Daily Nebraskan
Wednesday, April 6, 1983
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LisM of scientific ivmh
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(DJninrainniecQJ ioy ultio seeixeirs
In the 17th century, Rene Descartes
wanted to find a "method of rightly con
ducting the reason and discovering truth in
the sciences." Since then, the "scientific
method" has reigned as the closest we
measly human beinss can come to finding
"truth."
Lately, however, there have been a num
ber of controversies in the scientific com
munity that call into question this scienti
fic method as used by certain individuals.
It appears that what science tells us may
not always be so "true" after all.
The most widely discussed of the con
troversies involves antliropologist Derek
Freeman and his book "Margaret Mead and
Samoa: The Making and Unmaking of an
Antliropological Myth."
In his book, Freeman attempts to show
that Mead's most famous book, "Coming
of Age in Samoa," is, in his words, "as
tronomically wrong."
Mead's book is based on nine months of
study in Samoa in 1925 and 1926. The
book is filled with her observations that
the Samoan people are very relaxed and
casual about family relationships and sex.
This carefree attitude, Mead believed,
has made the Samoans better adjusted than
people of Western cultures, where guilt
and tension among families and sexual
partners are very common.
Freeman has spent more than six years
in Samoa and claims that Mead wrote a
very inaccurate account of Samoan cul
ture because of faulty research methods.
Mead, who died four years ago, could not
be reached for comment.
Freeman's view of Samoan culture is
quite different from Mead's. In his eyes,
sexual tension, rape, violence and jealousy
run rampant in the culture.
This conflict is very important when
one considers the impact that Mead's re
search has had on American society. It is
largely due to work like hers that educa
tion and child-raising in America have be
come much less structured and authoritar
ian in the last few decades.
It is startling to ponder that some of the
research that motivated such vast changes
in our culture may inordinately have been
influenced by the opinions of a researcher
and by the weakness of her methods.
There is another anthropologist who is
involved in a struggle with his colleagues,
and tliis one is alive to see his methods
questioned. Anthropologist Steven Mosh
er was recently dismissed from the depart
ment of anthropology at Stanford Univer
sity.
The reason for Mosher's dismissal in
volves some doctoral research he did in a
rural Cluncse village. During his stay there,
Mosher made some troubling observations,
including abortions forced on women up to
nine months pregnant as a means of birth
control.
In an attempt to draw attention to what
he felt was a seiious problem, Mosher pub
lished his findings in a popular magazine in
Taiwan. The Chinese government protest
ed, and Mosher was dismissed from Stan
ford for unprofessional behavior.
The Chinese government has since
sharply reduced the number of social sci
entists allowed in the country. Political
concerns have stepped into the scientific
realm and obscured our view of the
"truth."
Yet another conflict involved Dr. John
Darsee. Darsee had achieved success after
success in the field of medical research un
til, just after he had been offered an ap
pointment to Harvard Medical School's
faculty, it was discovered in 19S1 that
some of the data collected in his research
had been faked.
Darsee had cheated on research tests
ranging from measuring the effect of drugs
used to treat heart attacks to testing the
effects of radioactive substances on dogs.
It was discovered that the dogs in the lat
ter test were never exposed to the sub
stance. Thus, all the published results were
lies.
According to Time magazine, similar
cases of scientific fraud have appeared at
other research facilities at Yale, Cornell
and Boston University.
Some, scientists feel that the intense
pressure on scientists to continually pro
duce new research may be the reason for
Darsee's transgressions.
In other words, we have cases where
the collection of scientific knowledge has
been influenced by the personality of the
scientist, by the political restrictions on
the area under observation and by the
pressures of the scientific world itself.
This is not meant to say that now we
can't trust science anymore than we can
trust anything else as a source of "truth."
The continual rigors of testing hypotheses
are still the most effective way of weeding
out inaccuracies and falsities.
But no place is safe from the possibil
ity of error or dishonesty. The mists of hu
man frailty seep into the farthest corners.
Sorry, Rene, but it had to be said.
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tmaamutk aMaW. Mini inn i m
We need to realize that the finality of
the scientific research that will be added to
the knowledge humankind lias accumulat
ed rests as much with the integrity of the
scientist as it does with the "truth" he
hopes to find.
- David Thompson
Letter I
Policy J I
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Real heroes iraoiraejMeinrfl: Dim a wmld ilmt mieecfe them
Martin Luther King Jr. was shot and killed 15 years
ago Monday. A high-powered rifle picked him off a motel
balcony while he was in Memphis, Tenn., supporting a
sanitation workers' strike. In the weeks that followed,
cities around the country exploded into rioting and racial
violence out of grief, anger, frustration. King, one of
" - !
Dave Milo
Mumgaard
history's staunchest advocates of non-violence, was
"blessed" with a violent ending.
I don't remember all this very well, yet I do remember
leafing through LIFE magazine and seeing the famous
picture of the balcony assassination, the burning cities,
the funeral with everyone dressed in black. These scenes
swim in and out of my mind with those of Bobby
Kennedy's assassination two months later. I remember
this better because my mother woke all of us kids,
gathered us around the TV set, and had us watch the news
of the violence which man can impress upon man. I
still can see Kennedy lying on the hotel kitchen floor,
bleeding, with confusion reigning about him.
The reason I remember more about Kennedy's death
than King's is simple: I'm white. King was a black man
fighting for people's rights, and I knew, even though I
was only 7, I already had mine. Even today, I cannot
totally empathize with blacks and other minorities for the
same simple reason: when you're not it, you don't know
what it's like.
But I do know what a hero is, and I do know what
inspiration is. I can recognize that euphoric feeling when
my spine feels as if little fingers are dancing up and down
it: my face flushes and I can feel hot tears welling up in
my eyes. I know what it means when I take my fist and
hit it into my other hand, and lowly but firmly say
"yes!" I still feel this way whenever I hear King's recorded
speeches, when he says strongly "I have a dream," or
when he states "I've been to the mountaintop!" and
especially when he cries out "Free atjast, free at last,
thank God almighty, I'm free at last!"
King was a genuine hero. He was also a genuine
Christian who believed that social protest, when people
are being wrongly mistreated, is thoroughly compatible
with Christian doctrine. Yet, and not so surprisingly, the
FBI went to great lengths to try to brand him a
Communist.
As people lament almost continually, our society has
no heroes today. In almost universal agreement, people
feel we need heroes, but some people's ideas as to what
constitutes a hero are totally wrong. Astronauts, for
instance, aren't heroes. They're just baldly brave, thrill-
seeking adventurers, businessmen aren't heroes,
because much of what they do verges on immorality.
Military leaders, as in the Eisenhower vein, cannot be
heroes, since all they do is push papers and lives; and as
for those who in a war save other people's lives, they're
just heroes by necessity: the war shouldn't have been
fought in the first place. Politicians are least able to be
heroes, since most seek only glory and have limited
concern about less advantaged people's lives. A perfect
example of this is Ron Reagan, who once said that "the
time has come to stop being our brother's keeper and
start being his brother - and I think he'll keep himself."
Martin Luther King Jr. devoted and gave his life not
just fpr racial equality but for justice for all people. He
not only cared about blacks, but the poor and the op
pressed as well. How sad he would probably be if he
came back today and saw the Chicago mayoral race, with
a white Republican inching up in the polls on a black
Democrat simply because of racial prejudice. How sad
he would be to see that black teenagers today have a 60
percent unemployment rate, while the entire 'nation
reels from 10.3 percent unemployment. How sad he
would be to see that today, we have no heroes inspiring
the people to cast aside prejudice and ambition to work
together for a better society. Fifteen years hav? passed,
and we still stand in the stench of an unjust world.
But maybe if we all just hang on to that dream . . .
