Is scientific "consensus" worthless: Jeffery Epstein as a Darwinist patron

A little unpleasant, but an interesting comment on the state of science culture today:

From https://evolutionnews.org/2019/09/jeffre...cientists/:

"The scientific scandal involving pedophile Jeffery Epstein is horrifying, but it’s vital that we understand the real meaning of the collaboration between Epstein and the science elites. The most important meaning in that partnership between Epstein and leading Darwinists and computer scientists isn’t in the depravity of the man and his elite scientific friends. The most important meaning is in the silence in the scientific community in the midst of this atrocity. It is, I believe, a revelation about our scientific culture and particularly about the trust we should place in a “science consensus” that should shake us to our bones. It is what didn’t happen in the Epstein story, even more than what did happen, that reveals the most. 

What didn’t happen is this: there was no dissent in the scientific profession about taking guidance and money from a convicted pedophile who was obviously trafficking children for sex. Not a word. At every stage of this repellant saga, from Epstein’s early forays into scientific patronage twenty years ago through his conviction for child prostitution in 2008 to his largesse as a patron of elite Darwinists and computer scientists at MIT, Harvard, the Santa Fe Institute, the transhumanist project Humanity Plus, and many others in the decade that followed, there was, from the scientific community, abject silence."

No dissent, which is enforced by threat of instant loss of grant funding and career suicide. I suppose the easy rationalization was that absolutely any source of funding, no matter how repellent, was justified by the urgent need to support research advancing the consensus "truth".

This is the lesson from the Epstein scandal. Scientists are first and foremost devoted to their own professional survival, and they will toe any line to survive. They will lie, cheat, and steal for professional security. They will even tacitly endorse child rape and child sex trafficking — and personally profit from it — to avoid the professional abyss. Science is conducted under a code of omertà. Dissent is punished, mercilessly. 

As a measure of scientific (and moral) truth, scientific “consensus” is worthless."

What a lot of offensive rubbish.

Good to see you engaging in a discussion.

Has Evolution News released a list of its donors?

And to the extent its membership and donors belong to religions that have funded themselves through questionable means across the breadth of history, it seems questionable for them to call out the color of the kettle so to speak.

That said, arguable hypocrisy doesn't invalidate an argument. However it isn't clear why the claims in the article would invalidate the entire conception of a scientific consensus.

See, only the first half of the thread title appears when looking at the main page, and I got excited - earlier this year, there was an article in the Guardian quoting a respected scientist arguing for less consensus and more taking risks on "lone genius" figures, that I found very interesting at the time but never thought to save, and can no longer find. I'd hoped this thread was in reference to that.   (Anyone who knows what I'm talking about and has a link, please feel free to share it!)

In any event - that a number of people should have, at the very least, known better about Epstein is obvious, but this is a ramble of an article, short on evidence that the Epstein scandal has any bearing on "scientific consensus" as that term is usually understood.

Just as we seem to depend on investigative journalism to help us keep government in our service, perhaps we also need science writers to help us keep science in our service.

It has become evident from my own experience with parapsychologists that members of the science community cannot or will not police themselves. Considering the public funds that go into the education of academics, often in support of their research, it seems reasonable for the public to expect a little accountability.

Good to see you engaging in a discussion.

Obviously, it's an attempt to attack the scientific world as a whole on the quite spurious grounds that some scientists accepted funding from a particular person. And that there was a "scientific consensus" in favour of keeping quiet about it (?!?). And that therefore if there's a scientific consensus about any other matter it is valueless. What sense does that make?

Another person who apparently had some kind of relationship with Epstein was Roger Penrose. Does that mean that we should dismiss Orch OR - or unconventional theories of consciousness as a whole?

And then we have a conspiracy theory about scientists knowing that "Darwinism" is wrong, but persecuting anyone who says so.

Sorry, but I just get sick of reading this kind of anti-science drivel. People should just make the scientific argument. This kind of thing just sounds desperate, and weakens any case they may have.

See, only the first half of the thread title appears when looking at the main page, and I got excited - earlier this year, there was an article in the Guardian quoting a respected scientist arguing for less consensus and more taking risks on "lone genius" figures, that I found very interesting at the time but never thought to save, and can no longer find. I'd hoped this thread was in reference to that.   (Anyone who knows what I'm talking about and has a link, please feel free to share it!)

Is this it?
https://psiencequest.net/forums/thread-r...e-geniuses

Is this it?
https://psiencequest.net/forums/thread-r...e-geniuses

That's the one! And it seems I even commented at the time - really should've remembered that, then...

Argument is incoherent. If the author really cared they could shoot some of these supposed hivemind scientists emails asking their thoughts about Epsteins philanthropy.