ACI versus EPA: What happens when you put non-scientists in charge of science issues

The EPA was previously allowing fly ash to be used as fill for road embankments.The GOP just voted to let fly ash be treated as routine municipal trash.You think others are too far away from the issue.I think you are too close. I don't think we should lie, whether by omission or commission, in the name of a greater or more pragmatic truth. Ever.Edited by Omnivorous, : +,

So you think the EPA categorization of fly ash as hazardous waste is an attempt to undermine the legitimacy of science?

Fine.No, I don't approve of the sticker, because it singles out a specific set of scientific findings as requiring a caution label urging critical regard because of the sticker proponents' ideological interests. The content is accurate, but in the context of singling out evolution for the disclaimer, it is false.You, similarly, though inversely, are singling out a hazardous waste for not-labeling because of your own professional interests. It is you, not I, who is endorsing the disclaimer sticker by emulating it.Your example--the label--while true, is applied with the intent to subvert the truth through its prejudicial application, as though evolution required special scrutiny.The truthful labeling of fly ash, on the other hand, does not represent an inversion of the normal and accurate labeling of other hazardous waste.Now you answer my question.

Note that after insisting that I answer your question first, you failed to answer mine.I thought my objection was clear.Let's suppose that the congregation of the local Baptist church doesn't like Bob for some reason--maybe he's the village atheist. In this village, folks have updated the ancient practice of branding dangerous miscreants, using name tags instead.So the Baptists want Bob to wear a name tag that says, "Caution! My name is Bob. I'm a human being, and human beings commit rape and pillage."All that is true. But the law requires no other human being in the village to wear that tag. Long-time villagers know that the Baptists have an ax to grind, but visitors and new residents would think they need to watch Bob closely because he is prone to rape and pillage.Bill, on the other hand, is a dangerous person, known to poison his neighbors. But, oddly enough, he's good with herbs and potions, and the village apothecaries like to employ him.Most of the village wants him to wear the caution tag, but the apothecary folks oppose it, because they think customers might be frightened away by the tag. Other folks who have been poisoned by Bill say, well, that's a shame--but the bastard poisons people, and he has to wear the tag.The Baptists want to tag one human being with a caution that applies to all human beings because they don't like him, knowing that tag will cause others to question his trustworthiness unjustly. They want to use a selective citation of a general truth to create a false impression. Since Bob is, in fact. no more likely to rape and pillage than any other villager, I think they are wrong.The apothecaries want to exempt a poisoner from wearing a caution tag because he is useful to both them and the broader community, knowing that tag will cause others to question his trustworthiness and make it harder to employ him. Since Bill presents a danger to others, and by village law other dangerous people are tagged, I think they are wrong.Both the Baptists and the apothecaries want to abuse the truth for their own ends--the former with selective speech, the latter with selective silence. Both camps think they have good reasons. Both camps are wrong. Supporting truth is a simple stand, not a simple-minded one.As I pointed out before, you are trying to use the same tactic as the creationists who wrote the evolution disclaimer. If the disclaimer were "completely true," it would appear at the front of every textbook.But you knew that. You're trying to make the matter ambiguous as a rhetorical tactic--accusing me of hypocrisy in my high regard for the truth in order to undermine my argument in support of the EPA. You're abusing the truth to defend abusing the truth.

Good.Now answer the question.