[Upd-discuss] USA:Science Under Siege By Bush Administration, ACLU Charges

[Zapopan Martin Muela-Meza]

"A central lesson of science 
is that to understand complex issues 
(or even simple ones), 
we must try to free our minds of dogma 
and to guarantee the freedom to publish, 
to contradict, and to experiment. 
Arguments from authority are unacceptable. 
We are all fallible, even leaders. 
But however clear it is that criticism is necessary for progress,
governments tend to resist."
--Carl Sagan. US biologist and astronomer.
In: Sagan, C. (1998). "The common enemy." In: Billions and Billions.
Thoughts on Life and Death at the Brink of the Millenium. New York:
Ballantine Books, pp. 189-190.
http://www.socsci.uci.edu/~apetrov/memes/hum/cmn_enemy.html

"SPARC Open Access Forum" <SPARC-OAForum@arl.org>
Date:	Thu, 23 Jun 2005 15:39:18 -0400
From:	"Peter Suber" <peters@earlham.edu>  
Subject:	[SOAF] ACLU secrecy & science report

[Forwarding from the ACLU.  --Peter.]


The ACLU press release:

http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/SafeandFree.cfm?ID=18548&c=206

Science Under Siege By Bush Administration, ACLU Charges

June 21, 2005

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: media@aclu.org

Report Details Civil Liberties Implications of Faulty Policies

WASHINGTON -- The American Civil Liberties Union released a report today 
examining government policies and practices that have hampered academic 
freedom and scientific inquiry since September 11, 2001.

The report sheds new light on how these policies curtail basic rights and 
put all Americans at risk. "Attacks on scientific freedom have the same 
effect on our democracy as attacks on political freedom," said Anthony D. 
Romero, Executive Director of the ACLU. "Curtailing scientific freedom in 
the name of national security is bad for science, bad for freedom and 
simply not effective in increasing the safety of America."

The report, Science Under Siege, connects the dots between several 
different areas where misguided government policies are affecting science.

Among the abuses the ACLU examines in the report are:

* moves to overclassify information and designate whole areas of research 
as "sensitive but unclassified;"

* outright censorship and prescreening of scientific articles before 
publication; exclusion of foreign students from access to research 
projects;

* suppression of environmental and public health information; and 
increased 
restrictions on materials and technology commonly used in basic scientific

research.

Throughout the report, the ACLU challenges claims by the Bush 
administration that such policies are ultimately beneficial for national 
security, and points to documented cases in which the administration has 
distorted scientific and academic inquiry for particular political 
purposes.

"This report makes clear the extent to which the Bush administration has 
hampered the pursuit of knowledge and scientific inquiry," said Tania 
Simoncelli, the Technology and Science Fellow with the ACLU's Technology 
and Liberty Project. "It has diminished America's standing as a magnet for

students and intellectuals around the world, had a chilling effect on many

practicing scientists, and set terrible precedents for the government 
control of information."

According to the ACLU, restrictions on the free flow of information have 
jeopardized America's current global leadership in the sciences. In 
addition to policies implemented post-9/11, the report notes an ongoing 
erosion of environmental and public health standards, including mercury 
emissions, global climate change, sexual education and mountaintop removal

mining.

The ACLU recommends a series of reforms including a halt to 
overclassification, the elimination of the "sensitive but unclassified" 
designation, the removal of censorship and publication restrictions, 
dropping unnecessary restrictions on foreign students and scholars, 
maintaining the fundamental research exemption and protecting science from

undue political interference..

"The future security of our nation will flow from our global scientific 
strength and leadership," said Barry Steinhardt, Director of the ACLU's 
Technology and Liberty Project. "Attempts to achieve security through 
control and repression of information will never work, and will only 
undermine that leadership. The administration must reverse its misguided 
and damaging policies."

Science Under Siege is available online at www.aclu.org/scientificfreedom.


[Addendum, via the science_integrity list:]

 >>> Gila Neta 06/21/05 02:55PM >>> Courtesy of CQ midday update:

The American Civil Liberties Union charged today that the Bush 
administration is placing science under siege by overzealously tightening 
restrictions on information, individuals and technology in the name of 
homeland security.

The administration "has sought to impose growing restrictions on the free 
flow of scientific information, unreasonable barriers on the use of 
scientific materials and increased monitoring of and restrictions on 
foreign university students," the ACLU said, according to the Associated 
Press.

Robert Hopkins of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy 
criticized the ACLU for seeking to politicize the issue.

"The administration has worked in good faith with serious members of the 
science community, including the National Academies, to determine the best

way to enable the conduct of science without providing terrorists with a 
road map for pursuing their aims," Hopkins said.

But the ACLU contends that the administration has been overzealous, 
reversing past government openness by creating a presumption of secrecy 
and 
lengthening classification periods.

--------------------------- v ---------------------------
"I don't need to make more emphasize that the freedom of teaching
and the freedom of opinion in the literature and press
are the basis for the natural development of any individual"
--------------------------- v ---------------------------
"no necesito hacer hincapie en que la libertad de enseñanza
y la libertad de opinion en la literatura y en la prensa
son las bases para el desarrollo natural de cualquier individuo"

-- Albert Einstein. Sobre el humanismo. Escritos sobre política,
  sociedad y ciencia : On humanism. Essays on politics, society 
  and science. Barcelona: Ediciones Paidos, 1995, p. 68.


		
____________________________________________________ 
Yahoo! Sports 
Rekindle the Rivalries. Sign up for Fantasy Football 
http://football.fantasysports.yahoo.com