biological research with legitimate scientific purpose that may be misused to pose a biologic threat to public health and/or national security” (NSABB). The members of the NSABB include a wide variety of scientific experts from the fields of Microbiology, Public Health, and Immunology, as well as biodefense