When Science and politics meet, where is the line between investigation & evidence vs politics and casting blame?

[KerikBalm]

A scientific investigation seeks to answer a question.

Sometimes that question, or the answer to it involves determining a cause that is linked to human actions. In many such cases, certain human actions are determined to have had a detrimental effect. This obviously leads to a more political concept of "blame".

Obviously, political discussions are not meant to take place on these forums, but political discussions often revolve around subjective questions that cannot be answered by science (ex: should abortion be regulated, and if so, how?). Other times, the political sphere and the scientific sphere overlap, and a scientific discussion has extreme political implications, and results in blame. 

So when discussing such subjects on these forums, where is the line? According to the forum guidelines, "2.2 b Political, ideological or religious posts unrelated to Spaceflight, or of a nature deemed likely to result in behavior banned under rule 2.2D;"

with 2.2D being: "Insults and threats, stalking, bullying or any other behavior construed to be of a potentially rude, slanderous, accusatory, combative or otherwise harassing nature to/of another person;"

I note that 2.2B has a political exemption(?) if the posts are related to Spaceflight, whereas this is the Science and Spaceflight subforum.

With that in mind, I was wondering which of the following topics would be too political to be allowed to be discussed here:

Global warming: as the science strongly indicates a link with CO2 emissions, which can also be objectively linked with certain countries, companies, and policies. Is this topic off limits? Can we not discuss the Global warming?

Chernobyl: Nuclear science can explain how the disaster happened, which is thus objectively linked with the actions of certain individuals, government agencies, and policies. Is this topic off limits? Can we not discuss the Chernobyl disaster?

Evolution: as the science strongly indicates descent from a common ancestor for all life on Earth, which conflicts with certain religious views and is a political issue with government policies affected. Is this topic off limits? Can we not discuss evolution?

All of the above are examples of "settled" science.

Recently, another thread was closed where the scientific question was still open, but the political implications are huge. Where should the line be drawn when discussing science with political implications? Should we refer to the scale of the implications? who is implicated? or should the discussion be limited based on whether the science is settled or not, since unsettled science could result in "blame" that ultimately is not borne out by conclusive evidence?

It should not be hard to guess which topic I am referring to, but I would like to limit the discussion on this thread to the subject of how to navigate the fine line between politics and science if possible, and how to determine when it is not possible.

 

 

[DDE]

It is not possible adequately answer this question without going neck-deep into politics of science.

For example, the science is "settled" insofar as there is more or less a broad consensus. However, a common refrain is that global warming is a "politically charged" topic where dissent is stigmatized. A cynical analysis of the science as an institution would show that what achieves the status of settled science isn't necessarily what is true, but what is popular (peer review, as shown by several studies) and what promises desirable outcomes (chiefly grant allocation); the hypothesis that comes out on top isn't necessarily true (nor necessarily false), but one that fits in with current views,and guarantees more funding, preferably through becoming embedded with regulatory or political agencies - that's precisely why paradigm shifts are so painful... and that's before we get to the media and clickbait. This may be contrary to science as a method, but as any bribe-taking traffic cop would tell you, laws and how things are done are two different things, and are usually driven by incentives.

Further elaborating on desirable outcomes, the desirability is generally measured in the capacity to produce change. In other terms, power. Without most people realizing it, today's scientists are driven by the incentive structure of the industry to be an extremely power-hungry group.

There is relatively little power in fundamental fields of science, barring something exciting like phosphine on Venus, although the situation deteriorates as experiments (e.g. the LHC) become difficult to replicate. There is a lot of power to be had in fields like human biology, anthropology, sociology, psychology and economics, compounded by limited room for verification and testing; note how in many of these fields paradigm shifts have been substituted for with balkanization into countless rival schools. These disciplines are almost explicitly intended to be prescriptive, to exercise power over human society, and when power is the object, it's not the best ideas that prevail, it's the ideas that accrue the most power that are selected for. Sometimes they reflect reality, and sometimes they're Lysenkoism.

The moral of the rant: science readily devolves into a political excrementsshow of dubious scientific quality whenever you try to apply it to the real world. The way to observe the forum's rules for me, in spite of my strong and often radical opinions, has been a method of dispassionate, often bitter and acerbic observation as a more or less neutral third party. I appreciate this forum's status as neutral ground, and I know politics would destroy it.

[snip]

This is the reason for 2.2b

Edited June 8, 2021 by Snark
Redacted by moderator

[kerbiloid]

And are Zeus and Odin treated as religious figures?

And "voodoo".

[SOXBLOX]

6 hours ago, KerikBalm said:

All of the above are examples of "settled" science.

Because a bunch of dudes said so, and have some evidence to back it up? Sounds like the same situation Copernicus and Kepler were in when they said something different. Nothing is settled. Ever. We can always reexamine our theories.

Only math can be "settled". It uses rigorous proofs, instead of conclusions drawn from evidence. But even there, axioms can be discarded or assumptions changed.

I absolutely agree with @DDE. 2b is here for a reason. I have my own views, and I like the fact that this is one of the few places on the Internet where I can hold them without having a string of ad hominems thrown my way.

Edited June 7, 2021 by SOXBLOX

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

With politics there is no line. 

   * Deny Everything 

   * Admit Nothing

   * Make Counter-Accusations

 

 

[YNM]

6 hours ago, KerikBalm said:

[...] I note that 2.2B has a political exemption(?) if the posts are related to Spaceflight, whereas this is the Science and Spaceflight subforum.  [...]

[...] Can we not discuss the Global warming?

[...] Can we not discuss the Chernobyl disaster?

[...] Can we not discuss evolution?

You can. There are objective results on nearly all of this, and even if the nooks and crannies are different, we can tell that there's exactly a mountain ahead of us in our sight when discussing those topics.

However, the thing that's not really allowed is talking about the way how politics ties with everything IMO. The details about who's "making problems" etc. or who's taking the wrong decision and faulting/shaming that group is IMO the one that this forum tries to avoid. Science is at least grounded purely in results; when it comes to planning and design it becomes even more difficult to separate out the technical, scientifical, observational truths from the personal views of the people around. If you notice most of the thread that threads lightly (yes, pun intended) on the border tend to be those which talks about either future applications and similar things, or talking about how stuff currently works as is (esp. exploration agencies which are almost always going to be tied to a government or - worse - military). Way I see things here is that we're at least trying to adopt just culture - ie. this is a place to put your ideas or views out but not necessarily to say that someone else is guilty of having the false perception.

So IMO as long as we're not doing personal attacks because you think someone else is guilty of having the wrong idea about things it's OK to discuss just about everything relevant under the Science and Spaceflight topic.

[KerikBalm]

On 6/7/2021 at 5:25 AM, DDE said:

For example, the science is "settled" insofar as there is more or less a broad consensus.

I would agree with that, and its why I put it into quotes.

Quote

A cynical analysis of the science as an institution would show that what achieves the status of settled science isn't necessarily what is true, but what is popular (peer review, as shown by several studies) and what promises desirable outcomes (chiefly grant allocation); the hypothesis that comes out on top isn't necessarily true (nor necessarily false), but one that fits in with current views,and guarantees more funding, preferably through becoming embedded with regulatory or political agencies - that's precisely why paradigm shifts are so painful... and that's before we get to the media and clickbait. This may be contrary to science as a method, but as any bribe-taking traffic cop would tell you, laws and how things are done are two different things, and are usually driven by incentives.

I am still in agreement.

Quote

The moral of the rant: science readily devolves into a political excrementsshow of dubious scientific quality whenever you try to apply it to the real world.

Well... to some extent, there seems to be a lot of scientific discussion on here that doesn't devolve into an excerement show, I'd think some of it applies to the real world

[snip]

Assuming it refers back to the post that was recently locked, my view was that the consensus (which is now in flux), which I had a reason to think it was possibly " what is popular ... and what promises desirable outcomes (chiefly grant allocation)",  "one that fits in with current views,and guarantees more funding".

My desired outcome was a critical examination of the available evidence. If I came across as strong, its because my assessment was that the (somewhat dated) consensus did not fit the available evidence.

Digressing, momentarily:

Spoiler

While the conclusion that I think better fits the available evidence does point to a certain country being more to blame, that country's chief competitor also funded research at the particular - and recently disclosed e-mails shows that some in the cheif competitor country did not wish a certain hypothesis to be put forward, because it would open a "can of worms" due to that funding link.

My point is, if the other proposed explanation is correct, it is not one nation at fault, and the implications in fact affect a whole are of research that is competing for funding, creating conflicts of interest similar to what you outlines above.

 

Edited June 8, 2021 by Snark
Redacted by moderator

[SOXBLOX]

I guess I think that any time we try to use science to support one particular philosophy, or one particular way to act, it's crossed the line into philosophy/religion/politics/whatever. Any judgement on the way someone lives is derived from assumptions about morality, and not purely from science. We can go on to argue about which moral ideas, philosophies, religions, etc. are correct (surely there is a correct view?), but that falls outside the scope of this forum. But that's just my opinion.

Edited June 7, 2021 by SOXBLOX

[SpaceFace545]

I like politics

[tater]

Science is a process, not a set of facts.

Positive claims need to be demonstrated.

Models need to be testable (and then tested). If they are not predictive, they need to be revised or abandoned.

 

[SOXBLOX]

@KerikBalm brings up global warming. I guess that's a great example. IMO, we can discuss the science behind it, i.e. "does CO2 really affect the climate edit: in a major way?" or "does increased plant growth occur as a result of increased CO2; and does this act as a feedback loop?".

What we can't do is discuss things like "we should enact x law to combat global warming". We can even note the fact that a country has passed a particular law, but we can't pass judgement on it. Say, as an example, Spain decides to outlaw gasoline. We can say, "Spain's banning gasoline usage". We can't say, "This is a great victory for science!" or whatever, because that would reflect personal beliefs.

Again, this is just how I think the rules are interpreted. I wonder if one of the mods could weigh in?

Edited June 7, 2021 by SOXBLOX
Clarified.

[Elthy]

29 minutes ago, SOXBLOX said:

"does CO2 really affect the climate?"

I think  discussing that would fall under another rule, 2.2.h, as anyone arguing that CO2 doesnt affect the climate would be spreading conspiracy theorys on the same level of stupidity and contrary to all science as stating we never landed on the moon.

[MKI]

On 6/7/2021 at 12:55 AM, KerikBalm said:

Recently, another thread was closed where the scientific question was still open, but the political implications are huge. Where should the line be drawn when discussing science with political implications? Should we refer to the scale of the implications? who is implicated? or should the discussion be limited based on whether the science is settled or not, since unsettled science could result in "blame" that ultimately is not borne out by conclusive evidence?

It should not be hard to guess which topic I am referring to, but I would like to limit the discussion on this thread to the subject of how to navigate the fine line between politics and science if possible, and how to determine when it is not possible.

 

There should be enough topics to talk about in the world that getting anywhere near that "line".

Its like telling your kid "don't go near the edge of that cliff", and your kid asking "please measure out the exact distance of how close I can get to that cliff?", and when you pull out your handy-dandy measuring tape you of course carry in your pocket, and you measure it out, the kid says "but what about over here, where there is a hill?" or "what about where there is this giant rock?" or "or what if a gust of wind pushes me closer?", or the other 500 other things a little one may ask to "get closer to that line you haven't drawn". At some point you just get angry* because its a continual pushing for something that shouldn't even be a process, or discussion because you don't have time for it. So you tell your kid "just don't go near it please and stop asking questions", and your kid, being reasonable, stops asking mundane specifications, listens and stays away from the cliff.

Except in the case of codes of conduct, moderators usually are unpaid volunteers for some platform where you have to watch someone else's "kids" who may end up pushing your buttons, or someone else's (either inadvertently or purposely). 

I'd assume many people here aren't that annoying kid asking their parent to measure out the exact distance to the edge of the cliff. In this sense it should be easy to at least understand that the code of conduct is there not as actual hard laws, but more guidelines so moderators aren't dealing with that annoying kid asking you to measure out and specify every single tiny thing because there's plenty of other random stuff to ask about without getting close to anything. There is no line, or "measurement" because there shouldn't need to be one. 

 

So the answer doesn't sit with politics and science, it sits with the platform itself and the idea that you need to specify anything in the first place. Just like the kid who reasonably figures out that they shouldn't go near the cliff, one should be able to reasonably determine what is getting "too political" and back off of the subject. 

So your busy asking "how close can I get to the cliff", maybe you're too close to begin with?

 

 

 

Edited June 8, 2021 by MKI

[SunlitZelkova]

18 hours ago, KerikBalm said:

 

Recently, another thread was closed where the scientific question was still open, but the political implications are huge. Where should the line be drawn when discussing science with political implications? Should we refer to the scale of the implications? who is implicated? or should the discussion be limited based on whether the science is settled or not, since unsettled science could result in "blame" that ultimately is not borne out by conclusive evidence?

It should not be hard to guess which topic I am referring to, but I would like to limit the discussion on this thread to the subject of how to navigate the fine line between politics and science if possible, and how to determine when it is not possible.

 

 

The situation that occurred in "that" thread was highly unusual and very specific to that subject.

For the examples you provided- global warming, Chernobyl, and evolution- there is obviously data that can be gone over and discussed. As long as there is science in it, such discussion- assuming it is polite and does not devolve into a flame war- would likely be ok.

In "that" thread, there was no data at all- merely likelihoods and conjecture based on indirectly related factors. Therefore it did not qualify as a science discussion.

To sum it up using an analogy, if you have data on global warming and want to talk about what actions should be taken to mitigate global warming, so long as it is not hardcore propaganda, you can talk about that. Of course, the actions you suggest should be based on your data.

On the other hand, if you have a hunch based on the actions of a scientific organization that studies global warming (and no data to back it up), and your hunch implies or results in blame on (and thus consequences for) that scientific organization for some event occurring in the world related to global warming, it would be considered off limits.

If you have comments on the nature of "that" thread in response to my post, I recommend you PM me.

Edited June 8, 2021 by SunlitZelkova

[mikegarrison]

8 hours ago, SOXBLOX said:

What we can't do is discuss things like "we should enact x law to combat global warming".

This seems overly restrictive.

If alternative choices are being discussed, surely we could discuss the potential effectiveness of them.

[SOXBLOX]

6 minutes ago, mikegarrison said:

This seems overly restrictive.

If alternative choices are being discussed, surely we could discuss the potential effectiveness of them.

Fair enough.

[kerbiloid]

10 hours ago, Elthy said:

arguing that CO2 doesnt affect the climate

CO2 does.

This doesn't mean that the humanity's part in the total CO2 income does.

***

Still can't get what's not obvious about Chernobyl, to have any discussion on it.

[Elthy]

51 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

This doesn't mean that the humanity's part in the total CO2 income does.

Same stuff, denying man-made climate change is a conspiracy theory and thus banned und the forum rules.

[kerbiloid]

1 minute ago, Elthy said:

Same stuff, denying man-made climate change is a conspiracy theory and thus banned und the forum rules.

I believe you.

[KerikBalm]

18 hours ago, YNM said:

The details about who's "making problems" etc. or who's taking the wrong decision and faulting/shaming that group is IMO the one that this forum tries to avoid.

Well, that brings up an issue. Suppose we are talking about Chernobyl, and mentioning the decision to disable various safety systems. Is that blaming the person who disabled them? Is saying what someone did the same as saying that you blame them for doing them? is the blame implicit? is there anyway to discuss the objective actions of a party without some implicit condemnation, when said action is linked to what is generally accepted as a bad outcome?

18 hours ago, YNM said:

So IMO as long as we're not doing personal attacks because you think someone else is guilty of having the wrong idea about things it's OK to discuss just about everything relevant under the Science and Spaceflight topic.

In *that other thread*, there was no attack against someone else being "guilty of having the wrong idea about things". Instead what was discussed was the verifiable evidence supporting a plausible hypothesis to the answer of a scientific question. If we can discuss certain actions that almost certainly led to the Chernobyl disaster, can we discuss certain actions that may have plausilbly led to another? Is the determinant here the level of certainty in a scenario before it is proposed?

6 hours ago, SunlitZelkova said:

For the examples you provided- global warming, Chernobyl, and evolution- there is obviously data that can be gone over and discussed. As long as there is science in it, such discussion- assuming it is polite and does not devolve into a flame war- would likely be ok.

In "that" thread, there was no data at all- merely likelihoods and conjecture based on indirectly related factors. Therefore it did not qualify as a science discussion.

Well, here we have reached different conclusions. In particular, "that thread" did have data. The data was incomplete, but there is data. Some factors were more related than others, but some data was highly related/relevant (namely conclusive evidence that a certain event did not happen at a certain location, which was the initial suspected for the location of the event). That was a scientific conclusion based on hard data. It certainly did qualify as science.

Conjecture, is often defined as "an opinion or conclusion formed on the basis of incomplete information". I don't think this definition is very useful here, as to some extent, every opinion or conclusion is formed on information that is less than "complete". I would propose substituting "insufficient" for "incomplete". Furthermore, no opinion or conclusion was reached about what happened, but rather on the plausibility of what happened, and how evidence fit with two competing hypotheses. At no point was a conclusion stated that either hypothesis was right or wrong.

If I were to identify something as mere conjecture in "that" thread, it woul be the hypothesis that had previously had the general consensus. I apologize if I came accross as... animated, but it annoyed me greatly to see conjecture, that had consistenly failed to find evidence to support it, regarded as the consensus.

Additionally, "mere likelihoods" underlies a great deal of science (which obviously makes heavy use of statistics and baysien reasoning), so I would take issue with the idea that discussing likelhoods does not qualify as a scientific discussion.

6 hours ago, SunlitZelkova said:

To sum it up using an analogy, if you have data on global warming and want to talk about what actions should be taken to mitigate global warming, so long as it is not hardcore propaganda, you can talk about that. Of course, the actions you suggest should be based on your data.

On the other hand, if you have a hunch based on the actions of a scientific organization that studies global warming (and no data to back it up), and your hunch implies or results in blame on (and thus consequences for) that scientific organization for some event occurring in the world related to global warming, it would be considered off limits.

As noted above, I do not think this is an apt analogy, as the statement no data to back it up does not apply.

17 hours ago, tater said:

Science is a process, not a set of facts.

Positive claims need to be demonstrated.

Models need to be testable (and then tested). If they are not predictive, they need to be revised or abandoned.

Indeed, they do need to be testable, but some models are easier to test than others. Some tests could be done easier than others. This is particularly true when attempting to discern past events.

I would argue that "that" thread was closed after it was pointed out that one hypothesis had failed to pass any tests, and the competing hypothesis had in fact passed some tests. The problem being that these early and limited tests were pointing to a conclusion with massive political implications.

To me, it seems that some balance between the level of certainty and the scale of the implications is being sought.

The greater the implications, the more certainty is required before discussing it here?

 

[YNM]

2 minutes ago, KerikBalm said:

[...] mentioning the decision to disable various safety systems. Is that blaming the person who disabled them?

Human error is a factor, yes, but it's not as simple as one might think. Often the surrounding circumstances make those error more likely and/or have a worse effect than it could've been otherwise.

3 minutes ago, KerikBalm said:

In *that other thread*, there was no attack against someone else being "guilty of having the wrong idea about things". Instead what was discussed was the verifiable evidence supporting a plausible hypothesis to the answer of a scientific question.

I seriously have no idea which thread this is, I'm dumb like that.

9 minutes ago, KerikBalm said:

If we can discuss certain actions that almost certainly led to the Chernobyl disaster, can we discuss certain actions that may have plausilbly led to another? Is the determinant here the level of certainty in a scenario before it is proposed?

I have mentioned this -

"If you notice most of the thread that threads lightly on the border tend to be those which talks about either future applications and similar things, or talking about how stuff currently works as is"

Honestly ? It's at your own discretion. As long as it doesn't say anything about the standard political process and the messy popular cultural-sociological reality of the scene I think it mostly passes. Also as long as we're not insulting each other. If we're veering into the popular cultural-sociological scene, I suggest talking about it in The Lounge instead where those flames are expected more than here.

[kerbiloid]

Maybe, it would be easier to link the mysterious That Thread. 

But I don't insist.

[SunlitZelkova]

9 hours ago, KerikBalm said:

Well, here we have reached different conclusions. In particular, "that thread" did have data. The data was incomplete, but there is data. Some factors were more related than others, but some data was highly related/relevant (namely conclusive evidence that a certain event did not happen at a certain location, which was the initial suspected for the location of the event). That was a scientific conclusion based on hard data. It certainly did qualify as science.

Conjecture, is often defined as "an opinion or conclusion formed on the basis of incomplete information". I don't think this definition is very useful here, as to some extent, every opinion or conclusion is formed on information that is less than "complete". I would propose substituting "insufficient" for "incomplete". Furthermore, no opinion or conclusion was reached about what happened, but rather on the plausibility of what happened, and how evidence fit with two competing hypotheses. At no point was a conclusion stated that either hypothesis was right or wrong.

If I were to identify something as mere conjecture in "that" thread, it woul be the hypothesis that had previously had the general consensus. I apologize if I came accross as... animated, but it annoyed me greatly to see conjecture, that had consistenly failed to find evidence to support it, regarded as the consensus.

Additionally, "mere likelihoods" underlies a great deal of science (which obviously makes heavy use of statistics and baysien reasoning), so I would take issue with the idea that discussing likelhoods does not qualify as a scientific discussion.

As noted above, I do not think this is an apt analogy, as the statement no data to back it up does not apply.

It did have data but there was no data supporting the "controversial" hypothesis. There is merely a hole. But a hole is not proof something happened. It means we don't know.

I would like to clarify that I agree the "other" hypothesis- the one that previously had general consensus in the West- also has no data to support it.

In regards to your response with the definition of conjecture and in regards to my analogy, there is "data" but in the form of "no data" as I said in the first sentence. Of course, you and others were not sharing your pure opinions. But the information in the links shared basically amount to "we likely know one thing did not happen"- but not "we also know [with hard data/evidence] the other thing happened". In addition there is silenced from "the accused". But silence does not equal guilt.

Simply because the data relating to the "other" hypothesis appears to disprove it, it does not mean that it proves the other hypothesis. Which is what your posts implied.

If that were the case, the current data and weakening of the "other" hypothesis simultaneously strengthens the much more extreme hypothesis proposed by "the accused". Which of course, it does not.

Sharing that one hypothesis has been disproved with data is fine. But in your posts you also used that conclusion as evidence of another hypothesis. Which it is not, as described above. Therefore without data, the comment about the "controversial" hypothesis is considered to not be a science discussion.

EDIT- See the post by the moderator below in regards to that thread.

Edited June 8, 2021 by SunlitZelkova

[Snark]

Hi folks, a few things:

First, just to get this out of the way:  we've removed and/or redacted some content, due to 1. personal remarks, and 2. responding to personal remarks, and 3. backseat moderating.  It's fine to discuss things, everyone, but let's please not make this personal, such as speculating about other people's motivations.  That's out of bounds, per forum rule 2.2.b.  Please don't do that.  And if you see someone else doing it, please don't respond or try to "call them on it"-- that's also not allowed, it's called "backseat moderating" and is prohibited by rule 3.2. Just report the post and let the moderator team deal with it.  Thanks.

On to the more substantial point, here.  This thread raises some interesting questions, which (if I may be so bold) basically breaks down into two general areas of discussion:

1. Philosophical / sociological, i.e. "how does one define the boundary between science and politics" and related questions.
2. Practical, regarding this forum, i.e. "what are the rules, and how do moderators decide what's allowed and what's not."

Point #1 is certainly interesting, but that's not really in our wheelhouse as moderators; it's not about the forums.  So I won't make any attempt to address that, here.

Point #2, however, is definitely relevant to our duties, and I can see that folks would appreciate some clarity if possible.  "Just what is the policy, and why?"  So, let me see if I can shed some light.  The following is going to be long, but it boils down to the following topics (each of these sets the criteria for the next one):

1. What the forum is for
2. Why the rules exist
3. How we decide what the rules are
4. Why the "no politics" rule in particular
5. and finally, back to the actual question:  where exactly is the line between "politics" and "science" when they intertwine?

 

Okay.  Crushing Wall of Text™ begins now-- don't say I didn't warn you!  If you just want the answer to the question and don't care about the context leading up to it, skip ahead to the last section.

 

The "Prime Directive"

Before I get into the nitty-gritty of the actual policies, I think it's useful to take a step back and look at the overall guiding principle that drives everything else.   The "Prime Directive", as it were.  It's basically this:

• Q:  What is this forum for?
• A:  This forum is about the game Kerbal Space Program.
  • It exists to allow people who are interested in KSP to have a place where they can come to discuss it with other people who enjoy the game.
  • It shall provide a friendly, non-toxic environment where all are welcome.

That's it.  That's literally the only reason this forum exists.  That's essentially our entire motivation as moderators.  Basically any moderator action, ever, is in service of that purpose.

(Disclaimer:  My use of the term "Prime Directive" here is just my convenient turn of phrase for purposes of this discussion-- it's not like it's an official term or anything.) 

So, for any given situation where we need to consider taking moderator action about some situation, the only real question for us is:  "Does this situation threaten the above priority?"

• If yes:  Then we take action.
• If no:  Then we leave it alone and let people do pretty much what they want.

Of course that devolves to human judgment (the moderators'), and of course humans are imperfect, which means we can make mistakes.  But we've got some reasonable safeguards for that:  there's a team of us, we consult each other a lot to guard against individual lapses of judgment, and nobody makes it onto the team without a lengthy track record that demonstrates they have pretty good judgment.

TL;DR:

1. Every moderator action is primarily an exercise of judgment.
2. The basis of our judgment is the protection of "the KSP forums as a nice place for people to talk about KSP".

 

The role of the Forum Guidelines-- why have them at all?

"Well okay," I hear you cry, "if it's all just moderators 'exercising their judgment', then why bother even publishing any formal written rules at all?"

The answer is that it's primarily for the benefit of the users.  The "prime directive," above, basically boils down to "don't be a jerk."  That's an awfully vague statement, though-- especially since different people have very different concepts of acceptable topics of conversation, where personal boundaries are, etc.  One person's "admirable frankness" is another's "being a total jerk".  And if there weren't some written rules, then it would be uncomfortable to users, knowing that there are these "moderator" people who wield forum authority.

If you know you can get smitten with thunderbolts if you step over the line, then there's a natural and wholly reasonable desire to have some idea of where the line is (as judged by the Powers That Be).

So, as a result, we've tried to codify "don't be a jerk" into a set of forum rules that are reasonably explicit and detailed, about the do's and don'ts.  This accomplishes several things:

• It gives users a reasonable idea of what types of behavior to steer clear of.
• It helps the moderators be more consistent in our actions, and avoid "mission creep" over time-- we can refer back to the rules in each case, as a helpful framework.
• It helps the community have more confidence in the moderators as being reasonable arbiters of reasonable rules, rather than just a bunch of totally arbitrary martinets.

The important thing to understand, though, is that this is not legislation.  The forum guidelines are not intended to be a rigid, completely unambiguous, fully detailed specification of exactly what is or isn't allowed in every case.  Because to do that, they'd have to be about a hundred pages long, and they'd be written in such dense legalese that not even the moderators could keep up with them-- and they'd be totally impenetrable and useless to the users.  Which would be silly, since it's primarily for the users' benefit that the written forum guidelines exist in the first place.

"Well, okay, if they're not intended to be as detailed and specific as a legal framework would be... what are they for?"

Basically they're a guide for judgment.  They help users understand the approximate shape of our judgment space, and they help the moderators keep our judgments reasonably consistent and understandable.  Like any human creation, they're imperfect.  They are our attempt to strike a balance between "detailed enough to be useful to people" without being "too detailed so that they're hard to understand and toxically rigid to to apply."

 

How are the rules decided?  Why these rules?

It ties back to that "Prime Directive", again.

As much as possible, we'd prefer not to have rules.  After all, if our goal is for the forum to be a pleasant place where people are happy to spend their time... then people tend to be happiest when they're free.  Nobody likes being told what not to do.

Therefore, we have a strong "bias for inaction"-- less moderation is better moderation, and fewer rules are better.

So... basically the only reason for a rule to exist is if it is deemed necessary to protect that "prime directive".  There are certain types of user behavior that have significant negative consequences for other users.  So for such cases, we have a rule.  These are the cases where we judge that the positive effects of the rule (protecting the community from problematic behavior) outweighs the negative effects of the rule (constraining people's freedom).

"Well, okay then, how do you judge that balance?"

Well, anything that involves human decisions is not going to be an exact science.  However, in the case of the forum rules, we do have one thing going for us:  Lots and lots of data points.  The forums have been around for a decade now.  There have been nearly 200 thousand topics and nearly 4 million posts made.  Collectively, the moderator team has tons of experience of dealing with user behavior, and other users' reaction to it.  This is a very rich set of experimental evidence that we can leverage to drive the rules.

So, basically, it boils down to:  Each rule is there because bitter experience has demonstrated-- generally on many occasions-- that it's necessary to protect the Prime Directive. 

Which brings us to the current discussion:

 

What's the deal with "no politics"?  Why have that rule?

For reference, here are the relevant rules:

Quote

2.2.b Political, ideological or religious posts unrelated to Spaceflight, or of a nature deemed likely to result in behavior banned under rule 2.2D;

2.2.d Insults and threats, stalking, bullying or any other behavior construed to be of a potentially rude, slanderous, accusatory, combative or otherwise harassing nature to/of another person;

We don't have anything against politics as a topic of discussion, per se.  We'd love to just let everybody talk about any topic they want, so as to maximize user freedom, which is a Good Thing™, right?

However.  Many years of experience have demonstrated, consistently, that the community cannot be trusted to discuss this topic without going completely bonkers.  Any time politics comes up, the following is going to happen:

1. Someone will express a political viewpoint (i.e. approval or disapproval of some political position)
2. Many people who disagree with that viewpoint will feel uncomfortable and unwelcome, thus making the forum less pleasant for them
3. Some people will disagree with that viewpoint vehemently enough to express an opposing political viewpoint
4. This will then make both parties extremely angry, and then Bad Behavior™ will ensue
   • Endless circling back and forth because neither party will budge from their position, and both parties insist on having the last word
   • Personal insults and offensive speculation about ulterior motives begin to fly
   • etc.
5. The flames burn everything down, everyone involved (including innocent bystanders) has a really rotten time, and the Prime Directive is violated all to heck.

So, when we look at "politics as a topic", there are therefore two relevant considerations:

• It consistently degrades the forum experience for everyone
• It's not actually relevant to the forum's main purpose (it has nothing to do with KSP), so the only reason to allow it in the first place is a nebulous desire to "let people do whatever they want"

The result?  Some rules are difficult and we agonize over them, but this one's pretty much a no-brainer.  Thus the rule.  (We could summarize it as:  "rule 2.2.b exists because our experience is that the presence of politics always results in massive 2.2.d violation".)

 

Okay, so can you just answer the darn question please?  When science and politics intertwine, exactly where is the line?

Glad you asked. 

@KerikBalm gives a pretty good definition of the problem:

On 6/7/2021 at 3:55 AM, KerikBalm said:

Where should the line be drawn when discussing science with political implications?

 

And then goes on to ask some really good framing questions, to try to understand how we might judge where to put the boundary:

On 6/7/2021 at 3:55 AM, KerikBalm said:

Should we refer to the scale of the implications? who is implicated? or should the discussion be limited based on whether the science is settled or not, since unsettled science could result in "blame" that ultimately is not borne out by conclusive evidence?

Those are great framing questions, and it's understandable that you may want to try to nail this down to get objective rules for deciding.  However... as good as they are, these are actually not (very) pertinent to how we moderators make our decision.  They're the wrong questions.  They're good ones, it's just that this isn't how we decide.

As moderators, our decision isn't based on the science, or the politics, for the most part.  It's based on our understanding of how the KSP community will react.

Basically any topic can be categorized as a level of "fire danger":

• Green (vast majority of topics):  No particular reason to think it's any problem at all, just let people say whatever they want to.
• Yellow (small minority of topics):  Potentially dangerous, has a pretty good chance to blow up, but maybe people can be trusted to keep their act together and stay civil and not have hissy fits over it.  We keep an eye on it and are ready to step in if problems actually pop up, but otherwise stay hands off.
• Red (tiny minority of topics):  So incendiary that our experience tells us that it's going to blow up, so there's no point in waiting for it to actually do so.  Step in proactively and shut it down.

We'd love to let people discuss any topic-- regardless of the scale of the implications, who is implicated, or whether the science is "settled" or not.

However, we've found that certain topics are just like waving a red flag in front of the metaphorical bull.

So the answer to the question of "what is allowed" is this:

We disallow a discussion when the community demonstrates that they can't be trusted to discuss it responsibly.

 

Yes, I realize that may be profoundly unsatisfying.  "What?!  You mean there's this totally worthwhile topic, that there's no a priori reason why I shouldn't discuss it, and the only reason I can't is because other unreasonable people are going to get mad about it?"

Yes.  Exactly.  Rem acu tetigisti.  You have nailed it precisely.

Because it all ties back to the Prime Directive, and whether discussion can proceed without a whole bunch of yelling.  Occasionally, we're so sure that something's going to blow up that we'll just shut it down immediately when it pops up (e.g. a discussion of the political merits of a particular candidate or party).  More often, we'll adopt a "wait and see" attitude to a particular thread, and only step in after the members of the discussion have demonstrated that they can't be trusted to handle that topic anymore.  It's a "this is why we can't have nice things" scenario.

For example, take the coronavirus thread, which is the one people have been tiptoeing around in this thread up to this point.  Coronavirus is, of course, a pretty important topic, and we'd love to let people discuss it ad infinitum.  We did, in fact, allow it to go on for well over a year, and around 2000 posts.  For most of that time, it appeared that the community could handle it, so it stayed open (even though it did need some moderator attention from time to time).  Recently, however, the thread had been going in directions that were more problematic, and so after a lengthy discussion and review process among the team, we finally decided that the thread needed to be closed, because the benefit it brought to the community was becoming outweighed by the negative side effects.

(And, lest someone go haring off to the thread right now to see the last few pages to try to follow our judgment-- please do remember that there's also plenty of previously removed content that you don't see, but we do.  So, for privacy reasons, we can't really discuss the specific details of what finally pushed the thread over the line, beyond what we've already publicly posted.  So let's please not speculate about that here, it would be off-topic for this thread.)

 

 

[wumpus]

When Science and politics meet, where is the line between investigation & evidence vs politics and casting blame?

When something fails, it becomes a battle of casting blame.

If all you wanted was investigation and evidence, you wouldn't invite the politicians.  Truth doesn't help them, only what benefits their faction.

And don't expect scientists and/or engineers to be all that beholden to evidence either, CYA engineering becomes second nature as engineers get seasoned: anything that has something that appears to be a point of failure (and the opposing faction can conveniently ignore why it that failure almost certainly isn't the cause).  I'm not familiar with scientists, but in academics expect the politics to be worse than Congress, and even those in government or only mostly in industry  still need to keep those grants coming.  And those investigating you may well be competing for those grants.

Occasionally the investigation is thorough enough that no amount of casting blame around can provide cover: see Apollo 1 and Challenger.  But don't expect human attention to last that long without a strong reason, and make sure your designs not only hold up to physical laws, but look good to committees as well (a smart engineer has prepared for a design review as if it was an investigation for a fatal accident.  Nothing for the committee to attack.  If worst comes to worst, it may be such an investigation.  Let someone else who wasn't as careful in their design take the blame).

Edited June 8, 2021 by wumpus
s/and/hold, and footnote.