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Comment by ekianjo | Hacker News Reader

The article points this out at the end, but the reason is clear: because scientists are supposed to be pragmatic, not ideology-driven. Therefore, in a bi-party political world like the US, it would be difficult for them to fit in, in terms of policies. Most of the policies (on either side) are not evidence-based and actually have counter-productive effects in the long run (Charles Murray explained this through several cases, for example, in his book "Losing Ground").

However I am not sure about how relevant it is for the Singaporean examples to have had "scientific background". If you do not work in the actual science field and never used it, your background is worthless. If your everyday occupation is to gather support to get elected, I question the validity of the term "Scientist" in this case.

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Nobody who has worked in academia would claim that scientists are somehow "more pragmatic". Capricious, scheming, vindictive... just like the rest of the population :)

Plus the fact that scientists are typically paid by tax payers', in a stable governmental position (at least in Europe), and many never held any real job in their whole lives, only adds to my doubts.

Not all scientists are government-employed. It may be a majority in some countries, but I would not disregard the amount of scientists employed in the private industries as well. They may not be involved in fundamental research, rather "applied sciences", but they are scientists nonetheless. Anyone who produces data through experimentation, analyses it, uses critical judgment and appropriate tools to make evidence-based decisions is basically, in my eyes, a "scientist", no matter the exact field of work.

Regarding your first point, the scientists who are not pragmatic will take severe hits to their reputations down the road. Data and methodology is what matters, not personal opinion.

'Anyone who [...] uses critical judgment and appropriate tools to make evidence-based decisions'

Except for the experimentation part, that could describe a lawyer. Which begs the question,

Where does it go wrong?

Why do people from an evidence-based career become embroiled in the kind of back[stabbing/scratching] politics that seems to be the norm today? And how can it be fixed?

Experimentation is mandatory to conduct Science. You need to be able to form theories or hypotheses from data or observation, and then conduct a controlled experiment to validate your point. There can be no science without validation and repeatability.

Heh. We are definitely just as vindictive and scheming as anybody else, I'll admit. The thing is, though, that our worldview is based on evidence. No matter how vicious the funding committee meetings get, we are expected to have rational arguments for all of our claims and we are expected to back up our arguments with factual, tested evidence.

We may sink as low as anybody else, rhetorically speaking, but when we choose to we can do a lot better than the average person.

We have a lot of career politicians here as well who only worked in their respective parties usually starting in the youth organizations and then working their way up the ranks.

I'm curious though what you consider a to be "real" job.

I don't think it's too unreasonable to expect the minister for health, say, to have had a successful career working as a doctor in a hospital before entering politics, for the chancellor to have succeeded in business, for the defence minister to be a decorated soldier, etc etc.

There are numerous examples of politicians who have the matching formal education but make horrible politics irregardless. Here in Germany the minister of health was a physician and despite that he mostly was a lobbyist for the pharma industry (among other wrongdoings) and many of his decisions actually worsened the situation of regular patients. We also had lawyers in the ministry of justice who without blinking an eye issued laws which later were proven illegal by the high court. From a politician I expect a clear political vision and use expert knowledge to find the best way to achieve these goals. The necessary expertise can be acquired by, uh, experts which has to be done most often anyway as the minister himself does not usually have the time or specialization to deal with specific complex issues. What I expect from a minister though is to make a wise selection of experts he draws knowledge from and still make the final call whether he will follow the recommendations.

I disagree though. Merely having a PhD in the science field would change the (future) politician's worldview - from how to view data (you gotta admit it, if more US politicians were scientifically literate, they'd be less likely to claim climate change is false) to basic skepticism.

Having work done in the field of science, imo, is a plus

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