Group 5: We misidentified the metal as Iron, when it is in fact Zinc. This occurred because we calculated the volume incorrectly which thereby translated to the wrong density. In addition, we observed that the metal did not melt. Our metal also fell apart onto the table which could have been a sign of possible meltage. As for our mineral, we believed that it was quartz, when it was actually Fluorite. We did not believe it had dissolved into the test tube; however, it in fact was slightly soluble. The largest error we made, which would have helped us determine correctly what the quartz and the metal were, was incorrectly calculating the density. If we would have done this part correctly, we likely would have determined the correct mystery materials.
Group 4
ReplyDeleteAs a group we discussed how politics can enter their way into science. We also discussed the extreme lengths that people are willing to go with or without evidence to necessarily back up their claims and how this compromises the integrity of their work. As a result of this scandal we agreed that people are now less likely to believe science, because they view scientists as biased and unable to reach a consensus. This scandal has impacted political beliefs regarding climate change and further polarized the public, making it more difficult to come up with policy solutions to climate change.
Group 6: Climategate
ReplyDeleteThe main factor that struck us about climategate was the way in which it affected public opinion. Public opinion is one of the most important determinants in policy, because it determines who gets elected to positions that make decisions regarding issues such as climate change. Although the emails themselves were not considered ‘scientific fraud’, the way in which they were misconstrued and taken out of context still caused a large amount of media attention to be drawn to the issue. Regardless of what the truth is, sometimes this type of media attention detracts from the perceived credibility of science on behalf of the public, because when there is a constant back and forth argument over issues like climate change, people start to become more and more apathetic. When this occurs, there is not as much political mobilization, which means that public opinion will have less influence on policy that actually will help to prevent climate change from occurring.
The Freedom of Information Act tries to ensure completely transparency to the public about government agency knowledge, so people may be better informed citizens. Scientists should be completely transparent about their work, like the FOIA, because this will prevent opposition with political agendas from being able to use out of context information against science.
The key factors that contribute to climate gate are scientific legitimacy. It led to public awareness of climate change and it rose to question the legitimacy of peer review. Peer review is an important aspect of the scientific field. Having a discussion around the scientific consensus and including the opposite view gives a holistic view on the issue.
ReplyDeleteThe Freedom of Information Act is relevant to the climate gate because it will allow for information to be accessible to the public. This will allow individuals to make their conclusion of the issues because they will have access to the information. In the case of climate gate, having the information leaked led to a lot distrust in climate change scientists, but it hopefully will also change the relationship between the scientists and the public.
Group 1: Samone Parker-Watson, James Dean Vaillancourt, Hannah Robertson
ReplyDeleteOur group was alarmed by how easy it was for people to misconstrue information and create a massive smear campaign against one of the most pressing issues of our time and have it actually work. It is alarming because citizens rely on the media to synthesize a lot of complex ideas into something they can understand, and scandals like Climategate can create issues when it comes to making public policy and other ways of addressing the issue. If the conversation gets skewed to a place where we are arguing about whether or not climate change actually exists, like those who released the stolen data want, then we will never actually get to a point of solving the problem.
The Freedom of Information Act is incredibly important to the fight of climate change because it gives concerned citizens a tool to hold government and scientists accountable and what they are actually doing to solve the problem. People need to see the truth to make sure the public opinion isn't being swayed by inaccurate information and nothing is being covered up.