Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Renewed Call for Science Debate

I mentioned earlier that the planned for the Science Debate 2008 among the US presidential candidates has been postponed due to lack of interest among those candidates. There is now a push for 3 possible dates in May.

While I think this is very important debate not just in terms of the issues, but in terms of a way we can judge how these candidates arrive at what they believe to be a valid opinion, I am not that optimistic that they will agree to this. Why? Because unlike most of the other debates, one actually need to have some knowledge of facts in this debate to be able to form an opinion. If you look closely at all the other debates, one can almost make things up as one goes along at answering the questions or discussing the issues. In those debates, style mattered more than substance. In a Science Debate, substance will take precedent over style. And for most politicians, that is very difficult to do.

So I am not going to hold my breath for this to happen...

Zz.

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