Fever
4th March 2010
Get yourself in the mood . . .
Persuasion loves the heat.
Uncertainty? Fear? Confusion? Peitho lights up, “Is someone calling my name?” The Ancient Attendant prepares for affairs of the heart or affairs of the state. It’s all the same, you know.
Science loves the light.
Uncertainty? Fear? Confusion? Galileo smiles, returns to the lab and breaks the problem down, step by step until knowledge replaces ignorance.
Except today. Science has a new companion, Persuasion. And Science won’t go anywhere without Her, especially in Public.
. . . perhaps Fever at a higher pitch . . .
Need Persuasion for the Science of Health Care Reform? Let me show you how to spend one trillion dollars to reduce mortality by 1% and make people think we’ve Fixed It.
Need Persuasion for the Science of the FDA? Let me show you how mandatory menu calories counts will produce a 30 calorie reduction and fool people into thinking it is the End of Obesity as We Know It.
Need Persuasion for the Science of Global Warming? Here’s how you hide statistically insignificant data in a pretty chart to convince the People.
Need Persuasion for the Science of Selling News? Here’s how you market Science to people so they get all that great knowledge you’d have to suffer through in lectures, labs, and libraries, but without that annoying peer review.
. . . or Fever with the King . . .
Great times for Peitho, my friends, and it’s only going to get better. The last time Science came courting like this was during the Clinton Administration. Democrats are smart people in case you haven’t talked with one lately. You don’t even have to ask; they’ll tell. Especially the progressive ones. You know, the ones that use Science to inform Policy. Here, it’s good for you. Trust us. We’re smart.
Peitho loves them the best. Progressives don’t mind throwing Science overboard in a storm when you need to lighten the load. Is the data messy, complicated, and inconsistent? Pitch it and use this simple chart. Results disconfirm the original hypothesis? Let me adjustment myself in private and we’ll call it Post Hoc. Got folks who disagree? Frame them as Deniers.
Don’t worry about the Science. Persuasion will fix that.
. . . that’s all there is . . .