Blog 23

                The handout the Dr. Pennock passed out was the transcript of an interview between a person and a scientist. Within the transcript, the interviewer asked the scientist varying questions regarding the scientist’s opinion on things such as the necessity of certain scientific virtues, why he ranked them as he did, the affects vices have on science, and the affects of outside entities such as groups that provide funding. The scientist’s rankings and reasonings behind those rankings were logical and well thought out, especially when it involved his own personal experiences. One of his opinions though on a scientific virtue I thought was quite realistic and well addressed was his ranking of the importance of objectivity in science. He stated that he used to think that objectivity was the most important thing in science until he realized how near impossible it is to be completely objective. Not only does he recognize that we as humans can never be perfect in this area but also he is willing to admit it. A portion of scientists today would like to believe or say that scientists are completely objective and that their emotions never get in the way, when the reality is that this will never happen. It is better to embrace this imperfection and figure out how to work with it instead of around it. A good example of a scientist that did this well was Barbara McClintock. She understood the importance of having some subjective attachment to her work in order for her to not abandon it when others would put her down. However, she did not allow her subjectivity to cloud her data results and eventually her efforts to convey those results to others in an objective manner.

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