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My friends who work in scientific fields were aghast when they saw that the organizers of a planned "March for Science" had tweeted that "colonization, racism, immigration, native rights, sexism, ableism, queer-, trans-, intersex-phobia, & econ justice are scientific issues [black power emoji][rainbow emoji]." Who can blame them for their horror? The impartial search for truth is having enough problems these days, what with the discovery that many prominent scientific results, over a broad swath of fields, are non-replicable and likely false. It seems altogether the wrong time to inject a dose of partiality.
My correspondents always hasten to add that, of course, they're in favor of racial and genderbased outreach that seeks to increase the relatively low proportion of working scientists who are women or who belong to certain ethnic groups. They inform me that the institutions and practices of science are still shaped by covert and overt misogyny and racism, and I have no reason to doubt them. What makes them wary, however, is the even more illiberal desire to inject the views and interests of progressive social causes into the methodology of science itself (hypothesis formation, experiment, analysis) and perhaps even into its conclusions. This, in their eyes, would represent an overstepping of ideological bounds and a transgression against the most sacred ideals of the scientific enterprise (empiricism, objectivity, impartiality). It would transform science into a different activity, one which they do not recognize and of which they do not wish to be a part.
This is a naive view. In fact, the purported objectivity of scientific inquiry is a damaging myth, and the illiberal instincts of the Marchers for Science represent a corrective, though not a cure. Science has been ideologically captured since its birth, and "value-laden inquiry" is not a recent deviation but is rather fundamental to its successful practice. The successful conquest of the institutions of science by overtly politicized forces would change little on the ground, but it would help to update society's perceptions so that they match the underlying reality. We should welcome the March for Science as it sets out to destroy the academy's undeserved reputation for neutrality and to reveal science for what it has always been.
According to the popular understanding, science is simply...