A Scientific Change in Direction?

"Our national policies will not be revoked or modified, even for scientists." Adolf Hitler

I wrote a piece a while back comparing Nazi science minister Bernhard Rust and Christian Paradis, both of whom controlled any messages, pertaining to scientific research.

Gary Goodyear made a feel good announcement yesterday at Queen's University with the promise of a $30 million investment in research.

This just happened to coincide with another announcement that 50 staff members at Environment Canada, "including scientists and scientific support staff", were given their lay off notices.

What does it mean when Gary Goodyear, our science minister who doesn't believe in science, is pledging millions for scientific research, on the same day that we lose 50 scientists?

For the answer to that question, we can turn to a piece written by Laura Beach, and published on The Mark: The Militarization of Canada's Universities

Beach argues that most research at universities is now conducted to bolster " the “military industrial complex” within the university sphere."

A significant portion of federal funding to Canadian universities now flows through “matching funds” projects where industry and government share financial investment.

The Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) and the Networks of Centres of Excellence both participate in “matching funds” projects, favouring research that has direct applications in private industry. It is within this context that the influence of the military has become so pervasive in universities across the country.

Goodyear's announcement specifically mentions NSERC as one of the partners in the new research grant, and NSERC conducts research for the Department of National Defence.

The other area that is receiving research funding is Ultra Large Scale Software This is a system being developed for the U.S. Defense Department:

The U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) has a goal of information dominance—to achieve and exploit superior collection, fusion, analysis, and use of information to meet mission objectives. This goal depends on increasingly complex systems characterized by thousands of platforms, sensors, decision nodes, weapons, and war fighters connected through heterogeneous wired and wireless networks. These systems will push far beyond the size of today’s systems and systems of systems by every measure. They will be ultra-large, network-centric, real-time, cyber-physical, social systems that support a landscape of information-sharing constraints and must be adaptable and robust in extreme environments, and be sustainable legally, technically, and politically.

And if these three, seemingly unrelated stories, don't help to define Harper's change in direction, when it comes to scientific research, another might make you want to pay attention.

To further our own "military industrial complex", the government has just announced that they will be creating seven new operational bases around the world: Kuwait, Germany, Senegal, Kenya, Singapore, South Korea and Jamaica.

This while Libya is being blasted back to the stone age with the promise of more to come.

So now it makes perfect sense for Christian Paradis to filter information on government funded, scientific research.

And a joke from Time magazine, in a 1933 piece:

Two Germans were eyeing a burly lout in the Nazi uniform who was striding through a university hall. First man: "What is the policeman doing here?" Second man: "Sh, sh. That is the man selected to succeed Einstein."

Can you hear me now?

Is Christian Paradis Travelling Through History With Bernhard Rust?

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

Two Germans were eyeing a burly lout in the Nazi uniform who was striding through a university hall. First man: "What is the policeman doing here?" Second man: "Sh, sh. That is the man selected to succeed Einstein."

That joke was published in a 1933 Time Magazine, as part of a story entitled 'Science: Jews Without Jobs':

Two German-Jewish winners of Nobel Prizes were without jobs last week. Both are full of years and distinction. Dr. James Franck, 51, was a professor at Gottingen University. He won his Prize in 1925, for experimental physics. Professor Fritz Haber, 64, was director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Physical & Electrical Chemistry in Berlin. He invented the important synthesis of atmospheric nitrogen and hydrogen into ammonia which supplied Germany with explosives and fertilizers during the War. Like Nobel Laureate Albert Einstein, Laureates Haber and Franck resigned their German jobs to avoid Adolf Hitler's white pogrom. (1)

Since coming to power 4 1/2 years ago, Stephen Harper has also been engaged in a "white" extermination of knowledge, especially scientific.

So while recent news has revealed that Canadian scientists have now had their muzzles tightened even further by Stephen Harper and his faithful officer, Christian Paradis; it should not be surprising to anyone.

However, it should be extremely alarming to everyone.

Now I know that Dimitri Soudas will immediately cry foul, suggesting that I'm comparing this latest attack on science to the extermination of six million Jews, but this was 1933, when Time assumed that the Holocaust would be benign, and limited to loss of rights.

But it was a period when the Nazis were trying to centralize power, or as Hitler's science/education minister Bernhard Rust remarked, "The whole function of education is to create Nazis."

Besides, Ezra Levant has accused the wonderful Margaret Atwood of collaborating with Al-Qaeda, so the bar has been set pretty low. And in the case of attacks on the scientific communities, then and now, the facts speak for themselves.

Time Travellers

"Our national policies will not be revoked or modified, even for scientists." Adolf Hitler

Christian Paradis is not a scientist. His degree is in corporate law. And yet:

Natural Resources Canada scientists were told this spring they need “pre-approval” from Minister Christian Paradis’ office to speak with national and international journalists. Their “media lines” also need ministerial approval, say documents obtained by Postmedia News through access-to-information legislation. The documents say the “new” rules went into force in March and reveal how they apply to not only to contentious issues including the oilsands, but benign subjects such as floods that occurred 13,000 years ago.

They also give a glimpse of how Canadians are being cut off from scientists whose work is financed by taxpayers, critics say, and is often of significant public interest — be it about fish stocks, genetically modified crops or mercury pollution in the Athabasca River. “It’s Orwellian,” says Andrew Weaver, a climatologist at University of Victoria. The public, he says, has a right to know what federal scientists are discovering and learning. (2)

Bernhard Rust was not a scientist. His degrees were in linguistics and philosophy, and yet:

World great is Max Planck because he conceived the quantum theory, an exploit of pure science. Last week he listened with other German scientists in smoky Diisseldorf to Nazi Minister of Science, Art and Education Dr. Bernhard Rust, who felt called upon to deny that Hitlerism is hostile to Science.

"We are not! Nein!" cried Nazi Rust, "but we do not believe in Science divorced from the people. Nein! They are false scientists who believe that scientific life of a higher order can exist for itself alone while questions of the day are solved somewhere in the lower regions." (3)

So why does this matter? Lets hear the rest of the story of Nobel Prize winning physicist Max Planck:

That night Max Planck's scientific peers made him feel that he must make a bold reply to Bernhard Rust. Sad-faced Max Planck did not fail Pure Science. Next day at the Congress of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society for Advancement of Science he made what was considered a daring speech indeed. To have praised live Jew Albert Einstein would have been madness, but he did praise dead Jew Heinrich Hertz, discoverer of "Hertzian waves." And bold Max Planck said: "History proves that the greatest and most vital discoveries were made by scientists who worked for the sake of pure science only."

Indulgently Nazi Rust did not crack down on Professor Planck, but as president of the Society Herr Planck dolefully reported that 85 scientists have sent in their resignations and are suffering "economic difficulties" under the Nazi regime.

Same day in Munich, home of dark beer and darker Adolf Hitler. German artists were assured that Hitlerism is not opposed to art by Dr. Paul Joseph Goebbels, Minister of Propaganda & National Enlightenment. "Since National Socialism looks upon itself as the Art of Politics," crowed Cock Goebbels. "it feels a natural kinship with the other arts and artists." (3)

"Arts and artists" ... "scientists"... has a familiar ring, doesn't it?

"We are not! Nein!" cried Stephen Harper.

In another interesting co-incidence:

Citing actions taken by the Conservative government since winning a minority government in 2006, 85 scientists across Canada have signed an open letter to all national party leaders calling on them to state how they will 'improve Canada’s track record' regarding the objectivity of science. This is the second such initiative within the week, the letter on 7 October being signed by 120 scientists.

The scientists signing the latest letter represent hundreds of researchers such as Deans, Department Heads, Research Chairs, and research team leaders. They come from academic fields of Anthropology, Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, Biology, Community Health and Epidemiology, Criminology, Earth & Ocean Sciences, Educational Psychology, Environmental & Engineering Sciences, Land Resource Science, Medicine, Nursing, Philosophy, Physics, Psychiatry, Social Work, and Sociology.

"85 scientists across Canada" ... "Herr Planck dolefully reported that 85 scientists have sent in their resignations." Are we going to let it get that far?

Sources:

1. Science: Jews Without Jobs, Time Magazine, June 05, 1933

2. Ottawa’s media rules muzzling federal scientists, say observers, By Margaret Munro, Postmedia News, September 12, 2010

3. GERMANY: False Planck? Time Magazine, June 18, 1934

4. Canadian scientists protest Harper's attacks on science, Wikinews, October 13, 2008