Senate Advances "Secret Science" Bill, Sets Up Possible Showdown With President 355
sciencehabit writes: Republicans in Congress appear to be headed for a showdown with the White House over controversial "secret science" legislation aimed at changing how the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) uses scientific studies. A deeply divided Senate panel yesterday advanced a bill that would require EPA to craft its policies based only on public data available to outside experts. The House of Representatives has already passed a similar measure. But Democrats and science groups have harshly criticized the approach, and the White House has threatened a veto.
Toad (Score:4, Insightful)
Secret toad controls Congreff. Secret toad has poison webs in its eyes. Secret toad is behind all NATO exercises and World Bank. Secret toad controls air with secret toad poison rays and mind controff.
Why is this even a debate? (Score:5, Insightful)
Making decisions based on research that can't be independently validated or audited is the very definition of junk science. I mean, I know that the pay journals would love to see open access go away, but that's just their flawed business model talking.
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One of the effects of the bill will be to make it impossible to use data from large scale public health studies. The raw data is secret for privacy reasons and for practical purposes impossible to replicate. For example the highly respected Framingham Heart Study has been running since 1948; under the terms of the bill its results couldn't be used in setting policy because the data are simply impossible to replicate.
Re:Why is this even a debate? (Score:5, Informative)
The terms of the bill covers this situation and the results from that study would be allowed.
Re:Why is this even a debate? (Score:5, Informative)
>One of the effects of the bill will be to make it impossible to use data from large scale public health studie
That's not an effect, that's the GOAL. The Republicans have a problem preventing sensible regulations around things like air pollution and climate change backed up by solid scientific research - so they are trying to make the science that backs it up illegal.
Science that is not "secret" by any definition that applies to the scientific method at all - which is why scientists around the US has denounced the bill. There is no problem with reproducability at all.
What does put SOME access restriction on these large public health studies is that, because of when they were done, they were not anonymous. The only "secret" bit about them is confidential patient information. What the republicans want to do is exclude from scientific research all data that is covered by patient privilege.
Which is insane.
Re:Why is this even a debate? (Score:5, Insightful)
EPA is not necessarily a science creating organization, it's a policy creation and enforcement organization. It doesn't necessarily have to have solid science established and well accepted before it is allowed to make regulation. It gets input from many sources, some of which are lies, and then forms a policy. Under some administrations it errs on the side of caution, and with other administrations it errs on the side of profit.
As in, there is evidence that chemical A may cause cancer or is killing off some fisheries. One side wishes that to be enough to limit use of chemical A or to require safety measures against spills. The other side wishes to continue using chemical A until there is absolutely undeniable proof (which will never occur). But the EPA is not creating the science here, instead it is acting in the public's interest based upon existing scientific studies and evidence.
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Making decisions based on research that can't be independently validated or audited is the very definition of junk science.
You do reallze you just included all medical research that respects the confidentiality of human subjects?
Re:Why is this even a debate? (Score:5, Insightful)
I know that is the talking point they've decided to go with, but it simply isn't true. I ran the lab for an 8 center trial covering nearly 9,000 cancer patients. We didn't get any personally identifying data - just a number. (unless the nurse of phlebotomist made a mistake and wrote the patient name on the vial). Our couple-million data points were all tied to a number. The number tied back to a list of data about the patient - not including anything personally identifying.
I can't speak for every research situation, but claiming that medical research requires violations of patient confidentiality is specious. It clearly does not in most cases. I suppose if you were studying something rare like breast cancer among post-operative transgendered males you might run into some difficulties with identities being discoverable, but I don't think that's enough to claim the whole thing to be null and void.
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Re:Why is this even a debate? (Score:4, Informative)
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Citations?
Before we continue — citations?
Imagine, for a second, the evil RethugliKKKans trying to mandate use of open source software by a government agency [slashdot.org] — and Slashdot opposing it...
Re:Why is this even a debate? (Score:5, Insightful)
So cite the parts you find offensive...
Bravo! This sentence alone explains everything about you. Very well put, except for one minor nit: In such context, the word is spelled KKKonservatives. Otherwise perfect.
I do. And one of the requirements for a scientific finding, is that it be reproducible [wikipedia.org].
Don't single out EPA (Score:5, Insightful)
The all-or-nothing fallacy (Score:2, Insightful)
You have to start somewhere.
Even if there is such a bias, what of it? It is not like imposing this rule on the EPA today would prevent imposing it on other departments/agencies later.
Besides, the opponents of the idea do not oppose it on the grounds, that it is not going far enough. Obama is not saying:"I will veto this bill unless the rule covers th
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Re:The all-or-nothing fallacy (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, it is influencing the science.
If you know what they know, you can check the science, if it is bad science, you can correct it. If it is good science, you can improve it. If you cannot improve it, you can accept it and champion it. And when you make your science available to others to do the same, the EPA can then use it too. See how all that influence is possible?
The argument against influencing the science is essentially- stay out of this because we want it to mean what we want it to mean so we can justify doing what we want to do.
Many people will ignore this reality and focus on politics- those evil republicans only want to stop the EPA from doing what we want them to do. To them, it is not about the science, it is about doing what they want the EPA to do.
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Mod up.
Re:The all-or-nothing fallacy (Score:5, Interesting)
Because this is a transparent attempt to rein in the EPA on the grounds of 'science'. Seems OK as a sound bite, doesn't quite work well in the ugly real world. As noted in TFA, there are two major, practical objections:
- The EPA doesn't get enough funding to do all of the studies by themselves. And there seems to be no mechanism in the proposed legislation to fix that little oversight. So it becomes an issue of perfect rather than practical. Sure, it would be best if everything were publicly funded and every bit of data published on the Internet, but it is arguably better if some 'imperfect' data is used rather than the very limited amount of data that is openly published.
- Longitudinal data, by definition, isn't 'repeatable'. You don't get to rewind the tape (if you are unfamiliar with this analogy, look up 'VCR' and similar ancient technology).
The way this bill is crafted makes it perfectly clear that good science is not the goal. Emasculating the EPA is.
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Sure, it would be best if everything were publicly funded and every bit of data published on the Internet, but it is arguably better if some 'imperfect' data is used rather than the very limited amount of data that is openly published.
You're assuming nothing else will change. If this bill goes through, there will be an enormous push to make the private data public, and probably most of it will.
So... you're assuming the worst possible situation based on this change and everything else staying the same.
One might also argue that this change will encourage other changes, and the end result would be better.
I'm in favor of having information publicly available (for all departments, not just the EPA) and the argument about policy being made on
Re:The all-or-nothing fallacy (Score:5, Insightful)
The composition of the toxic cocktail that's used in horizontal fracturing is kept away from the public because it's a "trade secret". Do you believe the EPA should not be able to restrict the high-pressure injection of toxic chemicals into the aquifer because the information isn't "public"?
Or are people going to have to be able to strip paint with their drinking water before they'll be able to find out what's in it? Because freedom?
Look, I'm a big fan of Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning too, but when you have corporations with vested interests in keeping information away from the public, forcing the government to only be able to act on information that's public will only let them run further amok.
Maybe it's because I'm old enough to remember what the Great Lakes were like before the EPA. Gigantic bodies of "fresh" water that are too toxic to support life can really start to sour your opinion on the whole "get the government off corporations' backs" idea.
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The composition of the toxic cocktail that's used in horizontal fracturing is kept away from the public because it's a "trade secret". Do you believe the EPA should not be able to restrict the high-pressure injection of toxic chemicals into the aquifer because the information isn't "public"?
I think the studies that show that whatever is being used is harmful to the public should be public before those studies are used to make laws. The information that has to be public isn't "Company XYZ is using chemical Z", it is the study that says that chemical Z causes harm. Then EPA can ban its use.
Is the problem the use of chemical Z, or that company XYZ is using it? Why isn't is enough to ban Z? Who cares if it is XYZ or QRS, or what the mix they use is?
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Benzene can be a useful substance in certain controlled situations, but it's not safe for people to drink. How does "banning chemical Z if it's harmful" deal with that?
Because the actual regulation wouldn't be "ban benzene", it would be "the MCL for benzene in public drinking water is X ppb", just as the regulations regarding MCL in drinking water are already written. I didn't think you would see a statement about banning chemical Z as a claim that the regulation would say nothing but "ban chemical Z". Sheesh. I thought the context of "toxic chemicals used in fracking" would have been obvious and assumed.
How do you think "Z" gets banned?
By writing a regulation. That regulation doesn't need to say anyth
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Do you believe the EPA should not be able to restrict the high-pressure injection of toxic chemicals into the aquifer because the information isn't "public"?
We agree on many things, but this isn't one of them.
The EPA clearly (at least at present) has jurisdiction over polluted groundwater. That's the kind of thing it was created for.
Industry is not "allowed" to pollute groundwater just because its use of the pollutant is a "trade secret". That's not how it works. This is about the basis of regulations. If the public and "reasonably reproducible" science says (thin air example) isofurans above 20ppb are harmful to health, they can be regulated.
That mean
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My guess - no, my certainty - is that you have not read this law. That you have no idea what's really in the law, or what the law covers and does not cover.
And I am even more certain that YOU have not read it. You talk about trade secrets or banning the words "climate" and things that aren't covered at all. You talk about "previous versions" of this bill that "ban models", yet haven't noticed the implicit acceptance of computer models in 2(3)B(ii). You think that data about a specific company's fracking mix has to be made public before studies that show any of the chemicals in that mix can be banned for use in fracking, and that's just not true.
It should be
Re:The all-or-nothing fallacy (Score:5, Informative)
Well, the Great Lakes were pretty much sludge before the EPA started busting balls, so maybe not so ridiculous after all. You live anywhere near Lake Erie? Southern Lake Michigan? Before the EPA, most American cities were starting to look like downtown Bejing. I remember going to LA in the early '80s and the air was green. Today, you go to LA, and with the same number of cars, the air is actually breathable without mask.
There, that's better.
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- The EPA doesn't get enough funding to do all of the studies by themselves.
The law doesn't require the EPA to do the studies themselves.
Longitudinal data, by definition, isn't 'repeatable'.
The studies that produce data are supposed to be repeatable.
Every time the topic of availability of scientific data comes up, the general cry from slashdot readers is that information ought to be free. Here's that philosophy writ into law. The data that EPA uses to make rules and regulations has to be available online. Why isn't that a good thing, if all data ought to be online anyway?
The way this bill is crafted makes it perfectly clear that good science is not the goal. Emasculating the EPA is.
If EPA is using unpublished, unreviewable data to make deci
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The whole intent is pretty straight forward. They want all of the data public, so that it can be challenged in court, for years, prior to any changes. They will back this up with straight up junk science, not to defeat the real science but simply to bog it down in court. So one legislative change might be based upon hundreds of reports, they will simply cherry pick one report that can most readily be challenged, produce a counter junk science report and then block the legislative change until it is all res
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The whole intent is pretty straight forward. They want all of the data public, so that it can be challenged in court, for years, prior to any changes.
The laws are already challenged in court, for years. It's harder for EPA to win such lawsuits if the data is private, so making it public is a good thing.
They will back this up with straight up junk science,
This law is intended to prevent the use of junk science in regulatory activities. Make it public so it can be reviewed in public.
not to defeat the real science but simply to bog it down in court.
Real science can stand up to scientific scrutiny, so making the science public prior to making laws means it can be scrutinized. Keeping it secret just BEGS for lawsuits since there is otherwise no justification for the laws.
So one legislative change might be based upon hundreds of reports, they will simply cherry pick one report that can most readily be challenged, produce a counter junk science report and then block the legislative change until it is all resolved in court.
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"The way this bill is crafted makes it perfectly clear that good science is not the goal. Emasculating the EPA is."
If making the data the EPA makes policy on available to anybody is emasculig the EPA then the EPA deserves to be emasculated.
We don't have secret laws in this country, how would you know if you've broken one?
Secret science is a hideous idea. We can disagree on how we should handle a situation, that's policy but the fundamental facts of the matter do not improve with secrecy.
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Well, that would completely eliminate a wide variety of potential research avenues. Many scientific studies are only possible because the data is confidential. Medical studies in particular: you really don't want the public to have access to the private medical data which is used in medical studies.
In this specific case, there's a lot of international temperature data that is simply not available publicly, largely due to a variety of local political concerns.
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Medical studies in particular: you really don't want the public to have access to the private medical data which is used in medical studies.
I can not see how this is a valid argument -- of course such data should be anonymized and not traceable to an *individual* patient (this is where privacy kicks in), but it is done in publicly published medical research anyway ("Patient A [not Sam Smith!] was responding to treatment... ").
As to temperature data -- if there is suspicion that it is tainted by "local political concerns" -- should we even consider it to be valid *scientific* data?
Paul B.
Re:Don't single out EPA (Score:5, Insightful)
Except that it's often surprising how easy it is to de-anonymize data. I would definitely not want my medical data made public, even with anonymization, because I know that some clever person may later come up with a way to link my identity to my medical data using a method that the original researchers never considered.
As for temperature data, the nice thing there is that we have independent data sets. For temperature records, for example, we have satellite measurements which are fully public.
In actuality, this restriction would have essentially zero impact on the scientific conclusions: it's just a way to attempt to block action on climate change. People could say, "But hey, some fraction of this data was gleaned from private sources," and use that as an attempt to throw out the whole thing, despite the fact that removing the private data doesn't change the overall conclusion.
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I would definitely not want my medical data made public, even with anonymization, because I know that some clever person may later come up with a way to link my identity to my medical data using a method that the original researchers never considered.
Some poorly-anonymized data can be de-anonymized.
Here's a published result as would be required by law: "Of 1000 individuals with Crohn's Disease, 14% had a 200% increase of HDL levels after a three week exposure to water containing 30ppb As." Please de-anonymize that data. It's sufficient to reproduce the study and verify the results, but you can't determine the names of any of the participants.
People could say, "But hey, some fraction of this data was gleaned from private sources,"
"Gleaned from private sources" is irrelevant. "This data" is. It doesn't matter where the data came from, only
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Stop politicizing Science. It doesn't matter if some people want to use the phrase "some fraction of this data was gle
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you really don't want the public to have access to the private medical data which is used in medical studies.
The law doesn't require public access to private medical data. The law doesn't require publishing the list of people's names and their conditions for a medical study. It requires publishing the process and the results in a way that allows the study to be repeated for verification.
For example, the study using mice that showed that 10ppb As in drinking water harmed "mothers and their offspring" (mouse mothers and baby mice, not humans) didn't have to list the names of the mice, only aggregate numbers.
Well, that would completely eliminate a wide variety of potential research avenues.
No, t
What's the problem? (Score:2)
Re:What's the problem? (Score:5, Interesting)
_
As far as republican backed industry is concerned, anything like health and environmental issues that prevent them from doing whatever the hell they want is bad. The EPA is a big supplier of those things they hate, so if they can cripple the EPA, they get to do more things to make them money, despite it being dangerous to the public health and safety.
So yes, they are trying to pull a fast one by attempting to eliminate as much as they can.
It's kind of like a mafia lawyer trying to get the judge to throw out all witness testimony that is not 1st hand police testimony, or all evidence that has been touched or operated by someone other than a cop. So Uncle Johns being in the room and seeing Vinnie the Slasher cut up the victim gets thrown out, along with the fingerprints from the door because Uncle John used it to run out screaming for the cops, of which he is not one of. And forget witness protection also, you can't hide the names and address of Uncle Johns family either, since that kind of confidential information isn't "transparent" enough...
Again, yes, it's a scam attempting to cloak itself in respectability. (Or more like trying to sneak sarin into the theater by hiding it in an empty first aid kit wrapped in bandages.)
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I'm sure they're trying to pull a fast one of some kind but I admit to not seeing the problem with this idea in general. Shouldn't we want them to be basing policy on publicly available data?
Which would work great in a Communist Country.
In the Capitalist US of A it's not unusual for the best source of data to be somebody's trade secrets. Maybe they're in the business of collecting (and selling) data and they offer scientists a peek for a price, or perhaps they're doing something (say burning different grades of coal in a power plant depending on business needs), and the EPA wants to use a study about it (perhaps the study correlates local air quality to the grade of coal burned). Unless the pow
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In the Capitalist US of A it's not unusual for the best source of data to be somebody's trade secrets.
This law has nothing to do with trade secrets. It says that data used to create rules by the EPA has to be publicly available in a way that can be reproduced.
If the EPA is basing regulations on trade secrets, they are doing it wrong and should be stopped. It would have been amazing to the founding fathers for someone to say "we're making a law against doing something, but we can't tell you why...".
Unless the power-plant company is willing to release reams and reams of data on precisely which load of coal it burned which day into the public domain, that study is based on non-public data.
They don't have to be that precise. And if they've given the data to EPA, then it ought to be public domai
Senator Snowball Inhofe.. (Score:2, Insightful)
PS (Score:5, Insightful)
Shouldn't we want them to be basing policy on publicly available data?
This is an excellent example of how well-crafted political propaganda works. The act of introducing the bill implies the EPA are not already basing policy on publicly available data, opposing the bill implies you want to hide something from the public. Even if the bill fails to pass, it has already succeeded as a propaganda piece.
Make no mistake, this is a far-right attempt to put Science on a short leash.
Re:PS (Score:4, Insightful)
the year is 2015. this is being pushed by republicans. it has the word 'science' in it.
therefore, I already know all I need to know about this.
for some things, you have to think deeply. but not for all things.
does anyone truly and honestly believe the republicans are (these days, at least) pro-science???
(what is that saying about ducks walking and quacking, again?)
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So then the easy way to solve the issue is to make the data publicly available.
But your far-left attempt to ram through big policy initiatives based on secret data is an attempt to put ALL of us on a short leash. I hope you get bitten, to be honest.
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No, it is that it is a MYTH that there even is any "secret data" in the first place.
There is no secret data.
Here, let me google that for you [lmgtfy.com].
Oh there it is, on the very first page:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/data-... [noaa.gov]
http://berkeleyearth.org/sourc... [berkeleyearth.org]
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/ [nasa.gov]
Re:PS (Score:4, Insightful)
Make no mistake, this is a far-right attempt to put Science on a short leash.
It's not an attempt to put Science on a short leash, it's an attempt to limit the EPA. In the USA, Republicans generally don't even pretend to like the EPA, mainly for reasons listed in this article [forbes.com]:
One of the most startling was a rule issued under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act that shut down 150 companies and imposed $100 million in costs to reduce a hypothetical cancer risk that was the equivalent of spending $9 trillion (yes, with a “t”) to avert a single case of cancer. Congress often has helped the EPA squander the taxpayers’ money. It has passed more than 20 environmental laws directing the government to pay the legal fees of green groups that sue the government, even when the government-subsidized plaintiffs would lose. Guaranteed money for suing the government—what a deal!
I have no idea if the claims in the article are accurate or not, I'm just pointed out that those are the reasons Republicans don't like the EPA.
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Theoretically, but I'd sure feel better if it wasn't being pushed by the same party that forbids government scientists from uttering the words, "climate change".
Because whatever you think of the notion of basing public policy on public data, you know this bill was written by lobbyists for the corporations most responsib
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Man, that's weak.
Yes, some of the data in medical studies, like names and addresses, are kept secret. But the study itself, along with the data that shows whatever, is publicly available. Thus, under this bill, the EPA could use that study and the data.
I think this is about climate change and model data. The conservatives aren't in a position to challenge the models because it's a black box, and no one is allowed to see in but a very few scientists and programmers. I can't hate them for wanting to turn the
Regulatory Capture (Score:2, Interesting)
If you're wondering why using "secret" science to regulate various environmental issues is a bad idea:
Researcher A: I've just discovered a substrate that makes solar cells 50% more efficient. This pushes their cost effectiveness to the point of making widespread adoption a no-brainer.
Researcher B, funded by the coal lobby: Hey EPA - this new solar substrate causes birth defects in robins! You can't show the proof to anyone though as it involves a secret process...
EPA: OK, effective immediately this substrat
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EPA: We need to see that study.
Researcher B: Sure, it uses a novel Beysian quantitative analysis based on 3 dimensional heat maps of multivariate data. I'm sure you have a team of domain-specific PhDs to go over the statistical methodology.
EPA: No, we're going to need more evidence...
Researcher B: What's that? I can't hear you over the screaming Greenpeace and Audubon Society protesters. Seriously, you need to do something about this industrial toxin poisoning our biosphere!
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Note that either Researcher A or Researcher B, or even both, could be shoveling manure. If the research is allowed to be kept secret, and the EPA allowed to use it while keeping it secret, either can be either:
1) Suppressing valuable new inventions to protect dying industries, or
2) Promoting stock scams for political allies of the administration.
Or, of course, both at the same time.
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Us Americans are really great at promoting logical theories of how government policy works, but not very good at integrating real world data into that.
Researcher B would have to provide his data to the EPA for that to work, and then when the EPA gets sued by researcher A's company the EPA would be required to show his study to the Court and the plaintiff on strict condition that they reveal no confidential data. If the EPA's BS argument based on a aBS study stands up in Court then all structural protections
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LOL regulatory capture :)
http://grist.org/politics/2011... [grist.org]
Basing decisions on publicly available data? (Score:2)
Basing policy decisions on data that can be peer reviewed -- why would this even be an issue? Isn't this better than "you can't do that, and we won't tell you why" or the nebulous "studies say". What studies? Secret studies. Ok...
If Congress is for it (Score:3, Insightful)
If Congress is for it, it probably isn't science.
"Secret Science" must be their code words for real science.
Re:If Congress is for it (Score:4, Insightful)
An earlier version of this general effort used language that would forbid reference to models in policymaking.
Presumably written by some clown club that doesn't know that models are what science produces. They were transparently trying to outlaw use of the computer models that climate science relies so heavily on. (And other branches of science, but climate science is the branch that's driving corruption^w campaign donations right now.)
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+1 Insightful and I'd kiss you if you were here.
To the rescue! (Score:2)
"and the White House has threatened a veto"
Yes! Our transparency president to the rescue....
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Transparency... what does this have to do with Transparency?
It is called strait forwardness.
Nothing hard to understand about "If this comes to my desk, I will veto it!"
That is as plain spoken as things can get.
How is this a bad thing? (Score:5, Insightful)
Not trying to troll here, just not seeing the other side.
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I RTFA and don't get the controversy.
Are these same republicans also providing additional funds for the EPA to purchase privately held data sets or are they defunding the EPA? Or do the republicans want to use the coercive power of the state to force other people to provide the EPA, gratis, the fruits of their labor?
for instance, as a scientist I may want to purchase a data set for my study. I am not entitled to provide that data set to others. I can document my methods and others can purchase that data set or an equivalent one and run th
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Wouldn't happen.
First, unless it is a prominently accepted safe additive, it would need to seek approval by the FDA in order to be marketed to the public in the first place.
http://www.fda.gov/ForConsumer... [fda.gov]
Second, part of the FDA's role is to study food available to the public not only for human consumption but most animal consumption to maintain certain health guidelines. This is done by "FDA field investigators inspect food companies, examine food shipments from abroad, and collect samples. Laboratory sci
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Suppose some food manufacturer introduces a new additive that increases their production by a large amount. It's in their interest to not get it regulated out of existence, right? So they'll claim that any data from experiments performed to determine the safety of the additive is proprietary. Under the secret science bill, they could then prevent the FDA from even examining the additive to determine its safety...quote>
So the FDA withholds its approval for lack of data, and then competitors point out that their products have FDA approval ...
So what?
For those wondering why this is a bad thing (Score:5, Informative)
Every single study which involves health records would be forbidden to be used, because the RAW data is not available to the public. It's the perfect knot - previous law prevents the release of personally identifiable medical data, and this law makes it illegal to base any regulation on any study for which the raw data (in this case, personally identifiable - as it must be able to be 100% independently verified) is not released to the public.
This is about neutering the EPA's ability to "prove" that any particular pollutant causes harm to humans. If you can't provide the raw data that asbestos has led to lung cancer - patient records going back decades - you aren't allow to regulate it. Black lung? Chromium compounds in drinking water? Sorry, unless you publically release the medical records of every single person in every study you cite, it's "secret data" and junk science.
Re:For those wondering why this is a bad thing (Score:4, Insightful)
This is knee jerk fear mongering.
The bill states that the law wouldn't supersede any statutory requirement (such as protection of PII).
The bill also specifies that the data should be presented so that "substantial reproduction" of the study is possible. It doesn't specify that reproduction needs to be done. It doesn't specify "100% independently verified."
These guys are asking the EPA to follow similar guidelines the FDA imposes on companies in evaluating a new drug or device. The FDA maintains a public database of filings, it's really interesting to go through. The bill is even closer to NIH publication guidelines. This is not just an anti-EPA thing here (granted, I'm sure there's some of that going on), this is getting the EPA in line with other health oriented agencies.
As for de-identification of the government owned part of the data, the Republicans are right. That should take an expert a couple of days, but it does cost money (there are many businesses who specialize in this kind of thing). The CDC doesn't leave money sitting around (I'm kind of shocked they leave PII medical records sitting around though, my company can't do that). They probably just can't pay to de-identify the data, and don't know if they can legally trust a Congressional committee to handle the data properly (probably they can't). So they're stuck without funding. The bill specifies $1M to do this, but given all the government offices involved, that's probably not enough.
Here's the real issue: The government doesn't actually own all the data the EPA is referencing, so the EPA can't publish it or share it. This is all to put pressure on the EPA to ask Harvard and ACS to share the data.
The data the government makes decisions on should be public. It shouldn't be acceptable for a scientist to say "trust me, I did the analysis correctly." We're not perfect, we make mistakes. Peer review is broken, we can't rely on that to catch errors. Open things up a bit more, and we'll get better conclusions.
We'll use magical pixie money to anonymize, right? (Score:3)
Of course it allows it - but does it *fund* it? That's the chloroform in the rag. Unless the original study authors spent the money up front to carefully anonymize the data, it all has to be re-hashed from scratch to ensure that no identifying data is released to the public, but that all the records are intact. That costs money, and I'm going to bet a donut that there's not a single cent allocated to pay for that data. And every single study would be required to be anonymized whether or not anyone else is g
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Anyone can reproduce the studies and use their own data, or even anonymize the existing data. Guarantee anonymization and/or privacy of personal or proprietary information and put funding in the bill to cover all costs associated with release of the data and there won't be a problem, along with an exemption for data more than X years old to allow for long term studies where the raw data may have already been condensed.
Or just put the burden of proof on those who disagree with study findings, requiring that
Loose ends (Score:3)
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There is ample evidence of Ocean acidification to suggest that CO2 needs to be treated as a pollutant.
Re:EPA has exceeded safe limits, needs curbing (Score:5, Informative)
"There is ample evidence of Ocean acidification to suggest that CO2 needs to be treated as a pollutant."
Then I'm sure you'll have no problem providing that evidence of this and of any harm..
I can tell you ahead of time corals have genes that switch on to handle heat and co2 and they have survived 7000 ppm CO2 in the past and that this is not affecting reefs which by some miracle are only dying near man where he pollutes; in the open ocean coral is fine.
Tree of life with time scale
http://rs79.vrx.net/opinions/i... [vrx.net]
Historic co2
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wi... [wikimedia.org]
Corals can turn certain genes on and off to cope with heat
http://www.sciencemag.org/cont... [sciencemag.org]
Dr. Bruce Carlson produced a wonderful video demonstrating the resilient capacity of coral reefs if humans would simply stopped interfering with nature.
http://www.advancedaquarist.co... [advancedaquarist.com]
Palau's coral reefs surprisingly resistant to ocean acidification
http://nsf.gov/news/news_summ.... [nsf.gov]
Total reef losses due to climate change are unlikely
http://www.advancedaquarist.co... [advancedaquarist.com]
For cold water corals, warming is beating acidification to drive a growth spurt
http://arstechnica.com/science... [arstechnica.com]
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Well, people have survived in terrorist captivity, but that doesn't mean that being in terrorist captivity is completely OK with me. It is about the quality of life of the Coral. I'm guessing you aren't about to start ingesting large amounts
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Re:EPA has exceeded safe limits, needs curbing (Score:5, Informative)
The scientific case for regulating CO2 as a pollutant is completely, utterly, and totally irrelevant.
The Supreme Court ruled that the agency is legally required [wikipedia.org] to regulate CO2 back in 2007, and the Supreme Court is by definition right on all points of law. Buch was able to put off actually regulating the dang things, so the Obama administration didn't have draft regs ready until '10, but legal case for regulating CO2 is decided.
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The SCOTUS's opinion is effectively conditional on CO2 being a greenhouse gas that can endanger public health or welfare.
The SCOTUS does not "judge" science. They based their decision on what other organizations have said. In other words, the SCOTUS has never "judged" whether or not CO2 is a pollutant.
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SCOTUS ruled that CO2 meets the definition of "pollutant" in the Clean Air Act, and that EPA therefore has to define a regulatory mechanism. They did not rule on "science" - they ruled on law. EPA must use science in the manner prescribed in the CAA to come up with regulations, and has fairly broad discretion (subject to lawsuits regarding its interpretation of the CAA by any and all participants) regarding how to do that.
Many of the things that appear to be "out of control" EPA by anti- (and even some pro-
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All Court Judgements are conditional.
The Judgement against OJ for beating those memorabilia collectors up was conditional on there not being new evidence that Prosecutors made the whole thing up.
Given the evidence available in 2007, the Courts ruled global warming was real and CO32 was a pollutant. Since then the evidence has just grown. Temperature's spiking (9 of the hottest 10 years are within the past decade), the ice caps are melting, and the counter-points you're talking about are all fantasy from a T [heartland.org]
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LOL, the only place Michael Mann's reputation has suffered is climate science deniers eyes. His reputation in scientific circles is doing just fine.
Re:EPA has exceeded safe limits, needs curbing (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:EPA has exceeded safe limits, needs curbing (Score:5, Informative)
Why do people keep saying shit like this?
It's the Congress that created the EPA. It's the Congress that funds them. It's the Executive that controls them in accordance with the laws passed by... Wait for it... CONGRESS. All that based on the "General Welfare" clause of the Constitution.
Or maybe you are suggesting that control of commons should be relinquished to the corporations?
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because there isn't and your reading of the US constitution fails basic comprehension.
While this general welfare clause has been expanded over the years, it still fails on several
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>It's people like you who are the reason these reports come out saying people in the US have an abysmal knowledge of history.
What did you expect. Republicans support republican politicians -even AFTER they recently proved that the foreign minister of Iran knows the US constitution (and it's definition of treason and the laws passed based on that definition) better than the republicans in the Senate do.
And if ever you needed proof that congress is now a law unto themselves... had ANY citizens written that
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Your reading implies that Congress can do pretty much whatever the fuck it wants if it deems it to be for the General Welfare. That pretty much flied in the face of the idea of limited government, which is the central pillar of our Constitution.
Re:EPA has exceeded safe limits, needs curbing (Score:5, Insightful)
Your reading implies that Congress can do pretty much whatever the fuck it wants if it deems it to be for the General Welfare. That pretty much flied in the face of the idea of limited government, which is the central pillar of our Constitution.
Depends on how limited you want the limits to be. If you want the government to be small enough to drown in a bathtub, then yes, it flies in your personal idea of a limited government.
OTOH, the Founders were explicitly creating a less limited government. They said flat-out it needed to be more powerful the the Articles of Confederation government because it had to be strong enough to keep the Brits out.
If there'd been pollution in their day they almost certainly would have added inter-state pollution to the list of things the Feds had the right to regulate, because part of the point of their Constitution was keeping the states from fighting each-other over trivial shit. And you can bet your ass that if Pennsylvania had been able to have all the benefits of coal power, with none of the pollution, simply by siting the plants upwind from the rest of the state they'd have done that shit; New York would have responded by calling out the militia...
Re:EPA has exceeded safe limits, needs curbing (Score:5, Insightful)
There is a very clear constitutional basis. The environment is very key to interstate commerce without any doubt. If you could confine the environment to every state's borders then perhaps things would be different, and Ohio could be full of burning rivers as long as Illinois is not affected.
But according to some nuts, under the constitution the feds can't do anything except manage wars. The constitution as it existed in 1781 is not the same as it is today. People forget all the amendments, all the judicial decisions, and the great big massive war we had that overturned the constitution so that slavery could finally be abolished which resulted in a strong centralized federal government no matter what the hell the founding fathers who owned slaves would have wanted.
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First, judicial decisions do not change the constitution, only amendments brought about in two specific ways can do that.
Second, the American civil war was not about slavery so much as it was about preserving the union. Granted, the constitutions underwent new interpretations at the time, but slavery ended with the passage of the 13th amendment.
Now, on to your meat or guts of your argument. Congress might have a role in regulating pollution between the states. But that still does not form the basis of the c
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Judicial decisions do affect how things are interpreted when they are vague and when different parts of the law and constitution conflict with each other. And a great many things in the constitution are vague.
The civil war was entirely about slavery, because the primary reason the union was in danger of breaking up was because of slavery. Most other issues for the war ultimately led back to slavery as the origin as well. It is true that many in the north were content to just continue being conciliatory a
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No, secession was entirely about slavery. The war never would have broke out if South Carolina hadn't attacked Fort Sumter. Had that not happened, an entirely different outcome was not only possible, but likely. Lincoln and the north was doing everything possible to remedy the situation without war. That failed when the south attacked a union fort.
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But according to some nuts, under the constitution the feds can't do anything except manage wars.
I'm NOT one of the "nuts" you mention -- I don't think we really want to go back to the "original meaning" and forget everything that happened since.
But your post is full of a lot of inaccuracies. For one, most of those "nuts" want to restrict the Constitution to the enumerated powers [wikipedia.org], which include a lot of things other than wars. They just have a more strict interpretation of certain clauses there, like "regulating commerce."
The constitution as it existed in 1781 is not the same as it is today.
The Constitution didn't exist in 1781. It was drafted in 1787 and enacted in
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>That being said, what exactly is your problem with requiring all information the EPA uses to set policies be open to the public and able to survive scientific scrutiny?
Nobody has ANY problem with that. Including senate democrats and the president and almost every scientific organisation in the USA who ALL oppose this bill... So why do they oppose the bill then ? Did it ever occur to you that maybe the bill isn't about what the republicans say it's about ?
What it's ACTUALLY about is that the reps are des
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I am not going to argue whether or not "secret science" should be used by the EPA. I will point out the hypocrisy in there is no difference between the EPA using "secret science" and the FDA using "secret science" when approving drugs. If you are going to ban it in one regulatory agency then you should ban it in all regulatory agencies.
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I am not going to argue whether or not "secret science" should be used by the EPA. I will point out the hypocrisy in there is no difference between the EPA using "secret science" and the FDA using "secret science" when approving drugs. If you are going to ban it in one regulatory agency then you should ban it in all regulatory agencies.
Shrug. That works for me. Although we may have to work on them one agency at a time. Tell you what. You help with the EPA and I'll certainly help with the FDA (that sounds like a good idea anyway).
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No government policy should be based on anything that can't be seen or challenged by the public except in emergency situations or national security. Anytime anyone in authority says "Because I say so" when making law, you should be suspicious.
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The reason people don't want EPA to cover CO2 is not because of science, but because it potentially eats into oil and energy profits.
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California, the land where silica(glass) causes cancer? The place which passed a physically impossible laws about electricity? That wretched hive of clueless nutballs? I'm all for cutting CO2, and fossil fuel usage, but basing anything legal off California is asking for trouble.(I am assuming everyone here knows how to google to find what I've referenced)
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Why do you assume outside scientists are republican? I'm not but I have a BIG problem with secret scientific data.
In theory all products of government are public domain (since the public paid for it) and this is fundamental "open and transparent 101".
Can you explain why secret data should be used to make public policy?
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Who knew the movie Idiocracy was real.
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There's a difference between "actually discredited, according to a reasonable person's opinion" and "'discredited' as an excuse for a biased person to ignore it." With this law, we're talking about the latter situation.
In particular, the Republican goal is to make the burden of proof for climate change so high -- by eliminating consideration of "non-reproducible" data, like al
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No we are not. The EPA or whatever is only has to show the credibility of their science used. If they show that yellow and blue make green, and I declare it makes orange, as long as they can reproduce the green claim, they can use it.
You cannot discredit something that can be proven through t