{"id":2543,"date":"2017-01-27T02:41:13","date_gmt":"2017-01-27T08:41:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.ams.org\/blogonmathblogs\/?p=2543"},"modified":"2017-01-28T17:15:44","modified_gmt":"2017-01-28T23:15:44","slug":"solidarity-with-scientists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ams.org\/blogonmathblogs\/2017\/01\/27\/solidarity-with-scientists\/","title":{"rendered":"Solidarity with Scientists"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mathematics has\u00a0an interesting relationship to science. People often think of mathematicians as a subset of scientists, and scientists definitely use mathematics in their work, but our day-to-day work, careers, and the kinds of problems and thinking that interest us most are often very different. Right now, in the face of an administration that is muzzling scientists<\/span><\/a>, mathematicians need to think about joining forces with scientists to advocate for policies that are important to us as mathematicians\/scientists as well as educators and members of society. In November, I wrote a post about what mathematicians should do now<\/span><\/a> in the wake of the surprising presidential election result. This post is a follow-up, more focused on actions scientists are currently taking. <\/span><\/p>\n

\"A

A marcher carries a pro-science sign at the Utah Women’s March on Monday, January 23, 2017. “What do we want? Evidence based science! When do we want it? After peer review!” Image: Monica Hymas Rasmussen.<\/p><\/div>\n

A few days ago, a group of scientists and science lovers started organizing<\/span><\/a> a March for Science on Washington<\/span><\/a>. There are very few details available so far, but you can follow their blog<\/span><\/a> to stay up-to-date. I hope they take seriously the people, especially black scientists, critiquing the organizers and encouraging them<\/span><\/a> to prioritize intersectionality, diversity, and inclusion. <\/span><\/p>\n

If the word \u201cintersectionality\u201d has you scrambling to find\u00a0the volume of a Steinmetz solid<\/span><\/a>, don\u2019t worry. If there\u2019s one thing mathematicians should be good at, it\u2019s learning new definitions and how they fit into existing contexts. Alycia Mosley Austin<\/span><\/a>, associate director of the Interdisciplinary Neuroscience Program and assistant dean of graduate recruitment and diversity initiatives at the University of Rhode Island, has a post for scientists new to activism<\/span><\/a>, highlighting resources you can use to get up to speed.<\/span><\/p>\n

There are many science-related policies Trump has discussed that cause me alarm, but I believe the absolute most crucial one is climate. Climate change is a pressing, urgent problem. It will impact many areas of our lives: economic stability, infectious disease, social justice, food and water safety. We should oppose efforts to silence scientists<\/span><\/a> speaking about climate change and other important scientific issues. That means scientists at the EPA, NASA, national parks, and other organizations must be able to do research and share information with the public regardless. In response to censorship<\/span><\/a> of their social media accounts, some rogue national park rangers created @altNatParkSer<\/span><\/a> (though they have since given it to people who are not employed by the National Park Service<\/span><\/a>). People from other agencies have followed suit. You can find them all on Alice Stollmeyer\u2019s Twistance<\/span><\/a> list.<\/span><\/p>\n

University of California Riverside mathematician and prolific math and science blogger<\/span><\/a> John Baez has been helping to organize and publicize the Azimuth Climate Data Backup Project<\/span><\/a> to save that important information in the event that government agencies that have collected it are asked to destroy it. He has written about the project in several posts<\/span><\/a> on his blog, starting last December<\/span><\/a>. We can all hope that it is unnecessarily alarmist, but Trump\u2019s first few days have not made me optimistic, and it would truly be devastating to lose that information.<\/span><\/p>\n

It would also be devastating for us to lose the contributions of our Iranian friends and other immigrants and refugees from Muslim countries. Part of why America\u2019s math and science research are so strong is that we attract some of the best mathematicians and scientists from all over the world. Some came as children in refugee families, some came as adults<\/span><\/a> to study or work. While we speak out about clear attacks on science in the form of intimidation at the EPA and national parks, we should also speak out about the threat to science if we lose the contributions of immigrants and refugees as a result of a travel ban on visitors from majority-Muslim countries<\/a>. The National Iranian American Council<\/span><\/a> has more details on the potential executive order, and Scott Aaronson has a blog post<\/span><\/a> elaborating on how terrible this would be. ETA:\u00a0Since I published this post, the executive order has been signed, and it has immediately gone into effect. If you are an academic who opposes it, here is a petition<\/a>\u00a0you can sign.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Since the election, I\u2019ve heard more murmurs than ever from mathematicians and scientists thinking about running for office<\/span><\/a>. As far as I know, there\u2019s only one mathematician in Congress, California representative Jerry McNerney<\/span><\/a>. But the website and blog 314 Action<\/span><\/a>, which aims to help STEM professionals speak to government or run for office, is inviting mathematicians to the party by using the first few (decimal) digits of \u03c0\u2014the math version of the bat signal\u2014in their name. The AAAS congressional fellowship<\/span><\/a>\u00a0is another way for mathematicians and scientists to get involved in politics. Applications open in May, so you\u2019ve got a little time to put yours together. ETA: See Karen Saxe’s comment for more information on these fellowships. The AMS sponsors one that is due February 15.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

I must admit, dear readers, I\u2019m worried, and I don\u2019t really know what to do. I\u2019d rather disengage, cross my fingers and hope nothing bad happens. When I feel like that, I read University of Hawaii at Manoa mathematician Piper Harron\u2019s reminder to Stay Screaming<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mathematics has\u00a0an interesting relationship to science. People often think of mathematicians as a subset of scientists, and scientists definitely use mathematics in their work, but our day-to-day work, careers, and the kinds of problems and thinking that interest us most … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[7,204,658,643,640],"class_list":["post-2543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-events","tag-climate-change","tag-climate-science","tag-immigration","tag-mathematics-in-society","tag-politics"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3tW3N-F1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ams.org\/blogonmathblogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ams.org\/blogonmathblogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ams.org\/blogonmathblogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ams.org\/blogonmathblogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ams.org\/blogonmathblogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2543"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ams.org\/blogonmathblogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2543\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2553,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ams.org\/blogonmathblogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2543\/revisions\/2553"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ams.org\/blogonmathblogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ams.org\/blogonmathblogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2543"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ams.org\/blogonmathblogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}