Swamp Stomp
Volume 16, Issue 33
Science leaders are fed up with politicians for not discussing scientific issues on the campaign trail. Politicians talk about their policies on issues they believe will sway voters. They do not believe that issues on science, research, and innovation will have much effect on voters. Science leaders believe that voters have the right to know politicians stances on issues ranging from climate change to cybersecurity. Since the politicians are not discussing these issues on the campaign trail, some science groups decided to do something about this.
An association of 56 science groups and higher education created 20 questions about scientific issues that will help voters understand where Democrat Hillary Clinton, Republican Donald Trump, the Green Party’s Jill Stein, and Libertarian Gary Johnson fall regarding these issues.
The association started the questioning candidates in 2008 but expanded the questions in 2016. ScienceDebate will post each candidate’s reply. The main purpose of the questions is to attract voter and media attention to these issues so that candidates need to address these issues before Election Day in three months.
“We are encouraging journalists to ask these questions at every opportunity,” says Shawn Otto, the effort’s organizer, who is based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. “We’re in a new era where science is impacting people more than ever, and candidates will respond to what is on the minds of the public.”
The group was unsuccessful in forcing candidates to have a science related issues debate in the 2008 and 2012 campaigns so it is unlikely that one will occur during the 2016 campaign. This does not mean that the group has given up on this goal. In the meantime, the group has put a lot of thought and energy into creating questions that they hope will garner a written response from each candidate’s organization.
The final 20 questions chosen were taken from a list of 400 questions that were submitted by participating organizations. “The new version reprises earlier questions on innovation policy, climate change, energy, food security, clean water, ocean health, and space. But some perennial topics have acquired a different focus; for example, the question about the internet has shifted from ensuring access to cybersecurity and privacy, and the question dealing with education now focuses on attracting more women and minorities into the scientific workforce rather than on boosting overall student achievement. There are also some fresh faces: Opioid addiction and mental health have cracked the list, whereas concern about safeguarding critical natural resources has fallen by the wayside” (Mervis).
According to Otto, the association purposefully omitted questions on issues that seemed too narrow. Two examples of too narrow issues are funding a particular federal agency or reforming the Department of Energy’s network of national laboratories. That does not stop specific organizations from hounding candidates on issues that they deem of great importance. Case in point, the Association of American Universities (AAU), a Washington, D.C.–based group of 62 research universities, released their own letter to the candidates on August 9, 2016 that focused on four issues. Coincidentally, only one issue, innovation, is on the associations list of questions. AAU’s vice president for public affairs, Barry Toiv, says the association agrees with what ScienceDebate is attempting to accomplish even though it is not part of the association. “But we also feel it’s important to highlight the issues that our members feel strongly about.”
Source: Mervis, Jeffrey. “U.S. Science Groups Have 20 Questions for Candidates.” ScienceInsider. Science Magazine, 10 Aug. 2016. Web. 10 Aug. 2016.