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Re: [Phys-L] How Activism Distorts The Assessment Of Health Risks



Accepting for a moment your premise that veracity of content is largely driven by the generic characteristics of readers and writers, what would that make of professional magazines controlled by, and containing, articles written mostly by people feeding off variety of federal grants and read by the same, both keenly interested in enlarging the pie? Just wondering.

Ze'ev


On 11/21/2012 1:45 PM, brian whatcott wrote:
On 11/21/2012 2:44 PM, Ze'ev Wurman wrote:
A well-written piece of the risks of the Precautionary Principle and science distortion by activism.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2012/11/20/how-activism-distorts-the-assessment-of-health-risks/

Ze'ev

There are tree-huggers, there are innocent bystanders, there are users, there are folks who make money if people use a product.
And there are magazines that don't accept advertizing, magazines that speak to consumers and magazines that speak to investors.
Supposing this were an exhaustive list of the spectrum of products and reviewers, that would leave twelve pairings of readers and writers.
In this particular instance, we seem to have a magazine directed to investors, and it is a piece advocating the soft pedal for products that may possibly be labelled carcinogenic. Science distortion by activism would be somewhat comparable to results distorted by enlightened self-interest (In that amusing turn of phrase). Or is that last just The American Way? :-)

Brian Whatcott
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