Journal and Proceedings

of the

Royal Society of

2018

Volume 151 Part 1

Numbers 467 & 468

“... for the encouragement of studies and investigations in Science Art Literature and Philosophy ...”

THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF NEW SOUTH WALES

OFFICE BEARERS FOR 2018

Patron His Excellency General The Honourable AC DSC (Ret’d) Governor of New South Wales President Prof. Ian Sloan AO FRSN PhD FAA Vice Presidents Em. Prof. David Brynn Hibbert AM FRSN PhD CChem FRSC FRACI Mr John Hardie FRSN BSc (Syd) FGS MACE Ms Judith Wheeldon AM FRSN BS (Wis) MEd (Syd) FACE Hon. Secretary (Ed.) Em. Prof. Robert Marks FRSN MEngSci ResCert PhD (Stan) Hon. Secretary (Gen.) Dr Herma Büttner FRSN Dr.rer.nat Hon. Treasurer Mr Richard Wilmott MRSN Hon. Librarian Dr Ragbir Bhathal FRSN PhD FRAS FSAAS Hon. Web Master A/Prof. Chris Bertram FRSN PhD Councillors Dr Erik W. Aslaksen FRSN MSc (ETH) PhD Dr Mohammad Choucair PhD MRSN Em. Prof. Robert Clancy FRSN PhD FRACP Dr Laurel Dyson BSc(Hons) BA(Hons) PhD MRSN Ms Margaret Gibson MRSN Dr Donald Hector AM FRSN BE(Chem) PhD FIChemE FIEAust FAICD Prof. Nalini Joshi AO FRSN PhD (Prin) FAAS The Hon. Virginia Judge FRSN Prof. E James Kehoe FRSN PhD Hon. Prof. Ian Wilkinson FRSN PhD Southern Highlands Ms Anne Wood FRSN Branch Representative

Executive Office The Association Specialists

EDITORIAL BOARD Em. Prof. Robert Marks FRSN MEngSci ResCert MS PhD (Stan) – Hon. Editor Prof. Richard Banati FRSN MD PhD Prof. Michael Burton FRSN MA MMaths (Cantab) PhD (Edinb) FASA FAIP Dr Donald Hector AM FRSN BE(Chem) PhD (Syd) FIChemE FIEAust FAICD Em. Prof. David Brynn Hibbert AM FRSN PhD (Lond) CChem FRSC FRACI Dr Michael Lake BSc (Syd) PhD (Syd) Dr Nick Lomb BSc (Syd) PhD (Syd) FASA FRSA Prof. Timothy Schmidt FRSN BSc (Syd) PhD (Cantab)

Website: http://www.royalsoc.org.au

The Society traces its origin to the Philosophical Society of Australasia founded in in 1821. The Society exists for “the encouragement of studies and investigations in Science Art Literature and Philosophy”: publishing results of scientific investigations in its Journal and Proceedings; conducting monthly meetings; awarding prizes and medals; and by liaising with other learned societies within Australia and internationally. Membership is open to any person whose application is acceptable to the Society. Subscriptions for the Journal are also accepted. The Society welcomes, from members and non-members, manuscripts of research and review articles in all branches of science, art, literature and philosophy for publication in the Journal and Proceedings.

2 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 1–4. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010001-04

Editorial

Robert Marks Economics, University of New South Wales, Sydney E-mail: [email protected]

n May 31, 2018, I was privileged to be time as a research facility and published in Oa guest at the N.S.W. Judicial Com- 1983 (King and Lomb, 1983).7 mission Ngara Yura Program’s1 visit to the This convergence between astronomy Sydney Observatory when a star was named and Indigenous affairs8 is timely, since the in honour of Bonita Mabo AO, Eddie first paper in this issue is an address given Mabo’s widow. Bonita could not be present at the annual dinner of the Royal Society but was represented by their daughter, Gail, (the first at the State Library of N.S.W.) who thanked the Observatory and the on 18 May 2018 by recently elected Dist- Museum of Applied Arts & Sciences on her FRSN Tom Keneally. He is writing a his- mother’s behalf. On the 23rd anniversary of torical novel about Mungo Man, who lived the Mabo decision2 in 2015, a star had been and died in western N.S.W. about 42,000 named Koiki, in memory of Eddie Koiki years ago, and who was ceremonially laid Mabo.3 We peered at both stars through the to rest, decorated with ochre from a distant Observatory’s 40cm North Dome reflecting deposit. The printed version of the address telescope4, and discussed the vexed issue of includes references Tom used in his research, longitude5 at the date of the Observatory’s but I have also found some, including the founding, in 1858.6 The Observatory has recently published work by Billy Griffiths, been a running theme in the Journal & Deep Time Dreaming (2018), which is an Proceedings, with early Sydney astronomers, account of the people and discoveries and such as W. Scott, J. Tebbutt, H.C. Russell, disputes that have arisen in the past half cen- and G.D. Hirst, regular contributors. The tury of Australian archaeology, written by a Sydney Southern Star Catalogue (SSSC) was historian who has also worked on some digs. compiled by Sydney Observatory during its This book, for instance, discusses the issues around ownership of ancient remains, the protocols established since Mungo Lady and

1 https://www.judcom.nsw.gov.au/education/ngara- yura-program/ 7 In a recent email, Nick Lomb tells me: “The catalogue 2 Recently elected Fellow, Sir Anthony Mason FRSN, is online. In 1983 I sent off the catalogue on a reel of was the Chief Justice of the High Court when the computer tape to an astronomical data centre in the decision was handed down. US. It has been preserved all these years and is now available through a data centre in Strasbourg at http:// 3 The stars’ SSSC numbers are: Koiki 803504, Bonita 803544. And see Indigi Lab (2016). vizier.u-strasbg.fr/viz-bin/VizieR-3?-source=I/86A/ primary. Through that link you can interrogate the 4 See photos of the stars on page 5 below. catalogue by putting in the star’s SSSC number, eg 5 See Tebbutt (1878) and Russell (1878) and Sobel 803504 (Koiki), in the box marked num and press- (1995). ing Submit.” 6 See Ashcroft et al. (2018). 8 See also Bhathal (2009).

1 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Marks — Editorial

Mungo Man appeared to Dr. Jim Bowler in After some delays in receiving their papers 1969 and 1974.9 (and never hearing from one participant — The second paper is an address given on his paper is an edited version of the tran- Australia Day, 2017, by this year’s Austra- script of his talk), the proceedings of the lian of the Year, DistFRSN Michelle Sim- Royal Society of N.S.W. and Four Academies mons, on, inter alia, her team’s progress at Forum, “The Future of Reason in a Post- making a quantum computer, using single Truth World,” on November 29, 2017, at phosphorus atoms on a silicon lattice. As Government House, Sydney, are presented teams here and abroad compete to design in this issue. A wide variety of issues is raised and construct quantum computers, theo- in the presentations, and news (of Russian retical computer scientists are discussing influence in various votes and elections how such machines will behave. Aaronson outside Russia, for instance) and research (2018) stresses that “Quantum computers into the phenomena discussed continues would (sic) not solve hard search Problems to appear. In particular, to understand how instantaneously by simply trying all the pos- false news spreads, Vosoughi et al. (2018) sible solutions at once.” Rather, he and de used a data set of rumour cascades on Twitter Wolf (2017), argue that they could provide from 2006 to 2017. About 126,000 rumours dramatic speed-ups of a few specific prob- were spread by about 3 million people. False lems, three of which they emphasise: first, news reached more people than the truth; simulation of quantum and chem- the top 1% of false news cascades diffused to istry, to design new drugs, materials, solar between 1000 and 100,000 people, whereas cells, high-temperature superconductors, the truth rarely diffused to more than 1000 etc. Second, breaking existing public-key people. Falsehood also diffused faster than cryptography, although probably not future the truth. The degree of novelty and the standards, and not private-key cryptography. emotional reactions of recipients might be Third, optimization and machine learning, responsible for the differences observed. This they believe. But there will no doubt be is depressing, if not entirely unexpected. benefits for other applications. At a more Finally, I wish to thank the team of people mundane level, Professor Simmons, who has who have helped me with this issue: new recently been elected as an FRS (), father Ed Hibbert, and new Members Jason also focused on high-school education, and Antony and Rory McGuire. A note: follow- deplored the watering down of HSC physics, ing a chat between us, Rory found that his for instance, given the need for pupils to be grandfather’s grandfather, Henry Grattan challenged in order to learn and to develop Douglass (1790-1865),10 a physician from confidence in the STEM subjects. Dublin, was the first secretary of the Austra- lian Philosophical Society and later helped re-form it into the Royal Society of N.S.W. 9 See Bowler (2014) and Bowler et al. (1970), (1972). He was also a vice president of the Mechan- For a longer discussion of the issues between Indig- enous peoples and archaeologists and science over the past 40 years, see Colley (2002). As members of the Royal Society, we should not always assume that sci- ence must trump the interests, ownership, and respon- 10 http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/douglass-henry- sibilities of Aborigines. grattan-1987

2 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Marks — Editorial

ics’ School of Arts in 1850. And much more besides.11 Bonita While using the Trove database to confirm SSSC 803544 SAO 251838 Dr. Douglass’ role, I found the transcripts GSC 897900623 of seven papers presented to 1630 light years Philosophical Society in 1850 and 1851 and Hot blue “B” star subsequently published in the popular press. VisBonita mag 9.26 Constellation Crux I have added links to them in the Journal SSSC 803544 RASAO 12 h251838 18m 09.42 s 12 Dec –63 01’ 14.1” Archive . Fortuitously, one is the earliest GSC 897900623°

paper known on the utility of the bomareng 1630 light years (sic) (Mitchell 1851). Hot blue “B” star Stop press: On the fiftieth anniversary Vis mag 9.26 of Jim Bowler’s first seeing the remains of Constellation Crux RA 12h 18m 09.42s Mungo Lady (July 15, 1968), he has written Dec –63° 01’ 14.1” a piece in The Conversation (2018), arguing that inaction by state and federal authorities Bonita has deprived us “of that fundamental right SSSC 803544 Hot blue “B” star to honour the dead to whom our history SAO 251838 Vis mag 9.26 Koiki owes so much.” GSC 897900623 Constellation Crux SSSC 803504 1630 light years RA 12h 18m 09.42s SAO 251790 Dec –63° 01’ 14.1” GSC 897805899 Ackowledgements 4800 light years The photo of the stars made use of the Hot blue “B” star “Aladin sky atlas” developed at CDS, Stras- Vis mag 5.97 ConsteKoikillation Crux bourg Observatory, France (http://aladin. RASSSC 12h 803504 12m 12.9 s u-strasbg.fr). The photo was forwarded by DecSAO -62 2517° 57’ 9003.0 ” Joanne Selfe of the Ngara Yura Program GSC 897805899 (images courtesy of VizieR). 4800 light years Hot blue “B” star Vis mag 5.97 Constellation Crux RA 12h 12m 12.9s Dec -62° 57’ 03.0” Images courtesy of VizieR

Images courtesy of VizieR

11 On page 16 of his inaugural address to the Royal Koiki Society, on 9 July, 1867, the Rev. W.B. Clarke (1867) SSSC 803504 Hot blue “B” star reports that H.G. Douglass was the first Honorary Sec- SAO 251790 Vis mag 5.97 retary of the Australian Philosophical Society, formed GSC 897805899 Constellation Crux in 1850. 4800 light years RA 12h 12m 12.9s 12 https://royalsoc.org.au/links-to-papers-since-1856 Dec -62° 57’ 03.0”

3 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Marks — Editorial

References Griffiths, B. (2018) Deep Time Dreaming: Aaronson, S. (2018) Quantum computing for Uncovering Ancient Australia, Melbourne: Black. policymakers and philosopher-novelists, June 6, Indigi Lab (2016) Eddie Mabo: It was written in 2018; on his blog, Shtetl-Optimized, at https:// the stars, 4 March. http://www.indigilab.com. www.scottaaronson.com/blog/ au/astronomy/eddie-mabo-it-was-written-in- Ashcroft, L., Jacob, A., Johnson, A., Lomb, N., the-stars/ Pascoe, B., and Watson, F. (2018) The Story of Keneally, T. (2018) Mungo Man imagined: the Sydney Observatory, Ultimo: Museum of writing the ultimate historical novel, Journal Applied Arts and Sciences Media. & Proc. of the Royal Society of New South Wales, Bhathal, R. (2009) Pre-contact astronomy, 151: 6-14. Journal & Proc. of the Royal Society of New South King, D.S. and Lomb, N.R. (1983) Sydney Wales, 142: 15-23. https://royalsoc.org.au/ Southern Star Catalogue. Journal & Proc. of images/pdf/journal/142_Bhathal4.pdf the Royal Society of New South Wales, 116: Bowler, J.M. (2014) Mungo Man is a physical 53-70. https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/ reminder of the need for Indigenous page/46357402 recognition, Guardian, 25 Feb. https://www. Mitchell, T.L. (1851) On the bomareng propeller, theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/25/mungo- Sydney Morning Herald, 11 Jan, p.2. https:// man-physical-reminder-need-for-indigenous- trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/12924036 recognition Mabo v Queensland (No 2) [1992] HCA 23, Bowler, J.M. (2018) Time to honour a historical (1992) 175 CLR 1 (3 June 1992), High Court. legend: 50 years since the discovery of http://www8.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/viewdoc/au/ Mungo Lady, The Conversation, 6 July. https:// cases/cth/HCA/1992/23.html theconversation.com/time-to-honour-a- Russell, H.C. (1878) On the longitude of the historical-legend-50-years-since-the-discovery- Sydney Observatory, Journal & Proc. of the of-mungo-lady-97785 Royal Society of New South Wales, 12: 222- Bowler, J.M., Jones, R., Allen, H., and Thorne, 225. https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/ A.G. (1970) Pleistocene human remains from page/41415780 Australia: a living site and human cremation Simmons, M. (2018) We must set the bar high from Lake Mungo, western N.S.W., World and tell students we expect them to jump over Archaeology, 2(1): 39-60. it, Journal & Proc. of the Royal Society of New Bowler, J.M., Thorne, A.G., and Polach, H.A. South Wales, 151: 15-22. An address given on (1972) Pleistocene Man in Australia: age and 26 January 2017. significance of the Mungo skeleton, Nature, Sobel, D. (1995) Longitude: The True Story of a 240(5375): 48-50. Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Clarke W.B. (1867) Inaugural address to the Problem of His Time, NY: Walker & Co. Royal Society, delivered at its first meeting, Tebbutt, J. (1878) Proposed correction 9th July 1867, Trans. of the Royal Society to the assumed longitude of the Sydney of New South Wales, 1: 1-27. https://www. Observatory, Journal & Proc. of the Royal Society biodiversitylibrary.org/page/40522032 of New South Wales, 12: 63-69. https://www. Colley, S. (2002) Uncovering Australia: biodiversitylibrary.org/page/41415599 Archaeology, Indigenous people and the public, Vosoughi, S., Roy, D. and Aral, S. (2018) The Washington: Smithsonian Institution. spread of true and false news online. Science. de Wolf, R. (2017) The potential impact 359(6380): 1146-1151, March 9. doi:10.1126/ of quantum computers on society, science.aap9559. arXiv:1712.05380 [cs.CY] https://arxiv.org/ pdf/1712.05380.pdf

4 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 5–13. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010005-09

Mungo Man imagined: writing the ultimate historical novel

Tom Keneally, DistFRSN E-mail: [email protected]

Abstract On writing a historical novel about a man who died 42,000 years ago. This is an address given at the annual dinner of the Royal Society of New South Wales on May 18, 2018, by the recently elected Distinguished Fellow, noted novelist and historian, Tom Keneally.

our Excellency, Governor General Hurley, don’t care whether you’re in a picture or not, Yand Mrs Hurley, Fellows, Members, and they think any idiot can do that, they only Guests, I have a mutual friend who works for care about whether you’ve done your cer- the Hurleys, and while working for someone emony.” Well, Tommy is now gone to join you generally see all their flaws. This woman, his ceremony: he died about ten days ago, however, is unstoppable on their virtues and and it’s appropriate to dedicate this to him, the way they have continued the heritage of as a fully initiated Roper River man. Dame Marie Bashir and engagement with My favourite place of pilgrimage in Aus- the Australian public. And if we have people tralia is not Uluru or the Great Barrier Reef, like them serving the community, all an old but the dry lake bed named Mungo, awash republican like myself can say is “God save with semi-desert plants like saltbush and cot- the Queen.” tonbush, where in 1974, Professor James And I see with awe a list of Distinguished Bowler discovered the largely intact and ritu- Fellows, including some that I know by sight, ally buried skeleton of Mungo Man, who we like Professor Peter Baume, and some I’ve now know to have lived at least 42,000 years read of, such as Dr. , in the past. It bears repeating. Mungo Man’s quantum lady, . These DNA was laid down at least 42,000 years are names which would adorn any learned ago in the womb of a far-dispersed daughter society anywhere on Earth. So, I’m very of Mitochondrial Eve. His flesh expired at sensible of the honour of being given this least 42,000 years ago. Some early estimates from a high hand, and being amongst the put his height at 5 foot 7 — which I think is Fellowship. I think I can genuinely claim a perfectly acceptable height — or 170 cen- to be the most poorly educated of all the timetres, but later modelling has suggested Distinguished Fellows. a height of over six feet and as high as 196 I would like to dedicate this little speech centimetres. He had in any case a robust appropriately to the late Tommy Lewis, the frame except for osteoarthritis of the shoul- Aboriginal actor whom Fred Schepisi, the der, possibly from hunting, but I think also Australian director, saw in an airport and possibly from knapping stone. They needed asked to audition for the 1978 film. Tradi- to knap a lot of stone out there and that had tional people in Australia, I’ve noticed, can to have affected his shoulder. Significantly, all dance, can all sing, can all act, and as he was missing two lower canines, which Tommy Lewis said to me once, “The Elders some propose indicated a ceremonial extrac-

5 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Keneally — Mungo Man Imagined tion early in his life. And he was buried by quarters. This area had been in modern cooperative effort, involving a sacramen- times marginal country in terms of rainfall. tal fire and encrustation with red ochre The Willandra Lakes are lakes in a different acquired by trade with a society of humans sense than European lakes. The European from two hundred kilometres away, beyond eye would facilely expect them to contain the present Darling River. His eloquently water from season to season — that is part disposed bones speak to us of the reverent of the northern hemisphere definition of intervention of fellow members of our spe- a lake: lakes that assert their lake-ness by cies, Homo sapiens, over a bridge of 42,000 brimming and thus accommodating the (and some say many more) years. eye. The Lake did hold water in the Old l am often accused of being a “historical Man’s day, and accommodated his eye. But novelist”. It is not an insult to be so called. now the average of ten inches a year did But when I had an impulse to write imagina- not fall predictably in all years, and did not tively about the man found at Lake Mungo, come at all in some, although the saltbush our fellow Australian removed from us by of the basin made grazing sheep for wool those millennia, I did think, “I’ll give ’em viable … historical novelist. Is 42,000 years ago his- In any case, on that historic day in 1974, as torical enough for you?” I describe in the novel, Jim Bowler, and his I call Lake Mungo “Lake Learned” in the fictional counterpart, Peter Jorgensen, set novel I’m writing, due to appear in Australia out, as the ground dried, to the lunette at later this year. I call Jim Bowler Peter Jor- the eastern end of Mungo Lake, about 100 gensen in the novel, and give him a Scan- kilometres north of Balranald, N.S.W. He dinavian blonde rather than Celtic ginger rode his motorbike off to the south of the complexion. I write about fictional Learned lunette and to that big semicircle of sand Man, who is really Mungo Man, and fic- dunes and hills of ancient lake sediments, tional Peter Jorgensen, who is really a version which you will never forget should you see it of the very scholarly and very amiable Jim and which will become part of the landscape Bowler. This is an edited, penultimate ver- of your imagination if you have been there. sion of the discovery, which is very like the He abandoned the motorcycle, trudged up real discovery by Professor Bowler. So, this the hill, trudged up the layers of sediment, is what I wrote in the novel, which is based 70,000-year-old sediment, 60, 50, and so on, very much on what Jim Bowler himself told and saw a glint in the sand deposits. me of the discovery: In 1969 Bowler had already discovered a At the time of the discovery of astonish- palaeolithic skeleton in those sand dunes: a ingly ancient Learned Man, some decades cremated young woman who had been ritu- back, my friend Peter Jorgensen, whom I ally buried with reverence but whose bones nicknamed the Viking, was testing dried had been shattered in reverence as well, or, lake basins and their sediments for records some would say, in fear. This was Mungo of ancient climatic oscillations. Ironically, Lady, nearly two thousand years younger modern heavy rain had kept him bound than Mungo Man, the man he was about to the homestead of the old Lake Learned to discover. But, although Jorgensen knew Station, where he had a bed in the shearers’ there must be other ancient remains, he was

6 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Keneally — Mungo Man Imagined not looking for them. Then he saw a glimpse recognition. The attraction of Mungo Man of white, and it was the glint of the temple and his society and his ancestors, who pre- of Mungo Man’s skull, exposed by rain, and ceded him onto the shore probably at least this was the Old Man, Mungo Man, Learned 15,000 years before then, was that they lived Man of the novel, presenting his forehead. amongst megafauna: 200-kilo, two-metre- Late afternoon, and one of the Ancients had high kangaroos, an enormous diprotodon chosen to resurrect himself! of two-and-a-half tonnes, like a giant, slow “It had the flavour of a willed meeting,” I wombat, and a terrifying relative of the larger wrote. “Peter Jorgensen thought that he had koalas, the marsupial lion, the largest carni- found the Old Man, but he would always vore on the continent, Thylacoleo carnifex, be mindful of what a Riverina woman elder with its terrible prehensile claw, and its ter- of the Paakintji people would later tell him, rible teeth. Carnifex, in Latin, means execu- `You didn’t find the Old Lady and the Old tioner, as any member of the Society learnt Man. They found you!’” in kindergarten, I think, and computer mod- In his vastly popular book, Sapiens, the elling on intact skeletons of this extinct beast Israeli historian Yuval Noah Harari declares has shown that it was immensely more effi- the journey of the first humans to Australia cient, by slashing jugulars and severing the was one of the most important events in spine, than any present living predator. But history. It was the first time, he says, that Carnifex ran up against Homo sapiens, a clev- any human managed to leave the Afro-Asian erer beast still, with cognitive skills beyond ecological system, and was the first time that its magnificent capacities. So, Mungo Man any large terrestrial had managed to cross and his society, according to Harari, were that barrier, and it was the moment, when, the people who put paid to long-gestation, upon entering Australia, humans became the small-litter megafauna. The other theory is dominant species. They were not yet domi- that it was climate change, but Harari argues nant anywhere else on Earth. that climate change in Australia was not sig- The moment the first hunter-gatherer nificant enough to have caused the extinc- arrived on an Australian beach, says Harari, tions. You can read his book, Sapiens, and was the moment that Homo sapiens climbed encounter his claims. to the top rung in the food chain on a par- There were also enormous perenties in ticular landmass, thereby setting a pattern for Mungo Man’s world: Varanus giganteus, two all that was to happen on other continents, metres in length, and like the other animals, where our species did eventually become the protein on claws, coming to the lake to drink. dominant intelligence, and the dominant In the lake itself, of course, were predeces- decider of what would happen to other spe- sors of the Murray cod, and visiting migrat- cies. Until then, humans had displayed some ing birds, and huge supplies of thirsty meat innovative adaptations and behaviours, but coming to the shore. And that was the world their effect upon the environment had been that Mungo Man lived in, and that was the negligible. world that triggered his imagination. There The settlers of Australia did not merely were intimidating snakes, tall koalas, and adapt to the continent but, Harari argues, huge flightless birds. The balance between transformed the Australian ecosystem beyond species in the Australian ecosystem was dis-

7 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Keneally — Mungo Man Imagined rupted, Harari and others controversially millennia. One is a contemporary Austral- argue, by Mungo Man and his people. ian movie director named, in the manner In pointing the finger at the forebears of smart-alec novelists, Shelby Apples, to of modern day Aboriginals in the matter honour Australian optimism — once, in a of the death of the megafauna, Harari and Green Room of a TV show Alan Alda said others argue that the Ice Age that ended per- to me, “Who is this guy you Australians talk haps forty-five thousand or fewer years ago about, Shelby Apples?” and I thought that didn’t produce results catastrophic enough one day there must be a Shelby Apples. The to render the megafauna extinct all at once. second man is a fictional version of Mungo. If the diprotodon alone became extinct, that I won’t speak much of Shelby’s story. Indeed, would have been a fluke, but more than 90 the two stories have seemed to some editors per cent of Australia’s megafauna disap- ill-matched, and I am still trying to prove by peared at the same time as the diprotodon. re-writes that they definitely and obviously The small-litter, long-term gestation of many belong together, even if Learned Man is a of the megafauna meant that they could not man of law and Shelby a man of cinema- recover as quickly as did smaller, more pro- tography, which itself, after all, has a place lific animals. in law, as evidence and witness. Guilty or not of the death of the mega- The issue of cultural appropriation arises. fauna, these fellow children of Mitochon- Mungo Man and Mungo Lady are seen as drial Eve lived probably a far more bountiful relatives and forebears by the three tribes and comfortable life than our ancestors did, whose country meets at Lake Mungo. One beside a fifteen-foot-deep lake which con- is the Paakintji (“People of the River”), the tained such plenty, and to which were drawn Darling River people, the others the Mutthi waterbirds and the hinterland population Mutthi of the Northern Riverina, and the of fauna. In such a merry situation, Mungo Ngiyaampaa of the Menindee region. Quite Man needed to travel for only the same rea- appropriately, the three tribes feel a primary sons as we do now: for pilgrimage, educa- claim on Mungo Man. tion, romance and trade. What a wonderful Both Professor Bowler and the palae- quartet of human motivations! ontologist, the late Professor Alan Thorne, The Mungo People were the inheritors founder of the controversial Parallel Con- too of the cognitive revolution, the powers tinuity theory of human development, of abstraction which characterised humans became aware that they had committed a from about 70,000 years ago and which trespass and an abduction by taking remains endowed them with potent but intangible away without reference to the traditional concepts governing religion, art, identity owners, and both went to some trouble to and a universe of laws. ( was appease the justly aggrieved tribal owners always waiting for another burst of DNA and thenceforth to collaborate with them in which would give us the further cognitive creating protocols involving the discovery of revolution in our brains, which would make ancient remains. us slightly less illogical; but it never came.) The Elders’ abiding concept was that I set about to write a story of two old men Mungo Man had come again to tell Australia and their parallel deaths, separated by 42,000 something of great significance, a view that

8 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Keneally — Mungo Man Imagined the eighty-nine-year-old Jim Bowler shares nous people in white writers’ books, I would to this day. He does not believe, either, that give my fictional Mungo an august voice, Mungo has finished speaking yet, and he and set out to do so. But not only a kind of certainly does not believe that white society, sticky white sentimentality reigned here, but often through no fault of its own, has heard something that has struck all observers of Mungo resonate. pre-literate societies. Culture does not cease Given the claim the three tribes have on for lack of literacy. In fact, as the Cambridge him, by what right do I presume to write of anthropologist Jack Goody says, instead of Mungo, or, as he is in the novel, Learned? I individual glories such as attach to Dickens merely claim secondary ownership in him as and Dostoyevsky, Shakespeare and Shaw, a (shorter, it seems) member of the same spe- rather, “one of the features of oral commu- cies, whose own forebears once lived a more nication in pre-literate societies lies in its materially impoverished life than Mungo capacity to swallow up and to incorporate did. Primary ownership and primary deci- in a body of custom” the stories and images sion as to what befalls Mungo Man remain of any individual, and to compose them into with the Elders. But I felt justified in purely a body of culture. The pre-literate man and imaginative terms to attempt to create in woman speak richly — commentators would narrative a sort of Ur culture, the culture have us believe — from the implanted oral in which we know our forebears too were anthologies of their culture. The playwright then participating. In justifying myself, in of the Irish revival, J. M. Synge, in The Play- any case, I flashed the Homo sapiens badge, boy of the Western World, presents us with and — I believe — validly so. But it is true a world where pre-literate Aran Islanders that there has been an emergence of great create the vividness of poetry in their daily Aboriginal writers, including Jonathan speech. If all this is true, Mungo Man spoke Birch of Melbourne, Ellen van Neerven of in vivid tropes, not in grunts. Queensland, Alexis Wright and Michael It is easy enough to begin in a voice for Fogarty, and Aboriginal stories should be Learned Man, as I do: left to them. They own Aboriginal stories., O my Hero, I devote this account of my latter and any cultural justice would say so, and days to you — he’s addressing his hero in any system of fraternal, creative etiquette the sky, his ancestor — so that you under- would say so. stand how well I love you and love the Earth, I had earlier said that I could not have and know my duty to them, to all the Heroes, written The Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith now, to all the beasts and to all the people. I am as I did in my white-man ignorance of the thinking pleasantly of the wrestling that late ’sixties and early ’seventies. But, I felt comes at the start of the cold season, when I could claim Mungo Man, again in a sec- we occupy equal days of moon and sun, the ondary sense and at a prodigious distance days when the half of everything yearns for of time, as my uncle, and my brother. And the half of everything else, when ice sings to uncle and brother and fellow Australian of light, and when there should be efforts made everyone in this room. at wholeness. So we come to the equal day- I decided that, as a token reparation for night wrestling, and to its banquet. all the fractured English attributed to indige-

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We know about the antiquity of wres- as that I believe, utterly unscientifically, that tling, and it is fair game as a novelist if not the terrors and exultations and imageries and as a scholar to recruit it for a narrative of awes of all our forebears have left their traces the palaeolithic world. We know about in our imaginations. feasts, for there are areas out on the Lake And what was vegetation like in Ice Age Mungo lunette part glazed over by 31,000 Australia? There is a handy consensus for the years, till the end of the last ice age, of great idea that during ice ages savannah grasslands traditional fireplaces. Here, at ceremonial were more extensive in the interior, and forest times, haunches of megafauna were baked not as common as since the last ice age. on radiant mulga coals in coatings of aro- As I wrote, Mungo Man induced in me matic bark. an urgency, as he had in others, to make his But we come to guesswork very quickly. presence amongst us more widely known. If palaeolithic humans had the equivalent He is far more important than any novel, of cardinal points, what did they call them? and so in 2016 I wrote to Malcolm Turnbull, How did they convey what we mean by, say, putting to him that this was a chance to northwest? How did they count? There are undertake a work of nation-building, requir- some anthropological and paleontological ing both Federal and State ministers: hints in that area, but also contradictions of opinion. What did they make of seasons October 13, 2016 and how did they name them? Did they, like The Hon. Malcolm Turnbull traditional Aboriginals, believe in journeys Prime Minister to the sky during sleep, and encounters there AUSTRALIA with the revelations and wishes of hero- Re: The Willandra Lakes World Heritage ancestors? How did they manage society? Site: The Chance for a Great World Heritage Did they possess a system of moiety, clan, Site. skin laws of the kind Aboriginal culture still Dear Prime Minister, lived by in the age of anthropology? I recently had a chance to speak on a Herit- I was helped by my own inherent ani- age issue with the amiable Minister of Envi- mism, my own unscientific sense that ante- ronment and Heritage, Mr . diluvian presences, precedent and challeng- I have also spoken on this matter to my local ing, but not hostile, to my soul, inhabit the member, Premier the Hon. . I Australian landscape. I would assert, on the feel though that the unique project I out- basis of personal mytho-poetic (forgive the lined to him and am now outlining to you pretension) experience, that animism and will require national vision on the part of a ancestor-worship are the two natural reli- Prime Minister, a Premier, and the commit- gions of humanity, or at least of myself and ment of both governments. many other humans. And the connection Mungo Man, a set of bones waiting on a between geology and zoology — the out- bench at an Australia Museum depository crop that transmutes to the marsupial lion for disposal and return to his native Willan- — there are places in Australia where that dra Lakes area north of Balranald, is 42,000 happens on some level of our imaginations, years old. Mungo Lady is a set of remains and the world puts us in our place. As well nearly as old. They represent the two oldest

10 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Keneally — Mungo Man Imagined human ritual burials we possess evidence Homo sapiens. Mungo Man is, in an extended of on Earth. These enormously ancient sense, the heritage of all members of our members of the species Homo sapiens, our species. He sheds light on what it is to be species, were also members of a community human, Aboriginal, and Australian in equal which inhabited the lunette of Lake Mungo measure and in such a graphic way. For one between 60,000 years Before the Present Era thing, he represents a society that had lan- and the end of the last Ice Age. The remains guage, religion and technology all that time of that community and of the environment ago. It is one of the oldest human commu- it lived in are pervasive throughout the Wil- nities we have ever had a glimmering into landra Lakes area in New South Wales. That — and we have more than a glimmering into community and its remains are nothing less it, out there in Mungo — a community so than a world treasure. Most of Australia is, old that it reflects on scientific issues such through no fault of its own, ignorant of it. as when we left Africa, and when we began May I suggest that this represents an oblivion to speak. which a visionary leader could put paid to, It would be sad if Mungo Man were and all to massive Australian heritage, eco- allowed to remain indefinitely in storage, or nomic and social benefit. if, for lack of interest by government, the There are have been plans for a Keeping traditional owners are left with no option Place of some kind for Mungo Man and but to dispose privately of this incalculable Lady, plans involving input from interested treasure. parties and especially, and above all, from Apart from potential world interest in traditional owners, the three tribes, Mutthi Mungo Man and the other remains, and Mutthi, Ngiyaampaa, and Paakintji, whose the community and landscape they lived in, traditional territory all converges on Lake there is the consideration that a Keeping Mungo. But these plans have lacked direc- Place, organised according to the wishes of tion and intent from the highest level of the traditional owners, could also provide government. great infrastructure and employment ben- You will see that in raising with you this efits for the region. It could also be a centre huge national opportunity, I am influenced for learning for all young Australians, and of by the urgency of two noble men even older scholarship and education for the rest of us than me; firstly, Dr James Bowler, discoverer in general. It could also stand as our ultimate of Mungo Man and Mungo Lady and, sec- site of national reconciliation. ondly, the father of Australian palaeontol- I have taken the liberty of including some ogy, the great scholar and author Dr John notes on three World Heritage sites of the Mulvaney, who died last week. I attach to kind that benefit other modern nations at this letter their rather despairing letter to the same time as celebrating the ancient UNESCO about Australian inaction. communities that occupied the sites. I see Like many Australians, I feel that if the Willandra Lakes people of 40,000 to the appropriate disposal of Mungo Man’s 60,000 BPE as being potentially as engag- remains is made, the result will be a shrine ing and intriguing to the world as are the not only for Australians, black and white, remains of the Anasazi Pueblo dwelling areas but for anyone interested in the history of at Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado; as

11 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Keneally — Mungo Man Imagined the ruins of Petra in Jordan; and as the great indigenes but also for us, who in these mat- Heritage Centre at Ceide Fields in County ters so badly need enlightenment. One won- Mayo. All these are national treasures in ders if there are forces that do not want to their countries and attract world attention join Mungo’s story to the story told in two and international visitors. And yet, just as recent revolutionary books about who Abo- Mungo Man himself is at least fifteen times rigines were, and how they lived: Canberra older than Tutankhamen and the society of historian Bill Gammage’s The Biggest Estate the New Empire of Egypt, so the Willandra on Earth and Victorian Aboriginal Bruce Lakes story is over twenty times older than Pascoe’s Dark Emu. that of Petra, nearly ten times older than All I can say to my uncle and Elder, Ceide Fields, and forty times older than the Mungo Man, is: “Keep talking!” But the cliff houses of Mesa Verde. idea that Mungo has finished speaking to I hope it is not too crass of me to suggest us is not yet true, because we do not know that it would be a wonderful thing if your of him generally, because he is a minority government, at a time when we are consider- sport who deserves to be a major one. He ing a respectful constitutional recognition of will, along with Bill Gammage’s The Biggest indigenous stewardship and occupation of Estate on Earth and Bruce Pascoe’s Dark Emu, Australia, were responsible for combining bring us a new version of Australian history. with traditional owners to move this treasure One which will legitimise both races, and from the shadows to a place where it could one which will unify us in the future. occupy its proper place in the geography and So all I can say to my uncle and Elder, imaginations of our people. Mungo Man, is “Keep talking!‚” for though my book will probably go straight through As ever, my warmest wishes, to the keeper, Mungo Man is the one who Thomas Keneally without ball tampering will in the end take Malcolm Turnbull’s reply was amiable, the most difficult cosmic wicket — and that urbane and non-conclusive, but he hadn’t is the wicket of our popularly accepted, non- caught the bug, sadly. sense version of pre-history. As you may know, last year, after his Thank you. sojourn at the A. N. U. and on a shelf in a Museum of Australia repository, Mungo References Man was returned to his country by impor- Bowler, J.M., Johnston, H., Olley, J.M., tant men and women of the three tribes and a Prescott, J.R., Roberts, R.G., Shawcross, number of others, including the Yorta Yorta. W., and Spooner, N.A. (2003) New ages Jim Bowler was there, following the Elders, for human occupation and climatic change to see Mungo’s casket laid in an underground at Lake Mungo, Australia, Nature 421, 837–840, (20 February 2003). doi:10.1038/ safe. But not a single cabinet minister, state nature01383 or federal, not a single member of parlia- Gammage, B. (2012) The Biggest Estate ment, state or federal, appeared to witness on Earth: How Aborigines Made Australia, the passage of this exceptional, ancient Aus- Sydney: Allen & Unwin. tralian, the Australian not of one year, but Goody, J. (1977) The Domestication of the of millennia upon millennia. His movement Savage Mind. Camb.: Cambridge Univ. Press. could have shaken the earth not only for

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Harari, Y.N. (2014) Sapiens: A Brief History of Thorne, A., Grün, R., Mortimer, G., Spooner Humankind, NY: Harper. N.A. (1999) Australia’s oldest human Keneally, T. (1972) The Chant of Jimmy remains: age of the Lake Mungo 3 skeleton. J. Blacksmith, Sydney: Angus & Robertson. Hum. Evol. 36, 591–612. and Wroe, S., McHenry, C., Thomason, J. (2005) Bite club: comparative bite force in big biting “The Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith,” directed by mammals and the prediction of predatory Fred Schepisi, starring Tommy Lewis, 1978. behaviour in fossil taxa, Proc. Roy. Soc. B, Pascoe, B. (2014) Dark Emu, Black Seeds: 1-7. http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/ Agriculture or Accident? Broome, W.A.: content/272/1563/619 Magabala Books. Synge, J.M. (1907) The Playboy of the Western World. https://www.archive.org/stream/ theplayboyofthew01240gut/potww10.txt

13 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 14–21. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010014-08

We must set the bar high and tell students we expect them to jump over it

Michelle Simmons, FRS, DistFRSN Science, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia Corresponding author. E-mail: [email protected]

Abstract The 2018 Australian of the Year is quantum physicist, Michelle Simmons. Below is reprinted the address she gave on Australia Day, 24 January, 2017; she was elected FRS in May 2018.

is Excellency, the Governor of New So, if someone had told me 30 or 40 years HSouth Wales and Mrs Hurley; the ago that I would one day be asked to deliver Honourable Gladys Berejiklian, Premier an Australia Day address, you can imagine I of New South Wales; chairman and board would never have believed them. members of the Australia Day Council of Yet life is full of ironies. In my south-east New South Wales, distinguished guests, London home, when I was a little girl, I had ladies and gentlemen. It feels very odd for an older brother Gary who, whenever I got me to be here today. a little too annoying, used to joke with me: I went to a pretty rough school, a south- “One day I am going to buy you a one-way east London comprehensive. Out of the 200- ticket to Australia.” 300 students in my year, only 16 of them did As things turned out, he didn’t need to A Levels (that’s the equivalent of the HSC); because, in 1999, I came here of my own and, of those, only two passed. volition; and in 2007, I became an Austral- I have always been an introvert. As a child, ian citizen. When I say that, all the little I hated the limelight; I still do. In my English hairs on the back of my neck stand up and literature lessons at secondary school, our I feel really proud to be Australian. teacher used to go systematically around the For some reason, though, I always kept class to encourage each of us [to learn] to that plane ticket that brought me over here, read out aloud. Such was my fear of public and just a year ago I had it framed and speaking, however, that instead I quickly sent to my brother for his 50th birthday. learnt to shift desks every day so I made it Ironically, and a little sad for my father, my through the whole four years without having brother now lives in the US and I live here to speak up once. and I joke with Gary that I got the much What’s more, growing up in that part of better deal. Only, for me, it’s not a joke. I England, I was not raised within a culture really believe it. I genuinely do believe it is that said: “It would be essential to go to uni- better here than over there. And the 26th versity, let alone leave Britain and set up a of January, Australia Day, is one day when I life at the other end of the earth.” can say this wholeheartedly without feeling as though I am bragging.

14 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Simmons — Australia Day Speech

Today is a day for celebrating Australia: cal challenge of trying to create new devices the wonderful country it is, and all the that had never been made before, where each opportunities it offers. And to this end I atom had to be put in place to engineer a want to share with you why I came here — particular effect — in essence to create elec- and why I choose to stay. Along the way, I tronic devices at the atomic scale. hope to describe to you why I think Australia It was this that brought me to Australia. is a great place to be for anyone interested in Back in the , IBM invented a new scientific discovery and innovation. kind of microscope, which, for the first time, I also want to leave you with a sense of enabled humans to “see” on the atomic scale. why Australia is well placed to realise the These are fabulous tools — giant stainless next revolution in computing — the quan- steel contraptions that fill a room with a tum revolution. vacuum inside akin to that in outer space. But let me begin by telling you how unex- As with so much in science, the machine pected it was for me to become an Australian. itself looks incredibly complicated from A physics PhD is, in a sense, a passport to the outside, but the principle of its opera- the world, and I was lucky in my early career tion is simple. They are built around a very because I gained some terrific experience in fine metal tip, which we bring down, under excellent research groups in the UK. I went electrical control, towards a sample surface. to in the north of Eng- When it is in close contact with the surface, land where I was able to design and build electrons tunnel from the tip to the sample electronic devices — solar cells for capturing and create a current. We measure this cur- the sun’s energy. I then went to Cambridge rent and keep it constant as we scan the tip University in the south of England where I across the surface, hence the term “scan- learnt the complexity and fragility of discov- ning tunnelling microscope” (STM). We ering new quantum effects. This is the weird scan the atoms across the surface rather like physics that emerges when dealing with [the] a TV screen to build a topographic image world as it gets very small — in particular of the surface. when we get down to the size of individual The invention of this microscope enabled atoms (the fundamental building blocks of scientists to see individual atoms for the first nature from which we are all made), which time and to observe how the arrangement are approximately a million times smaller of the atoms on a surface was completely than the width of a human hair. different to those in the bulk crystal. When Working at Cambridge, in the semicon- we cut the surface, we remove the atoms ductor physics group, I learnt to design, above, causing the atoms at the surface to fabricate and measure my own samples — rearrange, moving closer together to lower three completely different skill sets, a unique their energy. Since most of life’s processes combination that really makes you the occur at surfaces or interfaces, being able master of your own destiny. But there also to actually see atoms and understand how came a point when I wanted to find a more they behave differently at surfaces was a huge ambitious project to work on than the very breakthrough. This was, then, an incredibly fundamental physics they were doing there. important discovery. The STM, as a conse- Specifically, I was drawn to the technologi- quence, was one of the fastest inventions to

15 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Simmons — Australia Day Speech win the Nobel Prize, just four years after its American culture was more appealing discovery in 1984. than this, but it too had its limitations. The But seeing atoms was just the beginning. US offered a highly competitive environ- In the , IBM found a way to exploit ment where you would fight both externally this technology to go one step further and and internally for funds and be beholden to to actually move atoms around on a surface. a senior mentor. Their system also restricted Using an early scanning tunnelling micro- responsibility for the early-career researcher, scope, they formed the world’s smallest logo whereas Australia offered the freedom of — the letters I, B, and M — out of atoms independent fellowships and the ability to of xenon on a copper surface. That was a work on large-scale projects with other aca- great demonstration of technological prow- demics from across the country. ess — to be able not just to image atoms Seriously, there was absolutely no com- but to manipulate them. But it is one thing petition. To this day, I am delighted with to push a few atoms around and make a my choice and firmly believe that there is logo, and quite another thing to take that no better place to undertake research. Aus- technology and create an electronic device tralia offers a culture of academic freedom, where the active, functional component is openness to ideas, and an amazing willing- a single atom. ness to pursue goals that are ambitious. And It was in the hope of realising this dream the results speak for themselves — we have that, in 1998, I applied for fellowships in achieved tremendous success in our endeav- Australia and in Cambridge, and for a faculty our, largely because we gave things a go that position at Stanford in the US. As a young the rest of the world didn’t dare to try, as I academic we are taught that the prestige hope I will explain. of the institutions that we work at is very When I moved to Australia, back in important. However, when I was offered the 1990, silicon device research was focused Australian fellowship, I accepted immediately on Moore’s Law. Have you ever noticed and pulled out of the other two processes. It that every year your computing devices are was a decision, I’ll be honest with you, that getting smaller and faster? Many years ago, perplexed not only my colleagues overseas, Gordon Moore, the co-founder of Intel, but also many Australians. When I arrived noted that the number of transistors on a here, people would ask me, “Why on earth silicon chip was doubling every 18 months did you come?” But the choice was easy. to two years. In practice, this meant that In practical terms, I did not want to stay each individual transistor had to be decreas- in Cambridge. The structure was too hier- ing in size at the same rate. The amazing archical and the research was esoteric. Who thing about this law is that in the late 1990s cares if you can answer a fundamental phys- you could plot the size of future transistors ics question? I wanted to build something as a function of time, allowing us to predict — something that could prove to be useful. that by 2020, we would reach the level of The British research system also offered that individual atoms. wonderful possibility of working with pes- With the industrial world focused on the simistic academics who will tell you a thou- iterative process of making devices smaller sand reasons why your ideas will not work. and smaller each year to maintain their

16 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Simmons — Australia Day Speech margins, back in 1999, with a few others defence firm has predicted that 40 per cent I hatched a plan. The plan was to focus of all Australian industry will be impacted on adapting the technology that existed if we can realise this technology. to image atoms to see if we could make a The potential rewards are certainly signifi- functional electronic device where the active cant. I firmly believed when I arrived here component was a single atom — in other that we had a viable yet ambitious pathway words to leapfrog the global IT industry and to get there. Yet, when we first proposed our make devices on the atomic scale. concept, there were many critics all over the This ambition was fuelled by a separate world, including senior scientists at IBM, theoretical proposal coming out from Aus- who said that, whilst it was a nice idea, there tralia back in 1998 which suggested, if we were many technical challenges that had to could control things at the atomic scale, then be overcome. We identified eight different we could make a completely new type of steps, none of which had been demonstrated. computer that worked entirely on quantum The consensus view within the global scien- physics. tific community was that the chances of our Such a computer is called a “quantum getting through all eight stages were near computer” and is predicted to bring with it impossible. an exponential speed-up in computational On top of this, to make things work, we power. This is because, instead of performing had to combine two technologies: linking calculations one after the other like a con- the STM (which provides the ability to ventional computer, a quantum computer measure and manipulate individual atoms) works in parallel, looking at all the possible with another technology called molecular outcomes at the same time. The result is beam epitaxy (MBE) which allows us to massively parallel computing, allowing us grow, layer by layer, material to protect the to solve problems in minutes that otherwise atoms we have put down. would take thousands of years. Both these instruments must operate One thinks here of problems where com- under ultra-high vacuum, but no one had puters work on large data bases or consider successfully combined the two, and they lots of variables, problems such as predict- seemed incompatible: the STM system ing the weather, stock markets, optimising needed low vibrational noise to have the speech, facial and object recognition (such sensitivity to image individual atoms, while as self-driving cars), looking at optimising the MBE system had very large pumps to aircraft design, targeting drug development ensure high purity crystal growth — pumps to the patient’s DNA, optimising traffic flow that caused a great deal of vibration. It was and working out the shortest possible deliv- high risk. When I told the two independent ery routes. UPS in the US have determined system manufacturers in Germany about the that if they could shorten the distance that idea, they said they would make a system every one of their drivers travels each day by to my design, but that there would be no one mile, they would save their company $50 guarantee that it would work. And, for a million per year. That’s an ideal problem for combined system that cost $3.5 million, that a quantum computer. But this is a capability was a pretty big risk! with widespread application. Indeed, a US

17 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Simmons — Australia Day Speech

It took two years from the design of the have demonstrated a concept like entangle- system to its delivery and set-up and was a ment between the atoms where the state of nail-biting time for my career. It explains one atom depends on the other — rather where a lot of my grey hairs started to come like a marriage. It does, however, have the in. It was hosted in two specially designed added “quantum” benefit that both parties adjacent laboratories but connected through can read each other’s minds. It’s a beautiful the wall. world to be in. Did it work? I think I wouldn’t be here if Finally, we have moved to two-, three- it hadn’t! But to my delight it worked a factor and four-qubit architectures and shown our of six better than I had hoped. And over the long-term ability using our STM to pattern past decade we have systematically solved all a 1024 atomic precision array. These achieve- those eight challenges that were predicted to ments have been published not only in the block our way. In fact, the video1 shows the usual scientific places. My team were in the step-by-step process we have developed by orders today and I’m very proud of them. which we place and build electronic devices They have also made it into Guinness World using a single phosphorus atom in silicon Records — as my son discovered one day to — the phosphorus being the atom on which his great surprise while sitting in his school we encode information for the atomic-scale library. computer. On the back of this success, we have In recent years, we have used this unique attracted to Australia some incredible young technology right here in Sydney to create scientists from all parts of the world — from a stack of world-first atomic-scale devices. Europe, the UK, the US, and Asia — some We have built the world’s smallest transis- of whom, I’m delighted to say, have decided tor where the active functional part is just a to make Australia their permanent home single atom beating those industry predic- too. We have also patented this technology tions from Moore’s Law by nearly a decade. extensively at each stage and remain the only Following this, we fabricated the world’s nar- group in the world that can make electronic rowest conducting wires in silicon, just four devices at the atomic scale. Most exciting atoms wide with the same current-carrying of all, though, is that we are now on a mis- capability of copper. We are systematically sion to build a complete prototype quantum working towards demonstrating all the indi- computer for which all the functional ele- vidual components of a 10-qubit system, ments are manufactured and controlled at which we hope to achieve within the next the atomic scale. five years. Using this technique, we have The significance of this for Australia shown that, in addition to placing the atoms should not be underestimated. Today, there and wires, we have built unique transistors is an international race to build a quantum that we can align next to the atoms with computer and the field is highly competi- sub-nanometre precision to initialise and tive — nicknamed the space race of the read out information on these atoms. We computing era. There are currently four fast-moving potential implementations for

1 https://newsroom.unsw.edu.au/news/science-tech/ making this work: one based upon supercon- seeing-believing-precision-atom-qubits-achieve- ducting circuits; one based on ion traps; one milestone

18 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Simmons — Australia Day Speech based upon a theoretical proposal involv- groups, I think governments sometimes ing rare sub-atomic particles called the struggle to understand either side of this Majorana fermions; and one based in the equation. Yet parties fulfil important but industrial-compatible silicon material. We different roles in our society, and play com- are the world leaders in the last area, where plementary parts in making new discoveries Australia has established a unique approach and in developing them into products or with a globally competitive edge that has services of value to society. Sometimes we been described by our US funding agencies need to work together. as having a two- to three-year lead over the Given the importance of quantum infor- rest of the world. mation for the finance, health, transporta- It is nail biting, it’s exciting and it’s hap- tion and logistics industries, and for the pening here right now in Sydney. But what computing and communications industries, really inspires me now is that we are at the it is natural for Australian industry to begin threshold of making this into something to invest in this area. And in this regard, I practical and real, with a demonstrable have had the great fortune to work with out- benefit. standing trailblazers in some of Australia’s Over the past three years, we have estab- leading high-technology companies, includ- lished a unique government/industry/uni- ing the Commonwealth Bank and Telstra versity consortium with the focused aim — an experience that has transformed my of building a 10-qubit prototype quantum view of Australia’s technological prowess in computer right here in Australia. It’s not the commercial sphere. I am serious — if going to be easy. Technologically and sci- anyone can help us to make it happen, it is entifically, we face a new set of challenges these guys. The technology leaders at these as we scale up. I am acutely conscious too organisations are sharp, on the ball, an abso- that getting these types of inter-sectoral lute delight to work with and at the very top undertakings off the ground is very difficult of their game. — more difficult, in fact, than some of the To do what we are planning we will all scientific challenges in quantum physics that need to be. Quantum physics is hard. Tech- I’ve faced in my career! To take things to the nology at the forefront of human endeavour next level, we need to work across different is hard. But that is what makes it worth it. cultures, where goals and expectations may I strongly believe that the things that are sometimes be at odds. most worth doing in life are nearly always Yet strangely, in this country, as in other hard to do. parts of the world, we tend to institutionalise Which brings me back to the beginning, our researchers and to blinker them to the and to the fundamental lessons I learnt as a advantages and skills of their colleagues in child. When I was growing up in England, other sectors. Thus, in the academic world, it before I became an Australian, I always knew is surprisingly common for people to dispar- that I liked doing things that were difficult — age the profit motive and the private sector; things that you had to try really hard to suc- while, in the commercial world, one often ceed at but that, when you did, the euphoria hears people denigrating the ivory-tower was immense. It is interesting, therefore, to mentality of academics. And between both admit now that I actually gave up physics

19 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Simmons — Australia Day Speech at O Level as I also really enjoyed biology, In my experience, there is a big cost in chemistry, history and English literature. this type of thinking. When we reduce the (Career advice at the time encouraged people quality of education that anyone receives, we to follow the subjects they enjoyed the most.) reduce the expectations we have of them. If Shortly into my O Level year, however, I we want young people to be the best they knew I had made an awful mistake. While I can be (at anything) we must set the bar high enjoyed these subjects, they didn’t challenge and tell them we expect them to jump over me. I realised then that my greatest joy was it. My strong belief is that we need to be solving problems that were complex and not teaching all students -— girls and boys — to so instantly rewarding to do. have high expectations of themselves. The consequence for me was I ended up What about our scientists? doing physics outside of school, and it took Our country has established centres me a while to catch up. The lesson I learnt of excellence that are the envy of scientists was you can always do the things you enjoy across the globe, in areas like robotic vision, and find easy outside of work. But problem astronomy, big data, gravitational wave solving and technical skills require consistent discovery, brain function, ageing and ecol- effort and are not so easy to pick up at any ogy. Collectively, these initiatives continue time in life. For me, it was better to do the to attract brilliant people from all over the things that have the greatest reward. Things world — most of whom come, no doubt, that are hard, not easy. And things that will with a shared sense of hope and excitement, continue to challenge you throughout your just like the one I held, and still hold, for life. this place. Now, there’s a message here for our edu- Remarkably, three of these centres of cators, our scientists and for all Australians. excellence are focused on quantum phys- First, science education. ics and related technologies — each with a Great teachers with high expectations particular presence here in NSW. Australia, challenge their students to be the best they for some reason, is disproportionately strong can be. But equally important are the cur- in quantum information science. And, with ricula that they teach. One of the few things billions of dollars of investment going into that horrified me when I arrived in Australia this field across the world, our next challenge was to discover that, several years ago, the is to see whether we can benefit from our high school physics curriculum was “femi- international lead, to try to translate that nised.” In other words, to make it more research into high-technology industries appealing to girls, our curricula designers here in Australia. in the bureaucracy substituted formulæ with Finally, there’s a broader message for all essays! What a disaster. From the students Australians. In Australia, when praising our- coming to university, I see little evidence that selves, even on occasions like this one, we this has made any difference and indeed I see tend to emphasise the beauty of our natural many students complaining that the physics environment, our great lifestyle, and the curriculum has left them ill equipped for easy-going nature of our people. The lucky university. country. I think this is a mistake, because it doesn’t acknowledge the hard work that

20 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Simmons — Australia Day Speech people have done to be successful and it we have so much to be thankful for — and, encourages us to shy away from difficult more importantly, so much to look forward challenges. In short, I believe it will eventu- to. But there is room for improvement as ally stop us from being as ambitious as we well. In our innovation policies, in our edu- might be. cation system, and in the ambitions of our Of course, ours is a country of great scientists and discoverers, I want Australians spirit and enormous promise — something above all to be known as people who do the that outsiders don’t always appreciate. With hard things. our inherent scepticism towards dogma and Thank you, and happy Australia Day. our openness and collaborative spirit, Aus- tralians are natural discoverers. We are also References problem-solvers who like to get things done. Pla, J.J., Tan, K.Y., Dehollain, J.P., Lim, W.H., Morton, J.J.L., Jamieson, D.N., Dzurak, A.S., But is this enough? Morello, A. (2012) A single-atom electron As we take things to the next phase of spin qubit in silicon, Nature 489, 541 (2012) trying to build a prototype quantum compu- Smith D. (2018) Seeing is believing: precision ter, I feel proud to be a part of the team that atom qubits achieve milestone, Media Office, is going to make this happen. I am grateful UNSW Sydney, 7 March. https://newsroom. for that Australian spirit to give things a go, unsw.edu.au/news/science-tech/seeing- believing-precision-atom-qubits-achieve- and our enduring sense of possibility. In this, milestone

21 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 22–24. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010022-03

The Future of Rationality in a Post-Truth World

His Excellency General The Honourable David Hurley AC DSC (Ret’d) Governor of New South Wales Patron of the Royal Society of New South Wales

Abstract This is the opening address given by His Excellency General The Honourable David Hurley AC DSC (Ret’d), Governor of New South Wales, to the Royal Society of New South Wales and Four Academies Forum on The Future of Rationality in a Post-Truth Worldon Wednesday, 29th November 2017.

adies and Gentlemen, I am delighted strategic direction and a business plan for Lto welcome you for this third annual both my role and Government House. In the Royal Society and Four Academies Forum, area of community engagement, I wanted to “The Future of Rationality in a Post-Truth value-add to the role. World.” When looking at my predecessors, I con- Before we commence, let me acknowl- sidered the role of Governor Brisbane in the edge the ancestral knowledge systems of our establishment of the Philosophical Society of traditional custodians, who have sustained Australasia. Why was that link in place? Obvi- this land for tens of thousands of years. I pay ously, the roles and functions, the authorities my respects to Gadigal Elders, past, present of Governors have changed since Brisbane’s and future, and to all Aboriginal and Torres days. The role of the Governor — then — was Strait Islander Peoples. to try to help the development of the early I would like to acknowledge Professor community, including its intellectual life, Brynn Hibbert, Professor Mary O’Kane, and see the great potential that existed in distinguished Law Society and Academy Fel- Australia. Why should that not be the role lows and their representatives, and presenters of the Governor now? I thought I should and members. follow in those footsteps. I began this series of forums three years I considered that one of the things I ago when I first became Governor of New could do as Patron of the Royal Society South Wales. would be to provide an opportunity to have Upon my appointment as Governor, I a “think-tank” here at Government House found that there were three “Cs” to the where we could look at some of the bigger role of Governor — which relate to the and more difficult issues that are facing us Constitutional, Ceremonial and Commu- today in a political sense, in a neutral aca- nity engagement roles of the appointment. demic environment. That’s the course we Constitutional and ceremonial duties took have undertaken. about 10 per cent of my time. It’s often hard to have discourse and dis- Ninety per cent of my time was involved cussion in public life these days without divi- in engaging with the people of New South siveness being drawn to people’s attention. Wales. It was clear to me that I needed a If you have two views, then there must be

22 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Hurley — Opening Day Address division, and division creates conflict; con- write a paper on rational decision-making flict creates news. That seems to be the way and a proposed plan to have a second airport of our media and news channels. This Forum in Sydney. This was in 1993. I came to the is not about that: it’s about examining issues conclusion that we were far removed from of importance to our society. the point of being able to make that deci- The topic we’ll look at today is not new, sion, because if you looked at the process we but there are aspects of it that have changed. were going through at that time, we were not For example, if we take the American jour- making a rational decision about a second nalist, critic and theorist H.L. Mencken, airport. I claim no position on any decision we may have different views about him as that’s been made recently. a person, but he’s very rich in comments But what are the alternatives to rational- about democracy. ity? Of course, subjective belief, faith, selec- “Democracy is a pathetic belief in the col- tive opinions, stand on this ground. What lective wisdom of individual ignorance” was do they mean for science, for society, for a comment written in 1926, or thereabouts. democracies as we know it — and, therefore, He had a view that our right to individual for our future? Are these really threats or speech — and our right to have an opin- are they impacts that new technology, new ion — does not necessarily make that opinion, ways of doing business have introduced to in itself, “right.” Therefore, how do we engage the society that we have? Is democracy on with the community, with people, with insti- the decline? Is there a threat to democracy tutions, with policy makers? that will increase that decline or are we going We now have transient “fake news,” “alterna- through a growth spurt in democracy, where tive facts,” and “post-truth” discourse — these it is just a different type of democracy that are not new ideas but, perhaps, different titles. is emerging that has challenged us as never Of course, “post-truth” was the word of the before? year for 2016 in the Oxford Dictionary. It has If we believe this, why do we wring our now created an industry and many books are hands instead of girding our loins? If we written on “post-truth.” believe in it, we defend it, we promote it; we So, is the topic we are about to discuss take it forward. I reference George Orwell something new — or something old with a through a quotation from a letter he wrote new title? Is it an old or a new phenomenon? in 1944: 1 Is it the result of today’s staggering growth (I fear) the horrors of emotional national- in information data and social media which ism and a tendency to disbelieve in the has brought it to the surface? existence of objective truth because all the Or is something more concerning in facts have to fit in with the words and the play? prophecies of some infallible fuhrer. If we look at the history and develop- ment of our civilisation, primarily western Already history has, in a sense, ceased to civilisation, rationality has been one of its exist. That is, there is no such thing as a foundation stones. history of our own times which can be A number of years ago I did a post-grad- uate course at Deakin University. I had to 1 https://www.thedailybeast.com/george-orwells-letter- on-why-he-wrote-1984

23 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Hurley — Opening Day Address

universally accepted, and the exact sci- Is this “falsification” another aspect of ences are endangered as soon as military the issue that we will discuss today? What necessity ceases to keep people up to the is “truth”? What is “post-truth”? How mark. do we deal with it as a democracy and a society? More importantly, how do we But if the sort of world that I’m afraid of assist decision-makers in performing their arrives, the world of two or three great duties? And that’s what we should be aiming superstates which are unable to conquer towards — to assist, to enable, to take our one another, two and two could become society forward. five, if the fuhrer wished it. The “big plus” from today is bringing I would like to remind you of when these together four Academies, which may not, words were written: 1944. on a daily basis, come together. That’s one of I could quote from Orwell’s novel — Nine- the purposes of this forum: collaboration. teen Eighty-Four — about the falsification of Today is a day for some very intriguing history: presentations. At the end of it, I hope we I know, of course, that the past is falsified will come out of this Forum more engaged but it would never be possible for me to and enlightened on these issues. prove it even when I did the falsification It is my honour to now introduce the myself. After the thing is done, no evi- third Royal Society of New South Wales dence ever remains. The only evidence is and Four Academies Forum: The Future of inside my own mind. Rationality in a Post-Truth World.

24 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 25–27. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010025-03

The Chief Scientist & Engineer’s view

Mary O’Kane Erstwhile Chief Scientist & Engineer, New South Wales; Chair, Independent Planning Commission of NSW E-mail: [email protected]

Rationality in a post-truth world contradictory, and changing requirements his is a timely topic. According to Wiki- that are often difficult to recognize. The Tpedia1, while the term “post-truth” is 25 use of the term ‘wicked’ here has come to years old, the term largely came into heavy denote resistance to resolution, rather than use during elections in several countries in evil. Moreover, because of complex interde- 2016. These elections were characterised by pendencies, the effort to solve one aspect of strong populist trends. As this Wikipedia a wicked problem may reveal or create other entry notes: “The term ‘post-truth politics’ problems.” was coined by the blogger David Roberts Examples of wicked problems the Chief in a blog post for Grist on 1 April 2010, Scientist & Engineer has been asked to deal where it was defined as ‘a political culture with include the following: in which politics (public opinion and media • Review of Coal Seam Gas activities in narratives2) have become almost entirely NSW disconnected from policy (the substance of • Review into the Decline of Koala Popula- legislation).’” tions in NSW • Energy Security Taskforce — The energy CSE sees a version of this involving crisis in Australia science issues • Independent Review of Rail Coal Dust The Chief Scientist & Engineer (CSE) has Emissions been asked by Government to review or • Advisory Committee on Tunnel Air Qual- provide comment on many matters where ity the issue is ostensibly a science one but it is • PFAS/PFOA Contamination, often from often one where the science issues are accom- military bases panied by very strong emotions. I suggest • Sea-level-rise advice these are examples of the science version of • The rat population of Lord Howe Island post-truth problems. • Medicinal Cannabis. We often note that these issues are typically In all of these, we found that people can be wicked problems. According to Wikipedia,3 enormously distressed about many aspects of “a wicked problem is a problem that is difficult the issue. Moreover, unlikely coalitions can or impossible to solve because of incomplete, emerge, e.g. in the case of Coal Seam Gas we had a strong between Lock the Gate and the National Farmers Federation. 1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-truth_politics 2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narrative 3 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicked_problem

25 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales O’Kane — View of the CSE

What characterised the CSG issue in on odd, mistaken or only partially correct NSW? premises. When we discussed the matter As an example, let’s consider the CSG Review. with those consulted, it became clear that Extracting coal seam gas in NSW is relatively their starting “facts” often came from poor straightforward technologically, but it needs media stories. People are often too time-poor to operate within a strong regulatory frame- to spend time sifting fact from fiction or work to deal with the community concerns. partial fact. They are often sceptical about The main community concerns about pro- government sources, citing bad past experi- ceeding with it were: ences with chemical spills, PFAS, dangerous side-effects of drugs they were not warned • land access issues about, Three Mile Island, etc. They are more • land value issues inclined to think “there is something to” • could the industry be regulated effectively press stories emphasizing dangers. given its distributed nature? It would seem we are in a “post-factual” • fear of fracking chemicals and resultant world (see Barber 2017). And the largely pos- health concerns (particularly in the light itive (at least with positive outweighing nega- of the movie Gasland) tive) contributions of science (e.g. sanitation, • would fracking induce seismicity? antibiotics, refrigeration, telecommunication, • would fracking chemicals cause contami- motorised transport, the internet, etc.) are nation? taken for granted or forgotten Maybe just • subsidence as we take democracy for granted! • surface, groundwater, and aquifer con- tamination So what did we do in the Review? • aquifer wrecking by drawing down water In carrying out the Review we tried to get a • gas coming into drinking water —lighting handle on these matters. Some of the things the Condamine we did included the following. We: • produced water including radioactive salts; • listened to as many different groups as we would it wreck the soil? could, striving always to be respectful • air-quality impacts • bad behaviour on the part of CSG com- • commissioned a study of the community panies, e.g. unauthorised access to land psychological issues (hence Lock the Gate), trucks tearing up • considered the literature worldwide includ- narrow country roads, etc. ing the grey literature • trustworthiness (or lack of) of CSG com- • held extensive community consultations panies and governments. ­‑— everywhere affected and with all key stakeholder groups A lot of the objections were rational … • established processes for managing poten- but based on odd premises tial conflicts of interest. • recruited staff: engineers, scientists, writers, The Office of the Chief Scientist & Engineer media expert (OCSE) carried out extensive community • commissioned parallel reports from mul- consultation as part of the Review. Many tiple experts on a range of topics relevant of the arguments proffered to the Review to the issue were rational but a large number were based

26 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales O’Kane — View of the CSE

• held workshops of top experts from differ- coming out of the Office is “just the facts, ent fields and cognate fields to identify and ma’am”, not advocacy, not spin. tackle the issues — with robust discussions Some things I’ve learned along the way: to really stress test matters • Science doesn’t stand still and it’s about • developed a detailed sampling approach to finding an intelligent way through the understanding whether regulatory compli- problem given the state of knowledge at ance was adequate (it wasn’t) present, acknowledging and emphasising • published all reports we commissioned, there is always more to find out. including parallel reports we commis- • It is important to pose the problem well sioned from different experts which often in an effort to try to understand the real were partially conflicting problem. • always answered press queries • It is important to get multiple views from • responded to all invitations for the CSE the experts; don’t rely on one expert only to give speeches on the matter on any given topic. • pointed out everyone’s rights under the • Empower people to ask questions — pro- Government Information Public Access mote openness and always recommend Act (GIPA), noting everyone has open open data and better communication. access rights with respect to government • Encourage governments to be preemp- documents and data in NSW tive in anticipating community concerns. • encouraged open data mechanisms so that They need to encourage well-founded and compliance with all environmental condi- robust discussion before policies are final- tions imposed on CSG and mining com- ised. panies can be monitored by everyone. Spe- In other words, science, at least to some cifically we recommended the creation of extent, can be a vital part of governments the Whole-of-Environment Data Reposi- regaining trust when dealing with wicked tory for this (see Recommendation 10 in problems. Science can help governments the Report of the Review, CSE 2014) reconnect politics with policy in a post-truth • were careful with our use of language, for and post-factual world. example: ◊ no “chemical” — bad. As in ‘nasty References chemicals’ Barber, L. (2017) Fake news in the post-factual world, Financial Times, Sept. 16, 2017. https:// ◊ no “renewable energy” — good. (Though www.ft.com/content/c8c749e0-996d-11e7- that is getting more mixed with wind b83c-9588e51488a0 farm objections.) Roberts, D (2010) Post-truth politics, Grist, April ◊ no “clean, green”. 1, 2010. https://grist.org/article/2010-03-30- post-truth-politics/ So where does this leave us? What Chief Scientist & Engineer (2014) Final should we do? Report of the Independent Review of Coal Seam Gas Activities in N.S.W. http://www. In my time as Chief Scientist & Engineer it chiefscientist.nsw.gov.au/__data/assets/ has been very important to me that the work pdf_file/0005/56912/140930-CSG-Final- Report.pdf

27 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 28–38. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010028-11

Rationality and post-truth — the threat to democratic society

Donald Hector AM PhD FRSN The Royal Society of New South Wales Corresponding author. E-mail: [email protected]

Abstract Two-thirds of Americans get at least some of their news from Facebook and over half get some of their news from Twitter. What has happened to reason? The post-modernists and relativists are in the ascendancy. The great Enlightenment philosopher David Hume said that errors in religion are dangerous but that errors in philosophy are only ridiculous. That is not the case. Rejecting established sources of reason and accepting that belief should have equal sway with fact puts an open, free society in great danger. This paper examines two issues: what is meant by the words “is true”? And the criteria for truth — how can we establish whether something is true or false? The situation is further complicated by the cogni- tive processes humans used to consider these issues. To determine whether a judgement, a choice, or a decision is likely to be successful, there are two to things consider. First: is the judgement rational — that is, is it coherent with the prevailing paradigm? and second: is the judgement accurate – does it cor- respond to established, accepted facts? Both are necessary for a sound judgement to be reached but neither is sufficient. But human cognition is flawed – our rationality is bounded and this can lead to serious errors. Bringing these two subjects together – philosophy and cognitive psychology – can give some insight into the nature of post-truth and the implicit threat to our open, democratic society.

Introduction dangerous but errors in philosophy are only hat a mess! Why can’t people be sensi- ridiculous. That is not so. Rejecting estab- Wble! Wherever we turn, there are astrol- lished sources of reason and accepting that ogers, homeopaths, theorists, belief should have equal sway with fact puts miracle workers and anti-vaxers. Politicians an open, free society in great danger. prefer to follow their “gut instinct” rather The advances made in human civilisa- than evidence-based rationale. The internet tion in the last 600 years have been greater has made everyone an expert! Two-thirds of than in the previous 60,000. In 1840, there Americans get at least some of their news was no country in the world where the life from Facebook and over half get some from expectancy at birth was greater than 40 years. Twitter. How much substance can there be in Today, just 180 years later, there is no coun- 140 characters? Is it the case that only twits try in the world where life expectancy is less tweet? Are the post-modernists and relativ- than 40 years — there are several countries ists in the ascendancy? What has happened where now it is more than double this. The to reason? rediscovery of Greek philosophy during the The great Enlightenment philosopher Renaissance, the emergence of the scientific David Hume said that errors in religion are method, mathematics, flourishing art, music

28 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Hector — Rationality and Post-Truth and literature together brought about the emotion and personal belief. One might be agricultural revolution, the scientific revo- tempted to say that Twitter trumps fact. lution, the Industrial Revolution and an I will discuss truth and then examine extraordinary period of human creativity. Of rationality. Then I will briefly outline why I these the scientific revolution was the most believe post-truth is so dangerous. important because it changed the fundamen- But, first, I will make three statements tal paradigm of Middle Ages Christianity upon which my subsequent remarks are and the ancient world: belief gradually gave based. way to evidence and reason. First, there is a physical world independ- The gains were greatest and emerged earli- ent of human thought. Second, from birth, est in what are now referred to as developed every human acquires a body of knowledge countries, most particularly those of West- that represents the physical world they expe- ern Europe and North America but the phe- rience through their senses. This is their sub- nomenon has now spread world-wide. Today, jective knowledge. And, third, there is an most prosperous countries share a common independent body of knowledge that has feature. Although far from perfect, they have been developed through human thought developed or have adopted institutions in and communication. This includes the full areas of law, politics, health, education and range of shared ideas, such as stories, writ- social institutions (such as universities and a ings, art, music, mathematics and so on. As free press) that place great value on evidence far as I know, the first philosopher to bring and fact. These institutions are the foun- this together quite so succinctly was Karl dations of today’s civil society. In such an Popper (Popper 1972). It was not original environment, enquiry is rigorous and subject — Popper drew upon philosophical thinking to review by one’s peers. Key to this is our that has emerged over the last two millennia modern notion of knowledge: as the Oxford — but he did put it very clearly. He referred English Dictionary puts it, “the apprehen- to these as the Three Worlds and claimed sion of fact or truth with the mind; clear that they are three distinct ontological states. and certain perception of fact or truth; the Some philosophers would dispute this, but state or condition of knowing fact or truth”. it is a good way to think about things in the Why is this emphasis on truth so important? context of today’s discussion. Because it led to the settling of disputes with Truth evidence and reason, rather than by force, and this then became the foundation of In considering truth philosophers generally institutions that people could trust. look at two issues: what is meant by the words The topic of this forum — truth, rational- “is true” (referred to as the “truth predicate”); ity and post-truth — is important because of and the criteria for truth (for example, if I the threat to these institutions posed by the say the book is blue, how do I determine emergence of “post-truth”. What is meant by whether the book really is blue?). the term “post-truth”? Simply that objective An example might show why this distinc- facts are less influential in shaping political tion is important. Pontius Pilate was famously debate or public opinion than appeals to reported to have asked the question “what is truth?”. He should have asked “is he guilty?”. The point is that it is important not to mix

29 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Hector — Rationality and Post-Truth up the question of what truth is with what The linguistic approach became influential we mean when we try to establish whether with the analytical philosophy of Russell and something is true or false. Wittgenstein in the early 20th century and The concept of truth only has relevance to was at its most influential with the logical self-conscious, linguistic beings, capable of positivists’ interpretation (in particular, the understanding and using concepts of truth semantic treatment by Tarski) of the cor- and falsity. Theoretical approaches to what is respondence theory of truth in the 1930s meant by “truth” fall into two broad groups. (Davidson 1990). There have been two Those that consider truth to be some genuine major epistemic approaches to truth, both property of a proposition, assertion or belief of which have their origins in Spinoza, Hegel — these are substantive approaches — and and other traditional philosophers. These are non-substantive approaches that argue that the pragmatist theory of truth, proposed by such a property or relation does not exist. C.S. Peirce, James, and Dewey in the late Non-substantive approaches argue that we 19th century (Haack 1976) and the coher- should not be misled by the similarity of the ence theory of truth, heavily influenced by truth predicate “is true” to other predicates the British idealist Bradley in the early 20th (such as, for example, “is blue”) into think- century (Schmitt 2004a). The coherence ing that similarly it denotes something real. theory of truth has been the more influential, In other words, it is wrong to interpret the particularly within the decision sciences. truth predicate as representing a genuine The correspondence and coherence theo- property (truth) of a thing, proposition, or ries of truth have been particularly influen- belief in the same way as blueness might be tial in the last century or so and these will considered to be a property. These deflation- be contrasted here. Both are substantive ary approaches (Lowe 1995, Schmitt 2004b) approaches in that both hold that truth propose that the truth predicate exists to exists and that it is a property of, or a rela- fulfil a purely linguistic function enabling tion involving a “truth-bearer” (that is, a speakers to do certain things, such as express proposition, sentence, or belief-state) and agreement with one another. a theoretical, omniscient “cogniser”. Cor- Another distinction that can be made respondence approaches propose that truth regarding theories of truth is between lin- is correspondence with “the way the world guistically- and epistemically-oriented is” and is independent from the cogniser, approaches. Modern, linguistically-oriented whereas coherence approaches argue that approaches attempt to analyse the meaning truth is coherence between truth-bearers of words and grammar to logically identify and include relationships between the and describe the nature of truth. In contrast, truth-bearer and the ideal cogniser (Schmitt epistemic approaches argue that the linguis- 2004c). Thus, truth is not independent from tic approaches fail to give an account of truth the cogniser and contains elements of sub- that allows us to understand how the notion jectivity. Correspondence theories have their of truth contributes to our efforts to know origins in Greek philosophy, whereas coher- and thus give an inadequate account of our ence theories are more modern, emerging in quest for knowledge. the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

30 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Hector — Rationality and Post-Truth

In the discussion below, two theories will monly formulated is satisfactory. Indeed, be discussed primarily in the context of pro- in a notable exchange between Austin and viding criteria for truth but some passing Strawson in 1950, (Austin 1950, Strawson observations will be made regarding their 1950), the generally accepted view is that usefulness in determining the nature of Strawson largely dismissed the commonly truth. articulated correspondence theory of truth If you subscribe to the view that a physi- as a means for understanding the meaning cal world (Popper’s World One) does exist, of truth, demonstrating that the argument independent of the human mind, then it was circular (Hamlyn 1962, Sainsbury 1998, follows that there must be truth-bearers Searle 1995). However, Strawson did not that can be independently and objectively deal with the usefulness of the correspond- evaluated. That is, observations about the ence theory as a criterion for determining physical world must be viewed from a cor- truth. respondence perspective. Hence, science Surprisingly, in the philosophical liter- is predominantly about correspondence: ature of the last century or so, the corre- making propositions and evaluating them, spondence and coherence approaches have independent of the observer. Now there are generally been placed in opposition to one all sorts of philosophical objections to this. another. But even if you accept the dubious There is a strong argument that much scien- claim that the two are opposed, this is only tific enquiry is socially determined — even the case when they are used as definitional down to questions that scientists decide to theories of truth (that is, the meaning of the investigate — but it is difficult to avoid the truth-predicate). When considered just in conclusion that there should be able to be the context of being criteria for truth, the truth-bearers formulated that can be objec- two approaches can be complementary and tively evaluated, even if we can never really provide valuable insights into issues. The achieve observer independence. theoretical limitation is only that they cannot On the other hand, Popper’s World Two provide sufficient justification to determine and many World Three phenomena cannot truth with absolute certainty. be dissociated from the cogniser, because Perhaps this might be clearer with an they are entirely products of human thought. example. I can make a statement, “the Thus, they can only be evaluated using a book is blue,” and assert that this statement coherence approach. contains the truth. The coherence theorist It is important to note that this conclu- might then ask: how do I sense and perceive sion is not based on the claim that accept- blue light? Is my perception of blueness the ance of realism requires the correspond- same as someone else’s? The correspond- ence theory of truth. It is simply that if a ence theorist argues that the statement does real world independent of human thought not require someone to think about it: it is exists, human thought needs a way to form either true or it is false. I can use a spectro- accurate representations that in some way photometer to see whether the wavelength correspond to these independent real-world of the light being reflected by the book is phenomena. Nor is this to argue that the about 475 nanometres: if it is, the statement correspondence theory of truth as com- is true. The most complete answer lies in a

31 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Hector — Rationality and Post-Truth combination of both the coherence and cor- , astrophysics, chemis- respondence approaches: if the light is at 475 try, and biology) and should be considered nm, it is blue light, so the book is blue. But correspondence-theoretically. And, as noted the perception of blueness may be different above, the correspondence approach pro- from person to person. I am colour-blind vides the means for determining whether and I am fairly confident that my perception our understanding of real-world phenom- of blueness is different to about 93% of the ena is true. Hence, in structuring the highly men and about 99.5% of the women in this complex problems of the 21st century, it is room. We cannot be certain how another important to establish as much of the prob- person perceives blueness but science pro- lem content as possible within an objective vides us with the means to finding an objec- domain so that it can be tested using cor- tive answer to the question. respondence criteria, without compromis- This distinction, I think, is at the heart ing the need to utilise coherence criteria in of the point that C.P. Snow tried to make relation to those things that are subjectively in his controversial essay, “The two cultures” determined. (1959). The is largely Let us now turn to the subject of ration- based on the correspondence approach (but ality. recognising that some questions are socially Rationality influenced), whereas the social sciences and the humanities refer more to the coherence All conscious animals need to make sense of approach because of the subjectivity in most the uncertainty they encounter in the world, of the issues they consider. The problem is and must either adapt to it or control it. To that scientists and technologists are reluc- do this they form mental representations of tant to recognise the social determinants that the world, based on the information they influence their investigations and outcomes, receive through their senses. They then react while those in the humanities and social sci- and behave accordingly (Polanyi 1957). As ences can be dismissive of expert opinion, Epstein (1994) puts it, they form a theory of even when it is based on overwhelming reality — a world theory — by which they scientific evidence. If we really want to see relate their own existence to the real-world knowledge advance, we should recognise the phenomena they encounter. This form of importance of both approaches to truth and cognition is intuitive. In humans, intuitive use them together. thought is experiential: it relies heavily on In summary, the important point is this. visual insight and the recognition of patterns The coherence approach (in its criteriologi- that emerge from complex systems. It is ori- cal sense) is useful as a criterion of truth for ented toward immediate action and it leads beliefs, statements, or theories about things to the formation of images that are persist- that are subjectively determined, that is, ent and slow to change. Intuition is experi- about norms, values, morals, ethics, aesthet- enced both passively and subconsciously and ics and so on. But there are some beliefs, is affected by emotion. Judgements arising statements, and theories about things where from intuition are compelling and bring with the aim of inquiry is for them to be objec- them a feeling of certainty and infallibility: tively determined (for example, mathematics, they appear to be self-evident. Indeed, we often see as irrational people who disagree

32 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Hector — Rationality and Post-Truth with our intuitively-determined judgements. (1991) (narrative/propositional), Hammond Intuitive cognition is often thought of as (1996) (analytical/intuitive) and Stanovich being imaginative, creative and even mysteri- and West (2000) (system 1/system 2), to ous. (Hammond 1996). name but a few. But humans have also developed a second These have generally been taken to be form of thought that is rational and analyti- dichotomous, rather than a complementary cal in nature. “cognitive continuum”, that recognises the This form of cognition is logical and importance of both forms of cognition. But derives from conscious understanding and if we do consider the two as a continuum, appraisal of real-world phenomena in the they give a much greater insight into the context of the individual’s own thoughts. “commonsense” nature of human thought. Analytical thinking is slower to process but Humans seem to be the only species to have can change rapidly: eureka moments. It developed such a sophisticated analytical rea- exists in the abstract and is denoted through soning capacity and this has made our spe- language and other symbols, such as num- cies very successful. It is the combination of bers. Unlike intuition, analytical cognition is these two aspects of human thought upon active and conscious: the individual controls which our view of rationality is constructed. its own thoughts and has the capacity for Our belief systems are largely a product of self-awareness and to be self-reflective. It is intuitive thinking and it takes a great deal based on evidence and logic (even if the logic of effort to undertake the rigorous analytical might be flawed). Importantly, the argument thinking needed for us to be truly rational. is retraceable. Epstein (1994) refers to this as Ultimately, the purpose of all this is to the “self theory”. Thus, the complete theory determine whether a judgement, a choice, of reality for a human is a cognitive system or a decision is likely to be successful. There consisting of a world-theory that emerges are two essential aspects to this. First, is the from intuitive thought and a complemen- judgement coherent with the prevailing tary self-theory that comes from analysis paradigm? And, second, is the judgement and reason. accurate? Does it correspond to established, Such a concept of a bimodal system of accepted facts? Both are necessary but nei- cognition is by no means new. The ancient ther is sufficient. For example, a rationally- Greek philosophers distinguished between determined judgement may not be accurate scientific knowledge and intuition (Aristo- because it is based on a wrong paradigm. tle 350BCE), as did early philosophers of And a judgement made through erroneous the modern era, for example, Pascal (1660) thinking (or is based on a wrong paradigm) in noting the difference between the math- may be accurate purely by chance. In other ematical and the intuitive mind. More words, for a judgement to be ultimately suc- recently various versions of a bimodal system cessful, it needs to correspond with observed of cognition have been developed, for exam- facts and phenomena and it must be coher- ple, Polanyi (1957) (problem-solving/heu- ent with our best objective understanding of ristic), Simon (1983) (bounded rationality/ the way the world works. intuitive rationality), Tversky and Kahne- This sounds quite straightforward but man (1983), (extensional/intuitive), Bruner cognitive psychologists have found we are

33 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Hector — Rationality and Post-Truth

prone to major errors in both our intui- experienced practitioners were subject to tive and analytical thinking. I will discuss these biases “when they think intuitively”. briefly two of the more influential areas of Furthermore, they noted that “the inher- research into this. An early pioneer in the ently subjective nature of probability has led area was Kenneth Hammond, who, in the many students to believe that coherence, or 1950s, developed a theory by Egon Brunswik internal consistency, is the only valid crite- on perception. He observed that people rion by which judged probability should be respond to various cues that they perceive evaluated”. They go on to say, “for judged and interpret. Each individual receives dif- probabilities to be considered adequate, or ferent cues and interprets them differently. rational, internal consistency is not enough. This gave rise to what Brunswick called the The judgements must be compatible with “lens model”. Just as an optical lens presents the entire web of beliefs held by the indi- a different image to observers, depending vidual ... the rational judge ... will attempt on their relative position, in much the same to make his probability judgements compat- way, people form different perceptions of ible with his knowledge about the subject situations because the cues they receive are matter, the laws of probability, and his own different and so their interpretations also judgemental heuristics and biases” (Tversky differ. Hence, it is to be expected that people and Kahneman 1974: 1130). reach different conclusions about the nature What Tversky and Kahneman referred of the problem from apparently identical to as “heuristics” are biases introduced observations.1 through the application of intuitive rather The second stream of research that has than analytical judgement. Further work become particularly influential in the last was done in a number of areas of profes- couple of decades relates to bias and error, sional practice, confirming the existence of particularly in intuitive thinking. The work bias in intuitive thinking (for example, in of Tversky and Kahneman was particu- finance (Slovic 1972), the judicial system larly influential. (For example, Tversky and (Carroll 1978), medical diagnosis and choice Kahneman (1974), Tversky and Kahneman of treatment (McNeil et al. 1982), clinical (1986), and Kahneman and Tversky (1984) diagnosis (Arkes 1981, Kleinmuntz 1984), found that both laymen and experienced and public policy decision-making (Thaler practitioners were subject to these biases.) 1983). This has led to a particularly pessimis- They investigated why people make appar- tic view regarding human judgement: that it ently simple mistakes in estimating prob- is irrational and untrustworthy. But many of abilities. Further investigation in several these researchers appear to have overlooked areas of professional practice confirmed the the caveat noted above, that Tversky and existence of bias (for example, in finance, Kahneman (and others, for example, Arkes the judicial system, medical diagnosis and (1981)) identified: bias is primarily a prob- choice of treatment, and public policy for- lem with intuitive judgement, not with mulation). rational judgement. In the first of these papers, Tversky and Indeed, a comprehensive review of deci- Kahneman found that both layman and sion-making errors presented by Fraser et al. (1992) suggests that, by understanding the 1 See also Enfield (2018) - Ed.

34 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Hector — Rationality and Post-Truth source of bias, often it can be removed from intuitive thought with the power of analy- the problem situation. For example, bias due sis to recognise the differences in percep- to the practitioner not understanding the tion and the bias introduced due to our problem adequately, erroneous assumptions intuitive thinking. This process of creativity, regarding problem data (such as probability combined with rigorous criticism, enables data), differences in assumptions between them to develop deep and rich subjective the practitioner and the observer, can give and objective knowledge and thereby form the appearance of bias where, upon closer a more comprehensive understanding of the examination, none exists. More specifi- world. cally, Nisbett et al. (1987) demonstrated In this brief review, I have argued that that training in inference enhances rational there is a remarkable consistency and con- thinking; Gigerenzer et al. (1991) showed vergence in the philosophy and psychology that when carefully analysed, some biases around both the nature of truth and criteria actually did not contravene probability for distinguishing between truth and falsity. theory and Lopes (1991) showed that with Both are important in understanding the more rigorous application of methodology, way in which humans make complex deci- some biases are reduced or disappear. sions and try to form rational judgements. But there is another important issue that Post-Truth emerges from this work on the rational- ity of human decision-making. Examples Let me now turn to post-truth and why I from law, medicine, science, and engineering think it poses such a threat to free, open soci- show that where intuition encroaches upon eties. If you look back over history, whenever the domain where analysis is required, the there has been a major change in the tech- application of intuition can lead to blindly nology of communication, social disruption over-confident judgements and decisions and change follows. Sometimes this is for the (Hammond (1996) p106). But to set aside better but often for the worse. The printing- the value of intuitive thought based on this press was used to great effect during the Ref- would be to overlook the great benefit that ormation, with the distribution of drawings derives from the creativity and insight of and pamphlets. The first English newspapers intuition across all aspects of human crea- were started in London in the 1660s at a tivity, from mathematics and science, to time of great social upheaval that gave birth the arts and humanities. A more optimistic to many of our modern institutions. interpretation of the relationship between Large-scale, automated printing-presses intuition and analysis is that in specific were developed in the 1850s and the daily instances, people may appear irrational but newspaper became possible. Together with are less so in the context of the entire prob- photography, which was also invented at lem situation; and that bias can be reduced if about this time, newspapers were major appropriate steps are taken, such as training influences in the American Civil War. Not the individual and appropriate selection of long after the invention of pictures, analytical methodologies. they were seized upon as a propaganda tool Very successful people seem to meld the and were used to sway public sentiment insight and creativity that derives from during World War I. Russia and Germany both embraced motion pictures and estab-

35 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Hector — Rationality and Post-Truth lished government-sponsored film industries. nature, these appeal to and reinforce per- In 1933, Hitler created the Reich Ministry sonal bias and prejudice. for People’s Enlightenment and Propaganda, Shrewd communicators, from shock-jocks run by Joseph Goebbels. It was used to great to politicians can now exploit this to directly effect in the Holocaust. Wherever you find target the individual, play to influence and a totalitarian regime, you will find a state- sentiment, and to shape public opinion. In sponsored ministry of information. such an environment, truth becomes one of The difference between totalitarian propa- the first casualties as the sheer volume of dis- ganda machines and the free press of open information and misinformation drowns out societies is that the free press aims for truth rationally-determined knowledge. This has in reporting, however imperfectly. This much the same effect as totalitarian propa- holds the establishment and its institutions ganda ministries: it erodes people’s trust in to account and thereby helps to maintain established institutions, replacing it with a our trust in them. Totalitarian propaganda false trust in belief-centric half-truths and units create false trust by deliberately pro- falsehoods that are loaded with disinforma- ducing disinformation and misinformation tion and misinformation and carefully avoid to conceal aspects of the truth, to support critique. For evidence of this, look no further the regime. than the misleading innuendo and deliber- The development of the World Wide Web ate lies that were propagated through social in the 1990s and the 24-hour availability of media in the Brexit referendum, the 2016 news has marginalised the established news US Presidential election, virtually every elec- media. The emergence of social media with tion in Australia of the last decade and the the extraordinary penetration of Facebook endless discussion around climate change. and Twitter has brought about a funda- mental change in the way in which news Conclusion is delivered to consumers and the political So, what can we do about it? The challenge discourse unfolds. News is no longer dis- is predominantly one of leadership. Lead- tributed via universally-accessible media. ers should critically evaluate propositions Rather, algorithms used by Facebook, Twit- in the light of fact and reason, while at the ter and Google deliver news, based on your same time recognising their own fallibility. search preferences. These companies do not We should be clear on what we mean by uncover news themselves but parasitically “truth”. We should insist that the criteria harvest information from established com- we use to distinguish truth from falsity are panies that invest in the human and financial clear. We should recognise the shortcom- resources needed to report it and many other ings of human cognition. We should insist sources as well. This so-called news is not on the same rigour from others. We should about the dissemination of objective infor- be vocal in our criticism when we see truth mation. It is about marketing a commodity being compromised. We must not let public called “content”, regardless of its truth, to an policy-making enter the domain of unsub- audience segmented down to the individual, stantiated, untrue dogma and belief. We driven solely by data analytics, marketing must protect the institutions of our society strategies and search engines. By their very by holding those who run them to account and supporting them in adversity. The more

36 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Hector — Rationality and Post-Truth we strengthen these institutions, the more Hamlyn, D. W. (1962) The correspondence people will be inclined to place their trust theory of truth, The Philosophical Quarterly, in them, rather than the ill-informed and 12, 48, 193-205. Hammond, K. R. (1996) Human Judgement deliberately misleading chatter they find on and Social Policy: irreducible uncertainty, the internet. inevitable error, unavoidable justice, Oxford U. Two centuries ago, Keats wrote, “truth is P., New York, 60-68. beauty”; last November, the leader in The Kahneman, D. & Tversky, A. (1984) Choices, Economist said, “truth is hard work”. Both values, and frames, American Psychologist, 39, 4, 341-350. were right. Kleinmuntz, B. (1984) The scientific study References of clinical judgment in psychology and medicine, Clinical Psychology Review, 4, 111- Aristotle (350BCE) Nicomachaean Ethics, 126. Translated by W. D. Ross. This web edition Lopes, L. L. (1991) The rhetoric of irrationality, published by eBooks@Adelaide: http://etext. Theory and Psychology, 1, 1, 65-82. library.adelaide.edu.au. Lowe, E. J. (1995) “Truth”, in Honderich, T. Arkes, H. R. (1981) Impediments to accurate (Ed.) The Oxford Companion to Philosophy, clinical judgment and possible ways to Oxford U. P., Oxford, 881-882. minimise their impact, Journal of Consulting McNeil, B. J., Sox, H. C. & Tversky, A. and Clinical Psychology, 49, 3, 323-330. (1982) On the elicitation of preferences Austin, J. (1950) Truth, Supplement to the for alternative therapies, New England Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 24, 111- Journal of Medicine, 306, 21, (Reprinted 128. in: Connolly, T., Arkes, H.R., Hammond, Bruner, J. S. (1991) The narrative construction K.R. (ed.), (2000), Judgement and Decision of reality, Critical Inquiry, 18, 1, 1-21. Making: an interdisciplinary reader (2nd Edn.), Carroll, J. S. (1978) Causal theories of crime Cambridge U. P., Cambridge, pp 272-280, and their effect upon expert parole decisions, 1259-1262. Law and Human Behaviour, 2, 4, 377-388. Nisbett, R., Fong, G. T. & Cheng, P. W. Davidson, D. (1990) The structure and (1987) Teaching reasoning, Science, New content of truth, The Journal of Philosophy, Series, 238, 4827, 625-631. 87, 6, 279-328. Pascal, B. (1660) Penseés, (Translated by Enfield, N. J. (2018) Mind, language and H.Trotter. http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/ rational discourse, Journal & Proceedings of mod/1660pascal-pensees.htm -- accessed 2 the Royal Society of New South Wales, 151, this Jun 2007.). issue. Polanyi, M. (1957) Problem solving, British Epstein, S. (1994) Integration of the cognitive Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 8, 30, and psychodynamics unconscious, American 89-103. Psychologist, 49, 8, 709-724. Popper, K. R. (1972) Objective Knowledge: an Fraser, J. M., Smith, P. J. & Smith, J. W. evolutionary approach, 2nd edn., Oxford U. P., (1992) A catalog of errors, International Oxford, 153. Journal of Man-Machine Studies, 37, 3, 265- Sainsbury, M. (1998) “Philosophical logic: 307. truth”, in Grayling, A. C. (Ed.) Philosophy Gigerenzer, G., Hoffrage, U. & Kleinbölting, 1: A Guide Through the Subject, Oxford U. P., H. (1991) Probabilistic mental models: Oxford, 105-114. a Brunswikian theory of confidence, Schmitt, F. F. (2004a) “Coherence theories of Psychological Review, 98, 4, 506-528. truth”, in Schmitt, F. F. (Ed.) Theories of truth, Haack, S. (1976) The pragmatist theory of truth, The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 27, 3, 231-249.

37 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Hector — Rationality and Post-Truth

Blackwell Publishing Ltd, Malden, MA, USA, implications for the rationality debate, 11-16. Behavioural and Brain Sciences, 23, 82. Schmitt, F. F. (2004b) “Deflationary theories Strawson, P. F. (1950) Truth, Supplement to of truth”, in Schmitt, F. F. (Ed.) Theories of the Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 24, truth, Blackwell Publishing Ltd, Malden, MA, 129-156. USA, 29. Thaler, R. H. (1983) Illusions, mirages, and Schmitt, F. F. (2004c) “Truth: an introduction”, public policy, Public Interest, 3, (re-printed in Schmitt, F. F. (Ed.) Blackwell Publishing in: Connolly, T., Arkes, H.R., Hammond, Ltd, Malden, MA, USA, 1-2. K.R. (ed.), (2000), Judgement and Decision Searle, J. R. (1995) The construction of social Making: an interdisciplinary reader (2nd edn.), reality, The Free Press, New York, 199-226. Cambridge U. P., Cambridge, pp 85-96, Simon, H. A. (1983) “Alternative visions 60-74. of rationality”, Reason in human affairs, Tversky, A. & Kahneman, D. (1974) Blackwell Publishing Ltd, Oxford, UK. Judgment under uncertainty: heuristics and Slovic, P. (1972) Psychological study of human biases, Science, New Series, 185, 4157, 1124- judgment: implications for investment 1131. decision-making, The Journal of Finance, 27, Tversky, A. & Kahneman, D. (1983) 4, 779-799. Extensional versus intuitive reasoning. The Snow, C. P. (1959) The Two Cultures and the conjunction fallacy in probability judgement, Scientific Revolution,Cambridge U.P. Psychological Review, 90, 4, 293-315. Stanovich, K. E. & West, R. F. (2000) Tversky, A. & Kahneman, D. (1986) Rational Individual differences in reasoning – choice and framing of decisions, Journal of Business, 59, 4, S251-S278.

Donald Hector AM PhD FRSN is a chemical engineer with extensive experience in large- scale industrial processing and the evaluation and commercialisation of new technologies. He was managing director of Dow Corning Australia and the executive director responsible for the Australian/, ASEAN and Indian subsidiaries of Dow Corning Corpora- tion, a high-technology, American multi-national company. He was also managing director of Asia Pacific Specialty Chemicals Ltd, an ASX-listed specialty chemicals and food-additives company and has been a non-executive chairman and director of ASX-listed and private companies and not-for-profit organisations. He is a Vice President and former President of the Royal Society of NSW.

38 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 39–44. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010039-06

Wind Turbine Syndrome: a communicated disease

Simon Chapman AO Emeritus professor, School of Public Health, Email: [email protected]

Introduction Previous Anxieties he world faces an existential threat from New technology has a long history of Tclimate change, and the transition to attracting prolonged, impassioned and often clean, renewable energy is front and centre crackpot attacks from those both fearful of global hopes for avoiding some of the of and hostile toward mephistophilean worst forecasts. Today, remarkably, Australia artifice that offends the existing order of has no peak national body or commission things. Linda Simon’s history of electricity, for climate change. Yet thanks to the efforts Dark Light: Electricity and Anxiety from the of four cross-bench politicians whose votes Telegraph to the X-ray (Simon 2004), notes were courted by an appeasing government, that, although the discovery of electricity we do have a Commissioner for Wind generated excitement and electricity com- Farms. The National Health and Medical panies worked hard to build the market for Research Council has no dedicated program electrical power: “more than thirty years after of research focused on climate change, but Thomas Edison invented the incandescent it has a dedicated research fund for research bulb in 1879 and soon afterwards installed a on wind-farm disease (NHMRC 2015) lighting system in a business section of lower which, as we shall see, is demonstrably a Manhattan, barely 10 per cent of Ameri- non-disease. can homes were wired. Even after the First This paper considers how this happened World War that percentage rose only to 20 and what it says about the erosion of truth per cent.” in the post-factual era. But, first, some One reason for this was that community historical context because it is important to anxiety about the safety of electricity was understand that what we today call “fake widespread, with many news reports being news” has long been part of popular culture published about the calamities that electric- in the form of factoids: items of unreliable ity caused those foolish enough to embrace it. information that are reported and repeated Some also worried about going blind from so often that they become accepted as fact. reading by electric light. On 10 May 1889, Social media has massively facilitated the Science noted: contagion of factoids. Bogus statements A new disease, called photo-electric oph- passed around face-to-face social networks thalmia, is described as due to the contin- in the pre-digital era moved at glacial pace ual action of the electric light on the eyes. compared with the speed at which claims The patient is awakened in the night by circulate today. severe pain around the eye, accompanied by an excessive secretion of tears. (Simon 2004, xvii)

39 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Chapman — Wind Turbine Syndrome

On 24 September in the same year, the Brit- In recent years, we’ve seen apocalyptic pre- ish Medical Journal carried a report that the dictions made about mobile phones doing newly popular telephone could cause ‘‘tel- to brain cancer what smoking did to lung ephone tinnitus,” claiming that victims ‘‘suf- cancer. Unfortunately for these forecasters, fered from nervous excitability, with buzzing the incidence of brain cancer has flat-lined noises in the ear, giddiness, and neuralgic for over thirty years while mobile phone use pains’’ (Simon 2004, xvii). has been almost universal for about 15 years The article contextualised the perils of (Chapman et al. 2016) these new contraptions: In 2006, two authors writing in Electro- As civilization advances, new diseases are magnetic Biology and Medicine (Hallberg and not only discovered, but are actually pro- Oberfeld 2006) predicted that by the end duced by the novel agencies which are of 2017, 50% of the world’s entire popula- brought to bear on man’s body and mind ... tion would be suffering from electrosensi- almost every addition which science makes tivity and hoping to beat a retreat to the to the convenience of the majority seems world’s ever-retreating electricity-free havens. to bring with it some new forms of suffer- Alarmingly, at this Society’s 2017 Forum ing to the few. Railway travelling its amari there were only about 30 days to go. aliquid in the shape of slight but possibly The most recent panics about “modern not unimportant jolting of the nervous worries” include Wifi, smart electricity centres; the electric light has already cre- meters, solar panels on roofs and my focus ated a special fear of ophthalmia; and now today, wind turbines. we have the telephone indicted as a cause Wind Turbines of ear troubles, which react on the spirits, My new book with Fiona Crichton, Wind and indirectly on general health. Turbine Syndrome: a Communicated Disease, George Miller Beard, the prominent US is published by Sydney University Press neurologist, promoted what became the (Chapman and Crichton 2018). I now sum- common diagnosis of neurasthenia from marise why it is clear that adverse reactions around 1869 (Beard 1881). His central to wind turbines are case-book examples of was that modern living and the pace psychogenic illness which spread by exposure of life among the well-to-do was causing a to negative publicity. I will then focus on the proliferation in a range of progressive symp- opposition to wind farms in Australia and the toms. forlorn factoid “science” that has driven it. Among the causes of all this nervousness, In our book, we list 247 different dis- Beard included several new-fangled inven- eases and symptoms in humans and animals tions: “wireless telegraphy, science, steam which have been attributed by wind-farm power, newspapers and the education of opponents to wind farms and particularly to women; in other words, modern civiliza- sub-audible infrasound. These include lung tion”. cancer, skin cancer, haemorrhoids, gain- I am old enough to have lived through ing weight, losing weight and my favourite, evidence-free public anxieties about tel- disoriented echidnas. But most are classic evision sets, electric blankets, microwave symptoms of anxiety: things that can happen ovens, power lines and computer screens. to you when you are very worried.

40 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Chapman — Wind Turbine Syndrome

From at least the time of Francis Bacon in 6 farms in Australia have had 74% of all the 15th century, scholars have observed that complaints (Chapman et al. 2013); people can worry themselves sick. (“infec- • Those with negative views about wind tions…if you fear them, you call them upon farms are more likely to report symptoms you”) (Bacon 2005). The nocebo effect, the than those with positive views; evil twin sibling of the healing placebo effect, • Those being paid to host turbines very has been documented in a vast research lit- rarely complain, suggesting that the drug erature in both clinical and real-world set- “money” may be a powerful preventive; tings, including in relation to wind farms (Crichton et al. 2014). When some people • Claims about only “susceptible” individ- are exposed to frightening information about uals, like those who get motion sickness agents or exposures, expectancy effects just while others don’t, struggle to explain why as powerful as placebo effects can operate there are apparently no susceptible people to make people feel sick with worry or anxi- in, for example, all of Western Australian ety. or Tasmania, where they are wind farms However, 25 scientific reviews published but no records of health complaints; since 2003 (Chapman and Simonetti 2015) • Claims about “over 40” Australian fami- have concluded that there is very poor evi- lies having to abandon their infrasound dence for any claim that wind turbines affected homes have never been validated, are the direct cause of any disease. For any with those making the claims saying that social scientist, there is a herd of uncontested many of the “wind-farm refugees” do not elephants in the room that points unavoid- want publicity; ably to a conclusion that “wind turbine syn- • While some complain of acute effects drome” is a communicated disease: you catch within minutes of exposure, the first it by hearing about it and then worrying known complaints about wind farms date about it. from 2002, although many wind farms In our book, we summarise what we were operational for many years prior to know: that. So why then were there no reported • A small minority of wind farms have a acute effects occurring prior to 2002? small minority of residents who claim to • Experimental subjects randomised to be be affected. The direct causation hypoth- exposed or not exposed to negative news esis would predict that all wind farms footage about harms and then should affect some people; exposed to infrasound and sham infra- • The great majority of complaints occur in sound show that prior exposure to anxiety- English-speaking nations, despite the pro- producing messages increases reporting of liferation of wind farms in Europe, China, symptoms (Crichton et al. 2014) even to and many other non-English speaking sham infrasound. nations. Somehow, it is a disease that only We devote a chapter to exploring the eccen- speaks English? tric views of several of Australia’s most prom- • Wind farms with a history of being tar- inent opponents of wind farms, including geted by opposition groups are more what courts have said about their professed “affected” by wind turbine syndrome. Just expertise. For example, Sarah Laurie, an

41 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Chapman — Wind Turbine Syndrome

unregistered doctor told a South Austral- won a Noble prize, whatever that might be. ian court in 2011 that wind turbines can (Chapman and Crichton 2017: 216). make people’s lips vibrate “from a distance Mr Noel Dean, an objector from the of 10 kilometres away” (Barnard 2014). Waubra area in Victoria, once told an anti- That’s about the distance from downtown wind-farm meeting at Baringhup in Victoria Sydney to the northern suburb of Chats- in 2013 that wind turbines started charging wood. Indeed, she believes these vibrations his mobile phone without it being plugged are “sufficient to knock them off their feet in (Chapman and Crichton 2017: 216): or bring some men to their knees when out “I’ve had my … mobile phone go into charge working in their paddock”. The television mode in the middle of the paddock, away program “Myth Busters” may find that an from everywhere.” interesting claim to put to the test. This extraordinary claim would certainly Laurie also claims some people are “so be of great interest to manufacturers of exquisitely sensitised to certain frequen- mobile phones, who to date have apparently cies that their perception of very, very low not advised that this remarkable charging frequency is right off the shape of the bell ability is something all phone users should curve, such that they can, for example, from be aware of. Australia, perceive an earthquake in Chile.” Ann Gardner, perhaps Australia’s most Chile is a mere 11,365 kilometres from Aus- prolific wind-farm complainant, believes tralia’s east coast. she is adversely affected by wind turbines Mr George Papadopolous, a rural phar- even when they are switched off (Chapman macist, may be such a person. He has written and Crichton 2017: 120). that, “On another occasion, and by far the And finally, Bruce Rapley, who in 1995 worst of all days, the problem had dissipated publicised the visit to New Zealand of a when arriving at Young about 100km from prominent Australian anti-immunisation the closest turbines … Truly these figures advocate, worked up to a farrago of outrage appear subjective, outrageous, and for most, in his oral evidence to the 2015 Senate wind impossible to believe. However, I am report- farm committee: ing my findings that have taken hours and In the future, I believe that the adverse days to determine. I’m not just plucking health effects of wind turbines will eclipse figures out of the air” (Papadopolous 2012). the asbestos problem in the annals of his- Mr Papadopolous for a time worked as an tory. In my opinion, the greed and sci- “assessor” for something called the Geovi- entific half-truths from the wind indus- tal Academy, an entity which sells blankets, try will be seen by history as one of the shields, paints and pillows to protect gulli- worst corporate and government abuses of ble people from the evils of electromagnetic democracy in the 21st century (Chapman radiation invading their houses. Its website and Crichton 2017: 218). once had an endorsement from “Noble The World Health Organization estimates [sic] Prize winner Ivan Engler Dr.med.univ., that 125 million people are today occupa- PhD.” No one named Ivan Engler ever won tionally exposed to asbestos and that about a Nobel Prize in any category. He may have half of all occupational cancers are asbestos- caused (WHO 2017).

42 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Chapman — Wind Turbine Syndrome

The sort of claptrap I have described is ward questions about the claims made by what passes for science and evidence in the anti-wind-farm interests. imaginary “debate” that has now caused These have included: the Australian parliament and two state • Serial complaints to senior officials in my parliaments to investigate wind farms on university that I was belittling wind-farm no fewer than five occasions between 2011 victims. Their claims were apparently and 2015. beyond question; By far the most egregious of these was • Taunts that I refused to ever meet vic- the 2015 Senate enquiry (Commonweath tims and “see for myself” (I was never 2015) headed by ex-Senator John Madigan, invited); a blacksmith before entering parliament. The Madigan Committee’s report is a trav- • Taunts that I should get a wind turbine in esty of science. It failed to even mention my own garden; what is universally acknowledged to be the • Complaints to my institutional ethics largest, most robust and important longitu- committee that I was conducting research dinal study of wind farms and health run by without ethics approval; Health Canada (2014). This study provided • Constant false claims that I am in the pay no support for the direct cause hypothesis. of the wind industry; The $2.5m Office of the Wind Farm • Regular attacks on my academic creden- Commissioner released its first annual report tials; (ONWFC 2017) in 2017. As anyone follow- • Attacks under parliamentary privilege (by ing this issue closely could have predicted, it two politicians); was not stampeded by complainants. Wind-farm opponents have grasped the • Two defamation suits; straw that the evidence that wind turbines • Regular slander on an anonymous web- are dangerous is poor, and argue that we site. therefore need to invest in research that they just know will prove their point. There’s also Conclusion “poor evidence” that UFOs, the Loch Ness The history of social panics over new tech- monster and leprechauns exist, but no seri- nology shows they have a natural history. ous scientific body thinks investing research There are doubtless a few people left who in such claims is sensible, other than the still fear television sets and microwave ovens. politically pressured NHMRC which in The heyday of fearing cell phone towers came 2015 allocated $2.5 million into wind and and went in the 1990s. Wind-farm anxiety health research. is now thankfully rapidly receding, with the A senior NHMRC official wrote that the desultory complaint volumes submitted to decision to allocate funding to wind turbine the Wind Commissioner [24] showing the and health research reflected the “macro- phenomenon has all but passed. political environment.” But the delays this panic caused in driving Let me finish by describing the tactics that Australian renewable energy harvesting were have been used against my efforts to ask awk- major. Our book’s final chapter explores the

43 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Chapman — Wind Turbine Syndrome lessons in how we might avoid the next wave Crichton, F., Chapman, S., Cundy, T., of “modern health worries.” Petrie, K.J. (2014) The link between health complaints and wind turbines: support References for the nocebo expectations hypothesis. Frontiers in Public Health doi: 10.3389/ Bacon, F. ([1597] 2005). “Of envy,” in The essays or counsels civil and moral of fpubh.2014.00220 Crichton, F., Dodd, G., Schmid, G., Gamble, Francis Bacon. Digital edition at http://bit. G., Petrie, K.J. (2014) Can expectations ly/2yOMpm4 produce symptoms from infrasound Barnard, M. (2012) Bad day in court associated with wind turbines? Health for anti-wind campaigner Sarah Laurie. Psychology, Apr 33(4):360-4. doi: 10.1037/ RenewEconomy, Nov 27. http://bit. a0031760. ly/2i7LdT0 Hallberg, O., Oberfeld, G. (2006) Will we Beard, G.M. (1881) American Nervousness, Its Electromagnetic Causes and Consequences: A Supplement to all become electrosensitive? Biology and Medicine 25: 189–191. Nervous Exhaustion (neurasthenia), Harvard: Health Canada (2014). Wind Turbine Noise Putnam and Health Study: Summary of Results. Chapman, S., Azizi, L., Luo, Q., Sitas, F. Government of Canada, 30 October. http:// (2016) Has the incidence of brain cancer bit.ly/1wn3Joc risen in Australia since the introduction National Health and Medical Research of mobile phones 29 years ago? Cancer Council (2015). Targeted Call for Research Epidemiology 42: 199-205. (TCR) into Wind Farms and Human Health. Chapman, S., Crichton, F. (2017) Wind https://www.nhmrc.gov.au/grants-funding/ Turbine Syndrome: a Communicated Disease. apply-funding/targeted-and-urgent-calls- Sydney: Sydney U. P. https://ses.library.usyd. research/targeted-call-research-tcr-wind-farm edu.au/handle/2123/17600 Office of the National Wind Farm Chapman S., Simonetti T. (2015) Summary Commissioner (2017) Annual Report to the of main conclusions reached in 25 reviews Parliament of Australia. Canberra, 31 Mar. of the research literature on wind farms and http://bit.ly/2y7dzrn health. University of Sydney eScholarship Papadopoulos, G. (2012) Wind turbines and Repository http://bit.ly/2zQs9k9 low frequency noise: Implications for human Chapman S., St George A., Waller K., Cakic health. Wind Watch, Sep 24. http://bit. V. (2013) The pattern of complaints about ly/2ciZ7lk Australian wind farms does not match the Simon, L. (2004) Dark Light. Electricity establishment and distribution of turbines: and Anxiety from the Telegraph to the X-ray. support for the psychogenic, “communicated Orlando, Fl.: Harcourt. disease” hypothesis. PLoS One 8(10): e76584. World Health Organization. (2017) Asbestos: doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0076584, 16 Oct elimination of asbestos-related diseases. Aug. Commonwealth of Australia (2015). Select www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs343/ Committee on Wind Turbines: Final Report. en/ Senate Printing Unit, Canberra. August https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_ Business/Committees/Senate/Wind_ Turbines/Wind_Turbines/Final_Report

44 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 45–49. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010045-05

The Brexit experience — evidence, expertise, and post-truth politics

James Wilsdon University of Sheffield and INGSA Corresponding author. E-mail: [email protected]

Abstract In this brief talk, Wilsdon explores, first, what happened in 2016 and why; second, what Brexit tells us about the relationship between evidence, expertise and policy; third, is this the beginning of the end of UK evidence-informed decision-making; and, fourth, what are the prospects for evidence and expertise in post-Brexit Britain?

Introduction economists and scientists all argued for the ver the past 20 years, the UK has built UK to remain in the EU. Oup a strong reputation for the quality The referendum process itself was marred of its scientific advisory system, as exempli- by exaggeration and the use of dubious facts fied by its network of scientific advisers in and figures on both sides, but particularly by almost every department of government and the Leave campaign, and by accusations of by its willingness to experiment and inno- outside interference in the democratic pro- vate with new approaches to evidence-based cess by a range of murky and unaccountable policy making. Its early adoption of “nudge” actors, including the Russian government. approaches to behaviour change and What More evidence on the scale of this inter- Works evidence centres being two recent ference is coming to light on a daily basis, examples.1 with clear parallels to aspects of the 2016 US Presidential election. But were the activities What happened in 2016? of Russian Twitter trolls enough to swing But this seemingly progressive arc towards the outcome? This seems less likely and we the ever-greater uptake of evidence and also know a lot about the underlying eco- expertise in decision-making took a major nomic and social insecurities, dislocations knock in June 2016 with the result of the and inequalities that gave rise to the 52% referendum on UK membership of the Euro- vote for Brexit. pean Union swinging narrowly, 52% to 48%, Concern about mass migration, post- in favour of Brexit. This was despite a moun- financial-crisis austerity, combined with tain of evidence and the near unanimous more inchoate desires to strengthen UK sov- support of experts of all kinds for remain- ereignty and “take back control,” all played ing in the EU. Long lists of business leaders, their part. As opinion polling shows, what the vote highlighted more than anything was two very different value sets held by almost 1 https://www.gov.uk/guidance/what-works-network; equal proportions of the UK public. It was https://www.behaviouralinsights.co.uk/

45 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Wilsdon — The Brexit Experience

possible to predict whether voters would by academics, journalists and political go for leave or remain based on their back- commentators. In some ways, things have ground views about the value of multicul- changed. The combination of vested inter- turalism, social liberalism and feminism. The ests, whether Moscow or Murdoch, the echo older you were, the more likely you were chamber effects of social media, powerful yet to vote for Brexit. The more educated you unaccountable algorithms all pose signifi- were, the more likely you were to vote for cant challenges for the operation of liberal, remain. evidence-informed democracy. But while “post-truth” was the word of The relationship between evidence, the year in 2016, it is hardly a new problem. expertise and policy Politics has always had a relationship of con- Another striking feature of the EU referen- venience with empirical reality, and science dum campaign was the prominence it gave was never pure, as the historian of science, (unusual in mainstream British politics) to Stephen Shapin reminds us (Shapin 2010). a critical stance on the value and legitimacy What Brexit and Trump have jolted is not of evidence and expertise, most notably in the status of truth, but the assumption that the now infamous remark by Government liberal, rational, cosmopolitan democracies, Minister Michael Gove that people have had informed by relevant evidence, will lead a “enough of experts”. To be fair to Michael majority to options that appear self-evidently Gove, the full version of his quote was a bit preferable to those who have benefited from more nuanced: “I think the people of this that same liberal, rational, cosmopolitan country have had enough of experts, from order (EU membership being an obvious organisations with acronyms saying that they example). know what is best and getting it consistently But the alternative truths experienced by wrong.” Nonetheless, his remarks were seen many in our society, especially in socioeco- by many, particularly in academia, as a sign nomic terms, are very different. So, while that something had shifted in the British assumptions of a rising tide of evidence- body politic, that this was more than just an informed decision-making in the UK have ongoing and gradual decline in deference to taken a knock, I think this is less a crisis of authority; it was more visceral, more angry. truth or of expertise and more a crisis of Other episodes in recent months have democracy. In seeking to renew the legiti- heightened such concerns. For example, macy of expertise and scientific advice, our the reactions back in January 2017 by Brit- starting point should not be to dismiss pop- ish newspapers to a ruling by the Supreme ulist movements or reassert the self-evident Court that Parliament needed to vote before superiority of rational decision-making. triggering the Article 50 clause that initi- We need instead to start by repairing our ates the process of leaving the EU. Even in democratic institutions and the cultures that the tabloid press, it’s been alarming to see support them. Part of this requires greater senior judges and MPs branded enemies of humility on the part of scientists and experts, the people simply for doing their job. acknowledging that we as a community have So is this all a sign of a new “post-truth too often uncritically aligned ourselves with politics” that we inhabit? This has been the the winners at the expense of the losers, as topic of numerous books in recent months

46 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Wilsdon — The Brexit Experience a prescient piece by Colin Macilwain in brokers and policy makers. Its focus is on Nature argued six months before Trump was assisting the development of effective advi- elected (Macilwain 2016). sory systems and the individual skills and Returning to the Michael Gove quote, institutional capacities that these require, for many people, the idea that expert views irrespective of particular structural arrange- align with their interests or reflect their own ments, through workshops, conferences and experience is highly debatable. In Newcastle a growing catalogue of case studies and other just before the referendum, a Kings College guidance. London professor invoked the views of lead- In delivering Brexit, decoupling struc- ing economists before inviting the audience tures for scientific and technical advice to imagine the likely plunge in UK gross can at first glance seem deceptively simple. domestic product after Brexit. Back yelled In many areas, UK institutions map onto the woman: “That’s your bloody GDP, not EU counterparts, the UK Food Standards ours.” Her brutally simple criticism has Agency coexists with the European Food a point and populist politicians or social and Safety Authority. The European Medi- media warriors can too easily tap into these cines Agency coexists with the UK medicines anxieties caused by globalisation and rising and healthcare products regulatory agency. inequalities and channel them towards Why not shift responsibility from Brussels resentment. to London and let us Brits get on with the job? However, as I argued in this Nature The beginning of the end of UK piece (Wilsdon 2017), the difficulty is that evidence-informed decision-making? UK and EU networks of expertise, guid- But we shouldn’t despair. In the UK, as in ance and oversight are complementary and Australia and elsewhere, evidence and exper- have developed in tandem over many years. tise are being sought with growing urgency Generations of British scientists and experts across a proliferating array of policy and have shaped EU frameworks and vice versa. public questions. At the same time and often Around every issue that is codified in law on the same issues, the legitimacy of evi- or regulation, there exists a softer sphere of dence and expertise has rarely been so fiercely influence, information exchange and stand- contested, the Brexit referendum being an ard setting. acute case in point. Paradox coexists with So, in animal health, the European Food the possibility of evidence-formed decision- Safety Authority plays an important role making. We need to better understand what in coordinating data and evidence about lies behind the former and forge alliances emerging livestock diseases. The UK ben- to advance the latter. This is why the Inter- efits from being part of a network of EU national Network for Government Science reference laboratories which coordinate sur- Advice (INGSA2) was set up. veillance, risk assessment and epidemiology Operating under the auspices of the on a range of transboundary diseases, such International Council of Science, ICSU, the as avian flu. The Food Standard Authority INGSA’s membership now includes almost has drawn heavily on the European Agency’s 5000 practitioners, academics, knowledge meta-analyses and sophisticated protocols around risk and uncertainty. 2 http://www.ingsa.org

47 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Wilsdon — The Brexit Experience

In the life sciences, the UK’s 3% share of diversity of perspectives: epistemic, insti- the global pharmaceutical market is dwarfed tutional and cultural diversity, diversity in by the EU’s 25%. This brings significant disciplines, in methods, in mechanisms, in benefits from regulatory harmonisation sectors and institutions, in experiences, ide- through the European Medicines Agency. ologies, background, culture and so forth. If EMA licensing was no longer to apply, Brokering means keeping it complex; there is the association of the British pharmaceutical no single privileged view of a complex prob- industry warns of a delay for up to a year in lem and, finally, brokering means providing British patients looking to access innovative multiple alternatives. Given uncertainties treatment. and diversity of knowledge and values, there Finally, turning to environmental protec- are usually multiple plausible pathways into tion, a recent inquiry by the UK Environ- the future and choosing amongst them is mental Audit Committee estimates that up inherently political. There is a strong focus to a third of EU legislation will be difficult to on experimentation and learning in this transpose into UK law and those protections approach to scientific advice. for wildlife, for habitats, for biodiversity that can be transferred will then be detached from Evidence and expertise in post-Brexit the underpinning sources of expert advice, Britain no longer updated, with no UK body to So, can Brexit become for the UK, or indeed enforce them. Over time, the UK can build Trump for the US, less a moment of undoing up new advisory and regulatory capacity, but or unravelling of all that has been achieved, this won’t be quick or easy. and instead a point of disruption from which So, as a community, committed to we pause, learn and regroup? In a thought- strengthening evidence-informed decision- ful new paper, the Science and Technology making, we need simultaneously to work on Studies scholars Sheila Jasanoff and Hilton the structural, social and political dimen- Simmet (Jasanoff and Simmet 2017) make sions of the problem, to rebuild and develop this cautiously positive case, asking whether new capacity at the evidence­–policy interface, “the post-truth moment can be reframed as but also to address the underlying causes of a moment of revelation that neither facts disaffection with experts. Drawing on the nor values can stand alone in a government latest “evidence of evidence use,” of which founded on the principles of truthfulness this review is a good example (Langer et al., and inclusive public debate.” They suggest 2016), can steer us towards what we in the that: “without renewed attention to the INGSA network like to call the science and norms that shape the practises of public art of scientific advice. science and public reason, it would not be Providing scientific advice in a reflective possible to guide fortune’s wheel expertly way that requires learning from mistakes, along the arc of justice.” and is humble in the way it makes its case On a bad day, of which there are too many often requires a shift from scientific advice right now in British public and political life, to knowledge brokering. Brokering requires the views I’ve just presented may come across persistent interaction with decision-makers and naïve, as wishful thinking. But much as I and their context. Brokering necessitates lament the result of the EU referendum and wish it could be halted or reversed, I also

48 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Wilsdon — The Brexit Experience refuse to believe it is the death of democ- Langer, L., Tripney, J., and Gough, D. (2016) racy or the beginning of the end of evidence- The Science of Using Science: Researching the informed decision-making. That story still Use of Research Evidence in Decision-Making, London: EPPI-Centre, Social Science Research has many chapters to be written. Unit, UCL Institute of Education University College London. https://eppi.ioe.ac.uk/cms/ References Default.aspx?tabid=3504 Ball J. (2017) Post-Truth: How Bullshit Conquered Langer, L., Tripney, J., and Gough, D. the World, London: Biteback Publishing. (2016) What works: researching the use of d’Ancona M. (2017) Post Truth: The New War on research evidence, IOE London Blog, https:// Truth and How to Fight Back, London: Ebury ioelondonblog.wordpress.com/2016/09/21/ Press. what-works-researching-the-use-of-research- Davis E. (2017) Post-Truth: Why We Have evidence/ Reached Peak Bullshit and What We Can Do Macilwain C. (2016) The elephant in the room About It, Boston: Little, Brown. we can’t ignore, Nature, 531: 277, 17 March. Gluckman P. and Wilsdon J. (2016) From https://www.nature.com/news/the-elephant-in- Paradox to Principles: Where Next for the-room-we-can-t-ignore-1.19561 Scientific Advice to Governments? Palgrave Shapin S. (2010) Never Pure: Historical Studies of Communications, Vol. 2, no. 16077. https:// Science as if It Was Produced by People with Bodies, www.nature.com/articles/palcomms201677 Situated in Time, Space, Culture, and Society, Jasanoff S. and Simmet H.R. (2017) No funeral and Struggling for Credibility and Authority, bells: Public reason in a ‘post-truth’ age, Social Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Studies of Science, 47: Issue 5, 2017 http:// Wilsdon J. (2017) Brexit must preserve journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/030631 advisory networks, Nature, 543: 591, 30 2717731936?journalCode=sssb March. https://www.nature.com/news/brexit- must-preserve-advisory-networks-1.21727

49 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 50–58. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010050-09

Why are scientists so quiet? Cultural and philosophical constraints on the public voice of the scientist

Emma L. Johnston Science, UNSW, Sydney, Australia E-mail: [email protected]

Abstract In this post-truth era of virulent attacks on science and online trolls, we scientists find ourselves scrambling for a foothold in an environment in which everyone has a voice —- and in which the truth can be virtually impossible to distinguish from “fake news,” and everything else in between. How do we react as a profession to shore up our own standing, and the importance of our work and of evidence-informed decision making, when the public is struggling to recognise credible scientific knowledge within this information free-for-all? I believe we are at a turning point that will serve as the catalyst for the remaking of much of what we have long understood as the culture and “rules” of science. First, we need to turn our attention to, and seek to understand, the profound impact of new information technologies on how we “communicate science.” We need to critically analyse our own culture of knowledge-making and acknowledge and challenge the constraints that have long discour- aged scientists from speaking out, leaving many of us now stranded ineffectually on the edge of public discourse. But this is just the first and most obvious step. If we challenge our entrenched culture, we will also be forced to rethink science education and, ultimately, how we “do science;” that is, how we create knowledge, our ultimate goal. This means recognising and embracing the new opportunities that change is throwing up, rather than bemoaning the inevitable pain of disruption. To do this, we need to loosen the academic hierarchies that have “quietened” scientists, we need to teach science students to speak out and to speak up and learn how to do so ourselves. Most importantly, we need to drive the restructuring of knowledge-making by overcoming our tendency to huddle in silos, and work collaboratively instead. This paper argues that by collaborating not only across disciplines, but also in genuine partnerships with communities, businesses and industries, we can go a long way to retaining trust in, and appreciation of, the power and validity of science and the scientific process.

Introduction Darwin had been an even bigger fan of bar- am a practising scientist and science com- nacles. I read of his meticulous, painstaking I municator. Not one well-versed in the dis- study of the world’s barnacles, an effort that section of the practices. As such, I present my consumed eight years of his life and ended comments as “Notes from the field”. in a serious bout of ill health. As an ecologist and sometime evolution- Charles Darwin ary biologist myself, Darwin’s theory of natu- As a young marine scientist, I was fasci- ral selection has influenced everything I’ve nated by rather strange organisms, barnacles; investigated and interpreted. It is part of my upside down prawns stuck on their back in lens on the world. a concrete cage, grasping at waves for a life- But, it was Darwin’s reason for embarking time. Much later I discovered that Charles on his global barnacle study — while leav- ing his sensational idea for On the Origin of

50 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Johnston — Why Are Scientists So Quiet?

Species by Means of Natural Selection locked barnacle work, a ready-made community of in a drawer at home in draft form, unseen colleagues ready to recognise the importance and unread for eight years — that touched of his new theory. He was taken seriously, a nerve. not, as we know, by everybody, but by a suf- Darwin’s obsessive journey from 1846 to ficient number of his peers. 1854 into what Rebecca Stott (2003: 206) That was almost 160 ago, but the story calls ‘barnacle darkness’ in her wonderful is still relevant today, and particularly so in book was partly driven by curiosity. Of the this apparently confounding post-truth era more than a thousand species he’d brought we find ourselves living in. I say confounding back to London on the Beagle there was only because we, as academics, have all played our one he had not been able to catalogue and part in building or reinforcing our global describe. This soft, small, dun-coloured crea- culture of “knowledge-making”. ture he’d found many years earlier inside a Knowledge-making today conch shell on a Chilean beach would turn out to be a rare, burrowing barnacle. The many different hurdles and gateways But it was not just this troublesome scien- we’ve put in place to weed out unreliable, tific loose end that drove Darwin to spend biased, ill-conceived and incomplete infor- so long finessing his books on barnacles. mation are designed to ensure that by the Darwin had an “instinct for postponement”. time we present our knowledge to the world He realised he needed to prove himself as it is a close to complete as possible. As senior a scientist, and a systematizer if he was to academics, most of us are probably confident be listened to when he did, finally, publish in the authority with which we publish and his most important work, On the Origin of in the credibility of our work. Species. So, he gave his wife detailed instruc- But this structure and culture have also tions on how to handle publication of Origin had perverse consequences which go back should he die before his barnacle study was to Darwin’s story and, in some ways, to complete. my own. We have built a knowledge hier- But the first book, Living Cirripedia, A archy — and a similarly strict professional Monograph on the Sub-class Cirripedia, with hierarchy — which has not only protected figures of all the species meticulously detailed the veracity of what we produce, but has won him the Royal Society Medal in 1853. actively discouraged scientists from taking He still had the Balanidæ to go! Together part in public debates, particularly young with his geological treatise on Coral Reefs, scientists who are, as Darwin noted, yet to the barnacles books established Darwin as win their spurs. a scientist “who had won his spurs”. Stott The result, I have observed, has been to (2003: 167) argues that, “Without his bar- quieten our profession. Many successive nacle spurs and barnacle contacts, On the generations of scientists have assumed that Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection the discovery process is mostly about gen- would have been very differently received.” erating “research outputs,” that their job When Darwin finally published his theory is only to generate new knowledge, not to of natural selection in 1859, he had a global advocate or argue, but to let the facts speak web of scientific contacts forged through his for themselves.

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There are very few scientifically trained Media today public intellectuals because our structures do Now, as scientists, we find ourselves scram- not support them, and scientists rarely see bling to find a foothold in an environment themselves as public intellectuals, or advo- in which everyone has a voice, and in which cates. Indeed, many scientists understand the truth can be virtually impossible to dis- that to actively seek the public spotlight risks tinguish from “fake news,” and everything drawing the contempt of their peers. In fact, else in between. As the Yale science com- despite the many passionate arguments and munication theorist, Dan Kahan recently discussion behind the scenes — and some wrote (2017), the problem is not the much- notable exceptions of internationally recog- maligned lack of scientific literacy in many nised science voices — the public face of the of our societies. Although scientific literacy scientific community is mostly hesitant and is highly desirable, it is not essential for the tight-lipped. public to recognise what it is that science In my own case, I was acutely aware of the “knows.” scientific hierarchy as a young academic. I The real difficulty for audiences, Kahan felt just as compelled to speak publicly about argues, is “identifying who knows what science then, as I do today, but I made a about what… and distinguishing the cur- concerted effort to remain quiet, to rec- rency of genuine scientific understanding ognise, and behave in accordance with my from the multiplicity of counterfeit alterna- then junior standing. If I spoke out, I spoke tives” (Kahan, 2017). Everybody appears to strictly within the direct realm of my active be peddling facts. research. I did not use my expertise to com- But what does it mean for scientists if ment on other matters of the day, even if the “cream” does not necessarily rise to the they were marine in nature. top in an information free-for-all, as we had In Darwin’s time the quiet that this hier- optimistically postulated in the early days of archy engendered was perhaps not such an the internet? Personally, I think we need to obvious a problem as it is today. The ability recognise that we are at a turning point. to contribute ideas was already limited to We may, in future, look back at the those with access to a printing press, a stage, dynamic changes we are witnessing as the a pulpit, or a soap box. And audiences too catalyst for the remaking of some of what were relatively small. we have long understood as the “rules” of Even in my own early career, during the scientific practice. early rise of the internet, there were no First, we need to turn our attention to, “broadcast media” available to anyone with an and seek to understand, the profound impact opinion and access to a keyboard or phone of new information technologies on how we and an internet connection. We still had “communicate science.” many reliable mass media gateways, through But that is just the most obvious issue. which pre-vetted information flowed. Many I’d like to explain why I believe this must publications had specialist science writers also challenge us to rethink what we teach whom we could trust to do our communi- in science education and, ultimately, how cation for us and who also investigated the we “do science:” how we create knowledge, investigators. our ultimate goal.

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I am not pessimistic: change always satellite plan has all the hallmarks of a scien- throws up new opportunities. But we need tific investigation. A ridiculous example, per- to be able to recognise and grasp them. So, haps, but one that goes to Kahan’s concerns what is the future of rationality in a post- about the challenges of recognising credible truth world? scientific information. This is especially so Fake news, propaganda and barefaced lies when the “tools” of science (in this case a are, of course, not new. More than three cen- satellite) confuse the issue, or as he puts it turies ago Jonathan Swift famously noted “pollute the scientific communication envi- that “falsehood flies, and truth comes limp- ronment.” ing after it” (9/11/1710)1. The British novel- One thing troubled me most. In the ist, best known for Gulliver’s Travels, was also virtual world, the glossy claims of the “flat an astute political commentator and pub- earthers” or anyone else without knowledge lished various pamphlets expressing his con- or authority are only one click away from the cerns about what we might today recognise CSIRO or NASA, or any of the Academies. as post-truth facts. But in Swift’s time the We know this “flat virtual space” is fuel- distances and speeds at which “falsehoods” ling some troubling communication prac- could travel were very limited, so too was the tices, like “false balance.” When one “side” size of the audience they could reach. of an argument is just as accessible, vocal or Today, falsehoods do more than fly: they visible as the counter view, we are at risk of seem to arrive fully formed in our con- assuming an equivalence: that they are the sciousness via our screens. The internet has two sides of a “balanced debate.” dramatically accelerated and amplified the For scientists, the obvious example is the sensational, the unreliable and the blatantly way in which this faux duality has bogged untrue ­— we all know that. But there is down the climate change debate in Australia, something else we need to consider about and beyond. We see Professor Brian Cox the design, or the shape, of the virtual world. seated alongside the former One Nation Before instant digital communication, in Senator and vocal climate change denier many countries we had gateways: we chose Malcolm Roberts on ABC TV in the name news and views via publishers we trusted to of “balance,” and within minutes a lifetime have vetted them first. of study and research becomes equivalent to In researching this paper, I came across an ill-informed . the multiple websites and Facebook pages We also know that any opinion, bias or for the Society. They claim to be prejudice can find validation somewhere on places “for free thinkers and the intellectual the internet, and that automated content- exchange of ideas,”2 and their latest crowd- selection algorithms reinforce particular funding campaign is raising funds to launch views. It is difficult to counter ‘selective a satellite to prove that we “round earthers” exposure’, ‘selective perception’ and ‘selec- have been conning the masses all along. The tive retention’; others have talked in detail websites look professional enough and the and with considerable insight and knowl- edge of such matters today. In the domain 1 https://www.thoughtco.com/art-of-political-lying- of science, research shows that genuine sci- by-swift-1690138 ence news initially spread quickly online, but 2 https://www.tfes.org/

53 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Johnston — Why Are Scientists So Quiet? that rumours have greater staying power and of the past. Discouraging researchers from persist for much longer on platforms like speaking out until the knowledge they were Facebook (Cook et al., 2007).3 generating had been vetted and verified, and For climate change mitigation, something they had built a considerable cache of con- very close to my heart, this means we find text, was a powerful way to build our cred- ourselves stuck in a repetitive and redun- ibility. Our quiet culture did help strengthen dant debate, when we should be channelling the knowledge system. our intellectual energies into solutions. This Now, however, everything has been turned is not, of course, a circumstance caused by on its head, and the silence and hesitancy of new communication technologies — these scientists are putting our knowledge system are just tools — but there are many with at risk. The question becomes, how do we vested interests who are exploiting them. raise our voices while retaining the rigour And there appear to be just as many with and the reliability of our knowledge crea- pre-conceived ideas of how the world works, tion? and conspiracy theories, who want to use I don’t want to depress anyone, but I them. As scientists trained to be quiet, we am sure many readers are familiar with the find ourselves on the margins, rarely being emerging interest in citations analysis. A heard above the din. decade or so ago, a library and information At the same time, another factor has come science researcher from Indiana University into play. As a public advocate for evidence- put many academic noses our of joint when based action to offset, mitigate and ultimately he revealed that 90 per cent of journal papers reverse climate change, I am regularly on are never cited by anyone and that half are the receiving end of various trolls’ extraor- never read except by their authors, referees dinary views. Trolls use the kinds of insults and journal editors. Publishing in Physics we would not consider hurling in person, World, Lokman Meho (2006) called this but with the anonymity of the online space a “sobering fact”. And, approximately one their inhibitions seem to melt away. article a minute is added to PubMed. Are its So, to our long-standing cultural con- 26 million or so papers to date a knowledge straints that discourage advocacy and agita- triumph or a tragedy? While we’ve become tion, I would add the undeniable pressure very good at adding to the global knowledge from trolls. vault, we are not very good at getting that So, what, as scientists, do we do? high-quality information out. In the face of today’s sometimes savage Get in the communication game and frequently ill-informed attacks on sci- First and foremost, “get in the (information/ ence, scientists and our findings, I think that communication) game.” Again, that might speaking out, well beyond our conventional seem obvious, but how we do that is a bit outlets, can strengthen our position. more complicated. Yet we are so accustomed to building our If we scrutinise the way our knowledge careers on the back of peer-to-peer commu- system has evolved over the centuries, it nication that we may not regard talking to wasn’t a bad model for the circumstances the public as part of our remit. We need to

3 See also Cook (2017) — Ed.

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build this into our promotion and rewards mesh. Most scientists would deny that sci- process and training. ence has a political element, or that observa- We really do need to be able to translate tions can be biased. complex concepts for diverse audiences, and When we begin to look deeply at how we do need to engage much more with other knowledge has been constructed, we can academic fields, so we can begin to under- no longer think of science as pure. When stand a bit more about things like the power we understand that the cultural pressure not of message framing, and that even the font to engage in public debate begins to appear we choose influences how people view the deliberate and duplicitous. It also invites us information we are presenting. There is no to consider other ways of knowledge-mak- shortage of empirical research that points to ing, which I believe can only make us better the best ways to convince an audience that scientists. This would give us room to re- our information is valuable and genuine. balance the biases in Western scientific cul- This goes back to the ways scientists can ture that have, for example, largely excluded help make it easier for the public to distin- women and non-Western forms of knowl- guish between credible information and the edge. I believe that the social/philosophical/ “flat earth society.” historical study of science and knowledge We may need to make a concerted effort production should be an integral and inte- to “brand” ourselves as credible, engaging, grated part of the science curriculum. This interesting sources. To do so, we must be will help us evolve our practices. able to explain what we do, why we do it, How should we be doing science? and why it matters to anyone. That is, the “so what?” of our work. This goes to my ultimate point. If we begin But branding and communications won’t to think about how we make knowledge — win this battle alone. What, then, would not just how we communicate that knowl- it actually take to turn this quiet culture edge in this post-truth era — this throws up around? a fundamental challenge. That is, to examine the way we do science, indeed to look at the Analysing the sociology of science way we do all research. I feel incredibly fortunate to have chosen to It is a rare and marvellous opportunity to major in the Philosophy and Sociology of have all the academies together to suggest a Science, alongside Ecology, at university and new way forward. what I learnt then informs what I do today. The process of research has long tended However, most scientists of today, our to prioritize isolated development. It is fun- scientific elite, and most science students, damental science that wins Nobel Prizes, our scientific community of the future, have and we understand the importance of this not studied any aspect of our Western scien- research because history has taught us that tific culture or how systems of knowledge- from fundamental knowledge much else making have been built. Scientists are mostly —much of it unanticipated and unimagined unaware of all the hard work that has been — flows. That is certainly true. put in by successive generations of philoso- But as scientists we are also solving com- phers and sociologists to situate scientific plex contemporary problems. And to do this knowledge within our cultural and social effectively we know we need to work across

55 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Johnston — Why Are Scientists So Quiet? academic disciplines and we need to collabo- knowledge, then wait for it to be taken up. rate with a whole range of professions and We may be identifying important problems, industries and decision-makers, who have but without a plan for finding a workable, an intimate understanding of, and a stake economically and socially acceptable solu- in solving, the many multi-faceted problems tion. we are seeking to address. A new form of collaboration This provides us with an opportunity to think about creating knowledge differently. Over the past decade or so, successive Fed- Research practices are evolving. Collabora- eral Governments have recognised the value tion and interdisciplinary research are about of co-creating knowledge, but mostly in the co-creation of knowledge. If you co- terms of collaboration between academia define and co-create research, you involve and industries, as a means of driving inno- your partners — those with a stake in the vation (AG, 2009) and, in turn, of securing problem you are solving — in the process Australia’s future economic prosperity. of discovery. You may find your work is Personally, I think the issue of collabora- taken up even before it is published, so your tion is about more than facilitating industrial research may have an impact even before the translation; it is about reimagining every- first paper comes out. And this real-world thing we do in science within a social, cul- impact plays an important part in public tural and economic context, as part of the debate: it is visible, tangible evidence of the big picture. It is about doing science differ- value of an evidence-based approach. ently. Facilitating engaged science, funding The very relationships necessary for col- more diverse partnerships, doing research laboration create valuable new pathways together. along which credible information and ideas For us pre-interneters this might seem like automatically flow. When we involve our a huge challenge, in terms of our academic partners in the scientific process, they learn culture, our skills and our practices. But the strengths of our method and the rigour over the many years I have been teaching, I of our approach. They develop respect for have seen waves of changes moving slowly this form of knowledge creation and can through our system. explain the process to their friends. Today’s students and early career research- That’s one part of the answer. But, what ers are digital natives — and they are more about taking even another step back and open in the way they do science — this asking ourselves to think more deeply about means they are expressing online, in real how we identify the gaps in the knowledge time, their enthusiasm for something they and problems we could like to solve. are discovering, in much the same way as Likewise, we tend to look at them in iso- they might report on a social event. They lation, when I believe we — all our many are tweeting from the lab. And suddenly disciplines — could, and should, be working their friends, family and followers are com- much more closely together. menting and contributing: they are engaged I see this all the time in my own field. with the very practice of science. “Next gen” We ask a contained question, we attend to scientists are crowd-funding their research. what is “up close,” then produce the new They are running citizen science projects.

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Their professional organisations are engaging ment, with lots of toxic messages muddy- with communities. ing the waters. Research tells us that people Next-gen researchers do, of course, under- acquire their scientific knowledge by con- stand the importance of verification, but sulting others whom they identify with, who they don’t feel the constraint of the cultural share their values and whom they therefore “muzzle” in the same way as did Darwin, or trust and understand. even myself. Generational change is already That, in my view, is good reason for us underway. to take stock, to take steps to address the Interestingly, the World Economic Forum limitations of our own culture and begin (WEF) identified the spread of misinforma- to dismantle our silos and to build diverse tion online as a major risk in its Global Risks partnerships; all of which can make us part Report as early as 2013 (Stroppa & Hanley of those trusted conversations. 2017) and it has since responded with a At the very least, my life-long interest in series of conferences and workshops about barnacles suggests a place we definitely don’t science communication, canvassing how we want to find ourselves: stuck to the same might counter “fake news.” old science rock, increasingly irrelevant, and Recently, the WEF Young Scientists — a drowning in a sea of noisy change. select group of the world’s most promising scientists under 40 — have been drafting the Acknowledgements WEF’s Universal code of Ethics for Research- Louise Williams assisted with the drafting ers. The very first responsibility on the list for and research for this paper. researchers and the organisations they repre- References sent is “to engage with the public.” This, in my mind, represents very significant cultural Australian Government (2009) Powering Ideas: An Innovation Agenda for the 21st Century. change. The code goes on to exhort scien- https://www.industry.gov.au/innovation/ tists to pursue the truth, maximise benefit InnovationPolicy/Pages/PoweringIdeas.aspx and minimise harm, engage with decision- Cook, J. (2017) Understanding and countering makers, support diversity, be mentors, and climate science denial, Journal & Proceedings be accountable. Its message is that we must of the Royal Society of New South Wales 150: 207-219, 2017. https://royalsoc.org.au/ talk and engage, agitate and argue. images/pdf/journal/150-2-Cook.pdf Conclusion Cook , J., Lewandowsky, S., Ecker, U. K. H. (2017) Neutralizing misinformation I am confident the three matters of which through inoculation: Exposing misleading I have spoken represent a positive way for- argumentation techniques reduces ward for science in the post-truth era. First, their influence, PLOS One, https://doi. org/10.1371/journal.pone.0175799 lifting our voice; second, critically analys- Finkel, A. (2016) 70 years old and thriving, ing our history, culture and practice; and, Opening keynote at the Innovation and third, evolving our knowledge production to Science Postgraduate Research Education engage communities in the entire practice. Forum. Melbourne, 29 July. http://www. In the past we have mostly converged on chiefscientist.gov.au/2016/07/speech- the best evidence for, say, the value of adding innovation-and-science-postgraduate- research-education-forum/ fluoride to water. But we’re now operating in a polluted science communication environ-

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Kahan, D.M. (2017) One of the sources of Stott, R. (2003) Darwin and the Barnacle, New ordinary science knowledge and extraordinary York: W. W. Norton, Kindle ed. science ignorance, in the Oxford Handbook Stroppa, A., Hanley, M. (2017) How can of the Science of Science Communication. Ed. we defeat fake news? World Economic by Kathleen Hall Jamieson, Dan Kahan, Forum, Feb. 8. https://www.weforum.org/ Dietram A. Scheufele. Oxford: O.U.P. agenda/2017/02/how-can-we-defeat-fake- Meho, L.I. (2006) The rise and rise of news-automate-the-right-to-reply/ citation analysis, https://arxiv.org/abs/ World Economic Forum (2012) Global Risks physics/0701012 2012, Geneva: WEF, 7th ed. http://www3. weforum.org/docs/WEF_GlobalRisks_ Report_2012.pdf

58 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 59–68. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010059-10

Influences on evidence: putting the cart before the horse

Lisa Bero, Ph.D. Charles Perkins Centre and Faculty of Pharmacy, The University of Sydney, Sydney E-mail: [email protected]

Abstract Conflicts of interest, particularly those related to financial gain, can influence policymaking, and mecha- nisms exist to try to minimize their impact on decisions. There has been a great deal of investigation and concern about the role of evidence in policymaking compared to other influences. But have we been putting the cart before the horse? Should we be paying more attention to what influences the evidence? Conflicts of interest can bias the design, methods, conduct, interpretation and publication of research. These biased findings deviate from the truth and have led decision makers to underesti- mate harms or overestimate effectiveness of interventions. The research community has responded by increasing transparency about the research enterprise. But this is not enough. We should strive to reduce the influence of conflicts of interest on research so we can have trustworthy evidence.

Introduction the truth. Conflicts of interest that bias the utting the cart before the horse is an design, methods, conduct, interpretation Panalogy for doing things in the wrong and publication of research have led decision order. In the Post-Truth world discussed in makers to underestimate harms or overesti- this issue of the Journal, concerns have been mate effectiveness of interventions. raised about the role of evidence in policy- Conflicts of interest, particularly those making. But have we been putting the cart related to financial gain, are also a powerful before the horse? Should we be paying more influence on policymaking, and mechanisms attention to what influences the evidence exist to try to minimize their impact on deci- itself? Bias occurs when generating or inter- sions. The research community has done preting evidence is not neutral: it leads to less to minimize the effects of conflicts of deviation from the truth. interest. The community has responded pri- One important cause of systemic bias lies marily by increasing transparency about the with powerful groups who have a financial research enterprise. But this is not enough. interest in a particular version of the truth. We should strive to reduce the influence of Such groups may fund employees, academic conflicts of interest on research so we can researchers or key opinion leaders to create have trustworthy evidence. or spread biased evidence, thus perpetuating What is a conflict of interest? fake news. These groups or individuals who have financial interests in a particular version A conflict of interest is a circumstance that of the truth are often said to have a financial creates a risk that professional judgments conflict of interest. Conflicts of interest can or actions regarding a primary interest will lead to bias in evidence if the people car- be unduly influenced by a secondary inter- rying out or disseminating research do so est (Lo and Field, 2009). In the case of in a manner that leads to deviation from research, the primary interest is conducting

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unbiased research while a secondary inter- Trump owns two golf courses in Scotland est may be personal financial gain of the and asked UK politicians to oppose wind researcher. Conflicts of interest should not farms. This was not because he believed be confused with other interests that affect they were bad for health, harmed animals, research. Research is not value free and is or contradicted US/UK energy goals, but conducted in a social context (Bero and because they would lower the value of his Grundy, 2016). Researchers have personal golf course property. beliefs, experiences and opinions that may Biomedical researchers have trouble rec- influence their choice of research topic or ognizing and acknowledging conflicts of paradigm. These interests make a researcher interest. Disclosures of funding sources and who they are and are not conflicts of inter- conflicts of interests in scientific articles est. Interests are ubiquitous, unlike conflicts are now more common, but they can still of interest which are unevenly distributed be confusing (Dunn et al., 2016). Disclo- among researchers (Bero and Grundy, 2016). sure statements may refer to “actual” and In addition, conflicts of interest have a “potential” conflicts of interest in the same “megaphone effect” as multiple researchers statement, or to multiple funding sources can have the same conflict of interest that with some listed as “dualities of interest.” influences research in the same direction. Some conflict of interest disclosures note For example, multiple investigators with that research article authors were “given an ties to the same pharmaceutical company opportunity” to disclose, but it is not clear to could bias research to favour the company’s readers what, if anything, was disclosed. products (Bero, 2017). In sum, conflicts of Or meaningful conflict of interest disclo- interest are a risk: they do not necessarily sures can be obfuscated if journals drown us produce biased judgments or actions. Con- in too much, or irrelevant, information. A flicts of interest are not “potential” but real; growing trend among medical journals is to whether they result in bias is the question. list pages of financial ties with companies for Conflicts of interest are well understood each article author. These long lists, however, in the realm of politics. For example, United fail to provide information on the relevance States President ’s conflicts of of the tie to the research being conducted, the interest have been documented. His failure financial amount of the tie, or the length of to disclose his income tax statements pre- the relationship between the researcher and vented the evaluation of his conflicts of inter- the company. Disclosures of “non-financial est related to tax reform. Nepotism within conflicts of interest” create confusion about his staff and the impact of US policies on what is a conflict of interest vs. a scientist his stocks, leasing of government property, with interests (Bero and Grundy, 2016). A and foreign holdings all present conflicts systematic review examining the associa- of interest. Simon Chapman’s paper in this tion of neonatal herpes simplex infection issue (Chapman, 2018) addresses miscon- with Jewish ritual circumcision examined ceptions about the hazards of wind farms. 6 published studies on this topic (Leas and Mr. Trump’s response to wind farms was Umscheid, 2015). The paper included this influenced by his conflicts of interest. Mr disclosure from the authors:

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B. F. L. is an adherent of Orthodox Juda- • “I recognize that I am in conflict, but ism, and he is not affiliated with the reli- believe that I can handle it. If I couldn’t gious sects that commonly practice direct handle the conflict I wouldn’t have gotten oral suction during circumcision, nor is involved.” he affiliated with any of the organizations These investigators fail to recognize that represented in the legal case addressing the preventing bias is not an issue of personal New York City informed consent rule. B. responsibility. Instead, we need institutional F. L. and his sons underwent ritual Jewish and cultural changes to reduce bias stem- circumcision, without direct oral suction. ming from conflicts of interest. By studying C. A. U. is a nonpracticing Roman Catho- the types of bias that are associated with con- lic whose wife affiliates with secular Juda- flicts of interest, we can develop institutional ism. C. A. U. and his son were circumcised strategies to mitigate the biases. by pediatricians in the hospital setting. Meta-research studies that examine It is unclear how these personal characteris- research across an entire body of evidence tics would be considered conflicts of interest have demonstrated that conflicts of interest rather than values and preferences that could are associated with bias. Bias occurs when influence the research. some study characteristic, such as the study While conflict of interest disclosure is a funding source or author conflict of interest, necessary first step, it is not a solution for is associated with the outcome of the study. managing or reducing bias associated with This association is observed even when con- conflicts of interest (Bero, 1999). In pub- trolling for the effect of the intervention or lished biomedical research, disclosure is exposure being tested or the methods of the difficult to enforce or simply not required. study. For example, a 2017 meta-analysis of Experiments have shown that, in the financial studies that examined the association of drug sector, disclosure makes those giving advice industry sponsorship with the outcomes of more biased (Cain et al., 2005). Finally, as drug studies found that studies sponsored shown later in this paper, disclosure does not by the makers of the drugs being tested were prevent bias in research. about 30% more likely to find that the drug was effective compared to studies with other Conflicts of interest and bias sponsors (Lundh et al., 2017). This associa- Researchers are likely to deny that conflicts tion was observed even though the studies of interest could bias their research. Quotes had similar methodological characteristics from interview studies with biomedical (eg, randomization or blinding). Similar rela- researchers illustrate this point (Boyd et al., tionships between funders and favourable 2003), (Lipton et al., 2004): outcomes have been observed for research • “I’m not influenced.” “My colleagues are in other fields such as nutrition or tobacco influenced, but I’m not.” research (Chartres et al., 2016), (Barnes and Bero, 1998). • “I have ties with all the companies, so I’m So what is going on… how does this bias not influenced by any.” happen? There are a number of ways that a • “I’m just helping out my patients.” study can be biased (Odierna et al., 2013). Bias can be introduced in the questions that

61 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Bero — Influences on Evidence are asked, including whether a question is ing research was also used by the tobacco asked at all or how a question is framed. Bias industry to distract attention away from can also be introduced in the methods of a the harms of second-hand smoke exposure. study, or in how a study is conducted behind The tobacco-industry-supported Center for the scenes, even if the method is rigorous. Indoor Air Research funded research on the Lastly, bias in a body of evidence can occur effects of indoor air substances such as carpet if only some studies get published or only fumes or oxygen from green leafy plants, some outcomes from a study get published. rather than research on the health effects of second-hand smoke. The results of these Conflicts of interest can affect research studies were used in policy arenas to sug- agendas gest that substances in indoor air other than Funders and authors with conflicts of inter- tobacco smoke were more likely to influ- est can bias entire research agendas, thus ence health and should be regulated instead influencing the questions that are asked in a (Barnes and Bero, 1996). way that makes them less relevant for public health interests and more relevant for com- Bias in methods mercial interests. For example, in a sample of Methodological risks of bias occur when 213 randomized controlled trials in nutrition components of a study design allow a sys- research, we found that 67% of the food- tematic error in the assessment of the mag- industry-sponsored studies focused on inter- nitude or direction of the results (Higgins ventions involving manipulations of specific and Green, 2008). In clinical trials testing nutrients (Fabbri et al., 2017b). The non- the efficacy of drugs, studies lacking ran- food industry-funded trials addressed differ- domization or blinding falsely inflate the ent levels of dietary composition, including efficacy of the drugs compared to studies whole foods and combinations of foods and that have these design features (Page et al., nutrients. A similar pattern was observed 2016). They also are less likely to report sta- among observational studies (Fabbri et al., tistically significant adverse effects (Nieto 2017a). Thus, the food-industry-funded et al., 2007). Thus, biased methods can studies were more likely to assess formulated shift effect estimates to be larger or smaller. products that could be marketed for benefits Inappropriate randomization and a lack related to a certain nutrient. Critical public of blinded outcome assessors can also bias health questions regarding the benefits of the outcomes of animal studies (Crossley whole foods and interactions of foods were et al., 2008). Industry-sponsored studies, not addressed. and those with conflicted authors, tend to In addition, food companies have funded use methods very similar to those in stud- research that detracts attention away from ies without financial ties. The differences in the harms of certain food ingredients. For outcomes observed between industry- and example, Coca-Cola has funded research on non-industry-sponsored studies are more the benefits of exercise rather than the harms likely due to biases in how the questions are of sugar, and the sugar industry funded asked as discussed above, or the next source research on the association of fat intake, but of bias in the research cycle: selective report- not sugar intake, with cardiovascular disease ing bias. (Kearns et al., 2016). The tactic of fund-

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Selective reporting bias regulatory approval of 33 new drugs, 78% Selective reporting bias occurs in different were published within 5 years of approval. ways (Dwan et al., 2011). Selective analysis However, all trials were published for only bias occurs when the same outcomes from 52% (17) of the drugs; no trials were pub- a study are analysed in different ways and lished for 2 of the drugs. One of the drugs only some of the analyses are published. with no published data was for a pediatric For example, different statistical tests could indication. All of the trials were sponsored achieve different levels of statistical signifi- by the companies who made the drugs and cance and only the analyses with statistically submitted the applications for regulatory significant findings are published. Selective approval to the FDA (Rising et al., 2008). outcome reporting occurs when some, but We also found evidence of selective out- not all, of the outcomes of a study are pub- come and analysis reporting. Forty-one lished. For example, a study with depression primary outcomes reported to FDA were as an outcome may use a scale to measure missing from the papers. None of these was depression following 3, 6, 12 and 18 months favourable to the drug being tested (Rising of treatment. Selective reporting bias occurs et al., 2008). Interestingly, 15 outcomes that if data from only one time point is reported. were not reported to the FDA appeared in Or if depression was measured using differ- the publications. All of these were favour- ent scales, selective outcome reporting would able to the drug being tested. Lastly, the occur if only the data from one scale was analysis and resulting statistical significance reported. Publication bias occurs when an of 5 outcomes changed between the FDA entire study is not published. data and published data. Four out of five of We conducted a series of studies dem- these changes favoured the test drug. The onstration selective reporting bias in the bottom line is that all of the selective report- publication of drug and tobacco research ing meant that the scientific publications where bias in reporting was associated with about each drug made the drug look more industry funding or financial conflicts of effective than it actually was. interest of the authors (Rising et al., 2008), Things get really interesting when we look (Hart et al., 2012). In one of these studies, at how studies are conducted behind the we asked the simple question, “Are all drug scenes. Litigation has given us glimpses into studies that are submitted to the US Food how conflicts of interest can introduce bias and Drug Administration as the basis for in the way a study is conducted, even when drug approval published?” Publication of it has a rigorous methodology. As part of these studies would mean that doctors and settlement agreements, courts have released other prescribers would have access to the previously confidential documents that were same information as the regulator. Prescrib- used as evidence in cases investigating harm ers could then base their treatment decisions from tobacco, drugs, or chemicals. These on the best available evidence rather than documents, which are freely available to the information provided by pharmaceutical public, are a goldmine of information about companies. how corporations influence research agenda, The simple answer to this question was no. as well as the design, conduct and publica- Of 128 trials that were used as the basis for tion of research (White and Bero, 2010).

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Internal documents from pharmaceutical for the protocol-defined primary outcome in companies have given us particular insight the internal documents were not reported into how industry sponsorship or conflicts in full or were reported with a changed pri- of interest affect the publication of science. mary outcome. The primary outcome was Drug industry documents described scien- changed in the case of 5 of 8 published trials tific publication as part of their marketing for which statistically significant differences strategy, with the goal of disseminating favouring gabapentin were reported. favourable information about their prod- Bias can also occur in the interpretation ucts (Steinman et al., 2006). Pfizer and of results, otherwise known as “spin.” Spin Parke-Davis sponsored trials of a drug called refers to reporting practices that distort the gabapentin to test the drug’s efficacy for a interpretation of results and mislead readers variety of unapproved (“off-label”) indica- so that results are viewed in a more favour- tions. Demonstrating that a drug works for able light. Spin is a familiar concept in the an unapproved indication could expand the media and politics, but is also prevalent in use of the drug and increase its sales. Internal the scientific literature. Spin was defined in documents describe how company execu- many different ways, but the most common tives managed the publication of every trial. manifestations were making the results look Directions were given that trials with “posi- larger than they were, claiming statistical tive” results were to be published and trials significance when there was none, and inap- with “negative” results were not (Steinman propriate claims of causality. We conducted et al., 2006). a systematic review of 35 studies of spin We tracked the publication of the 20 clini- (Chiu et al., 2017). The occurrence of spin cal trials of gabapentin for which internal differed by study designs. A median of 86% documents were available by comparing the of observational studies had spin, 58% of protocols for the trials found in the internal controlled trials, and 26% of meta-analyses documents to the final publications (Vedula and systematic reviews. Spun interpretations et al., 2009). The publication outcomes of meant that efficacy was inflated and harms these trials showed a very similar pattern to suppressed. Nine studies examined the the publication outcomes of the 164 trials association of spin with conflicts of interest where we compared what was submitted to or industry sponsorship. No differences in the FDA with what was published. Of the spin were detected, possibly due to the high 20 trials of gabapentin, 12 were reported in occurrence of spin overall. publications. For 8 of the 12 reported trials, Why conflicts of interest matter and what the primary outcome defined in the pub- we can do about them lished report differed from that described in the protocol. Of the 21 primary out- Valid evidence is the foundation for system- comes described in the protocols, 6 were atic reviews, public health and clinical guide- not reported at all and 4 were reported as lines, and health policies. Bias can be diffi- secondary outcomes. Of 28 primary out- cult to detect, but the evidence that conflicts comes described in the published reports, 12 of interest bias research cannot be ignored. were newly introduced. Trials that presented If the evidence is not solid in its question, findings that were not statistically significant design, methods or publication, the whole foundation for health policy crumbles. In

64 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Bero — Influences on Evidence addition, we have a problem of trust that is cols published in registries can be checked to particularly relevant in the Post-Truth era, find out if a study has been published. Com- when people do not know what to believe. parison of published trials with registered Conflicts of interest not only hurt the integ- protocols enables the detection of devia- rity of research, but also damage trust in sci- tions in conduct of the study and reporting ence and medicine (Lo and Field, 2009). It is biases. Clinical research registries permit the important to note that the effects of conflicts registration of observational studies, as well, of interest on research are not a problem of although registration of these types of stud- ‘bad apples’ or the moral failings of individu- ies is not common practice. Registries also als, but an undesirable situation that requires exist for systematic reviews and animal stud- structural solutions. ies (Chien et al., 2012), (Jansen of Lorkeers Disclosure is an essential first step in et al., 2014). Registry of all these types of identifying conflicts of interest, but does studies should become the norm. not reduce or eliminate bias. As noted above, Open access publication of datasets, financial disclosures in journal articles are through journals or data repositories, is a often inaccurate, incomplete, or obscured reform aimed at combating reporting and with irrelevant information. Rates of non- analysis biases, as well as spin. When full disclosure in journal articles remain high, datasets are available, different research so journals should penalize authors who teams can analyze the data to determine if fail to disclose financial ties. Disclosure can the findings are reproducible. Given the well also have adverse consequences. For exam- documented influence of industry funding ple, experimental psychology studies found and conflicts of interest on selective out- that disclosure by individuals in an advice- come reporting, open access publication of giving role benefited the advice givers, but data should be a requirement for industry- not those receiving the advice (Loewenstein supported researchers and studies. Research- et al., 2012). Lastly, disclosure of funding ers should participate in industry-funded source or an author financial tie may not studies only if all the data are made publicly reveal the full control of the sponsor over available. the question formulation, design, conduct Reporting guidelines, when required by or publication of the research (Lundh et al., journals, achieve completeness of report- 2012), (Bero et al., 2005). Additional disclo- ing so that biases in published articles can sures regarding the true role of the sponsor be assessed. Over 380 reporting guidelines, are necessary. covering most types of human and animal A number of structural reforms in clini- studies, can be found at the EQUATOR cal research are aimed at reducing report- website (Gould, 2016). Ironically, reporting ing and analysis biases. Study registration guidelines do not include detailed templates has become mandatory for publication of for improving the reporting of conflicts of clinical trials. Study registries have evolved interest. To improve study of the impact of from including minimal information about conflicts of interest, they should be reported a trial’s design to now including details of in a structured fashion. the methods and the results for primary out- Consumers should approach research comes (Dickersin and Rennie, 2012). Proto- conducted by private companies or by

65 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Bero — Influences on Evidence investigators with financial ties with scepti- give greater weight to research that is free cism. Critical appraisal skills can be taught of financial conflicts of interest. If we want to health professionals, consumer, and even to protect consumers from biased facts and primary school children (Odierna et al., restore their trust in science, real reform 2015), (Semakula et al., 2017), (Nsangi et al., across the research and regulatory sectors, 2017). Or consumers could leave the evalu- must be undertaken. We need to put the ation of research to someone else. Rigorous horse back in front of the cart and prioritize evidence synthesis, conducted by independ- structural solutions to minimize the influ- ent organizations such as Cochrane include ence of conflicts of interest on evidence an assessment for risk of bias for all studies itself. included in the analyses. The best option for eliminating bias stem- Acknowledgements ming from conflicts of interest is to elimi- There was no financial support for the prepa- nate the financial conflict of interest. This ration of this manuscript. is not a utopian ideal, as other professions References require that key decision makers (such as a judge) have no conflicts of interest. Depend- Barnes, D.E. & Bero, L.A. (1996) Industry- funded research and conflict of interest: An ence on industry funding could be lessened analysis of research sponsored by the tobacco by eliminating studies that are conducted industry through the Center for Indoor Air to produce alternate facts for marketing Research, J Health Polit Policy Law, 21, 3, or political purposes. The money diverted 515-42. from these activities could be invested in Barnes, D.E. & Bero, L.A. (1998) Why review articles on the health effects of passive more meaningful research. Companies could smoking reach different conclusions, JAMA, be charged fees, based on the amount of 279, 19, 1566-70. money they spend on advertising, to con- Bero, L. (2017) Addressing bias and conflict of duct research that they would normally interest among biomedical researchers, JAMA, not fund (Italian Medicines Agency (AIFA) 317, 17, 1723-1724. Research & Development Working Group, Bero, L., Glantz, S. & Hong, M.-K. (2005) The limits of competing interest disclosures, 2010). Publishers of research could just say Tobacco Control, 14, 118-126. no to the publication of industry sponsored Bero, L.A. (1999) Accepting commercial studies and extend this to include research sponsorship. Disclosure helps--but is not a conducted by investigators with financial panacea, Bmj, 319, 7211, 653-4. conflicts of interest (Lundh and Bero, 2017). Bero, L.A. & Grundy, Q. (2016) Why having a (non-financial) interest is not a conflict of Lastly, industry funding for research could interest, PLoS Biol, 14, 12, PMC5176169, be pooled, although there is little incentive e2001221. for companies to do this as they could not be Boyd, E.A., Cho, M.K. & Bero, L.A. (2003) guaranteed that the money would be spent Financial conflict-of-interest policies showing that their particular products are in clinical research: Issues for clinical superior. investigators, Acad Med, 78, 8, 769-74. Cain, D., Loewenstein, G. & Moore, D. The ideas for most of these reforms are (2005) The dirt on coming clean: The not new, but the political will to enact them perverse effects of disclosing conflicts of has been lacking. Decision makers should interest, J. Legal Stud, 34, 1-25.

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68 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 69–81. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010069-13

Algorithms of hate: How the Internet facilitates the spread of racism and how public policy might help stem the impact

Andrew Jakubowicz Social and Political Sciences, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, Australia E-mail: [email protected]

Abstract Complex multicultural societies hold together through effective and interactive communication, which reinforces civility, enhances information sharing, and facilitates the expression of interests while per- mitting both diversity and commonality. While trust is an important cement in the building of social cohesion, multicultural societies face continuing challenges as their ever-extending populations test the trust necessary to constitute supportive, bridging social capital. The Internet, which has become a crucial component of the communication systems in modern societies, offers both opportunities and challenges, especially in the generation and circulation of race hate speech which attacks social cohe- sion and aims to impose singular and exclusive racial, ethnic or religious social norms. The Internet in Australia remains problematic for four key reasons. The underlying algorithms that produce social media and underpin the profitability of the huge domains of Facebook and Alphabet also facilitate the spread of hate speech online. With very limited constraints on hate speech, the Australian Internet makes it easy to be racist. Human/computer interactions allow for far greater user disinhibition, which suits the proclivities of those more manipulative and sadistic users of the Internet. All of this is occur- ring in a post-truth world where racially, religiously and nationalistically inflected ideologies spread fairly much unchecked, and discourses of violence become everywhere more apparent. Australia has opportunities to do something about this situation in this country, yet we see around us a lethargy and acceptance of technological determinism. The paper assesses these claims and proposes some ways forward that are evidence-based, and collaborative, scholarly and social.

Post-truth and Internet racism: in this Forum a variety of approaches to this knowledge and power issue, with particular focus on the interfaces he Forum on Post Truth organised by the between science and power, between scholar- TRoyal Society of NSW and the scholarly ship and politics. Perhaps one of the most academies, held in November 2017, focuses complex interchanges – between knowledge our attention on the concept of truth, its and prejudice, freedom and constraint, emo- meanings in the “hard” and social sciences, tion and rationality, and policy and ideology and the manipulation of public comprehen- – can be found in the rapidly burgeoning sion of the realities in which we live. As a soci- space of on-line racism. ologist with humanist tendencies I have long On-line racism is a comparatively new held that truth claims are just that: proposi- phenomenon, maybe a generation old, given tions that can be tested empirically. However its dependence on the invention of the Inter- what counts as evidence can more often be a net and the development of the World Wide question for vigorous debate, though simple Web (Brown, 2017). Racism, of course, has assertion cannot win the day. We have seen a much longer timeframe, drifting back into

69 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Jakubowicz — Algorithms of Hate the mists of pre-history. Together racism and participation and understanding take time to the Internet have produced a phenomenon evolve and modify the emotional and intel- that requires a truly interdisciplinary schol- lectual portfolios people draw on to inter- arship to describe and analyse, drawing on act with others different from themselves. physical, economic, political and social sci- Thus multicultural societies require active ences. Beyond my analysis in this article lies interventions in the public sphere to build a prognosis on the one hand, and suggested community and resolve conflicts (Kymlicka, programs for intervention on the other. 2007). With the advent of the Internet, dig- This paper draws on a larger collegial work ital technologies are now deeply implicated (Jakubowicz et al., 2017a) to make some spe- in nearly all spheres of social interaction. cific claims about the way in which on-line The issue of cyber racism has particu- racism serves the purposes of the expansion lar relevance for scientists, humanists and of “post-truth”. The Internet facilitates this policy makers, as the phenomenon depends expansion by feeding a societal discourse in on the state of the social relations of multi- which race is given a false scientific realism, cultural societies, public policy perceptions racism confirmed as an acceptable mode of and responses to those relations, and the social relationship, and the politics of racial affordances of the digital technologies. It prejudice allowed to permeate arguments thus “pitches” at a point where the acad- about appropriate public policy (Nicholas emies intersect, the world-views and tech- and Bliuc, 2016). nical skills of the different branches can be applied, and the social advancement that the Why cyber racism matters Royal Society seeks to nurture is being chal- Modern Australia has been described as a lenged. On the other hand citizens might ask multicultural society, the most successful why Australian society should be concerned in the world according to Prime Minister about the spread of race hate speech on the Malcolm Turnbull, a perspective only pos- Internet (Bernardi, 2016). Surely, in a liberal sible if the Indigenous presence in Australia democracy, freedom of speech, no matter is ignored (Jakubowicz, 2015). Whether how objectionable, must be defended as a Australia in fact stands first in line — and higher-order value, one linked directly to I dispute this claim even in relation to the the pursuit of truth and therefore an under- cultural diversity of immigrant descend- pinning of science? While people may take ants: Canada is far ahead on many criteria offence at what other people say about them, (Tierney, 2007) — multicultural societies so long as the language does not seek to trig- all depend on a pro-active building of trust ger or actually triggers criminal behaviour, between disparate peoples, usually prompted do we not all have an interest in allowing and promoted by government. Trust, often its free expression? described as though it were the glue that In answer to these questions, let me begin anchors social cohesion (Markus, 2015), can with a short personal anecdote. Late last year be fragile in a multicultural milieu, where I wrote a piece for The Conversation review- people do not go back many generations ing the question of whether the concept together, and the intimate ties of kin and of ethno-political hierarchy or ethnocracy communal sharing among strangers are less (Jakubowicz, 2016) — used to examine how evident. Moreover, the subtleties of cultural

70 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Jakubowicz — Algorithms of Hate race, religion or creed was either actively or Four reasons Australia is a good place to unconsciously reflected in structures of sec- be an online racist tarianised democratic power — could be use- Four main elements make the Australian fully applied to Australian multiculturalism. experience of race hate on the Internet quite My argument was attacked by a post-truth specific, though perhaps only slightly more advocate who alleged its thrust would erode intense or focused compared with its spread the importance of White Anglo-culture as elsewhere. After all, the Internet has become the underpinning of Australian moral order. a global network of interconnectivity, with In addition, the individual pointed me and instantaneous communication facilitating other readers towards a website, twitter feed interactions between people who might in and Facebook page (Di Stefano and Esposito, the past have never come into contact. This 2016) in which my article and myself as its facilitation depends on both the physical/ author were the primary targets. The authors technological connections, and the technical of that piece had headed the article with languages and calculations that allow mes- a photo of the ceiling of the Yad Vashem sages to flow and reach their targets. These memorial hall to the slaughtered of the Holo- algorithms or sets of rules have been layered caust in Jerusalem, while the article attacked over the short history of the Internet into vast me as Jewish and therefore implacably fix- portfolios of instructions, often requiring ated (it appeared to them) on a project to millions of calculations, with consequences destroy White Australia by advancing multi- both intentional and unintentional (Parish, cultural ideas. There were many other subtle 2017) (Buni and Chemaly, 2016). and not so subtle references to the benefits The inventor of the World Wide Web, Tim of Nazism and the appropriate end for a Jew, Berners-Lee, has increasingly been worried to which the ceiling image of thousands of by these unintended consequences. Early in dead referred. 2017 he noted “And the thing that worries It is one of the uncomfortable conse- me most is that whatever it is we’ve created quences of being a Jewish intellectual and we’ve licensed racism to run free across the social scientist in the era of post-truth that planet and the consequences of that for civi- the new Nazis and other ultra-nationalists lisation and democracy are very, very sordid find us particularly attractive as targets, both if they’re not addressed” (Berners-Lee, 2017). for the views to which we can be attached, Near the end of 2017 he persisted with these and as individuals who can be made to suffer concerns. “My vision for an open platform emotionally through activation of Holocaust that allows anyone to share information, tropes. Ultimately, I decided to take no access opportunities and collaborate across action other than use the intervention as a geographical boundaries has been challenged standing case study in how the Internet has by increasingly powerful digital gatekeep- allowed the resurgence of race hate and the ers whose algorithms can be weaponised by difficulties the system creates for any action master manipulators” (Solon, 2017). to seek either redress or removal in a sea of There are two sets of algorithms that are global anonymity. most implicated in this process, apart from the ones “weaponised” in spheres of civil contestation and those activated in “hot

71 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Jakubowicz — Algorithms of Hate war” situations. Racism can be served either The specific interventions by extremists by directing Internet users to racist sites, or have both gender and class dimensions, as delivering racist messages to other sites. Both well as race. For example, the audiences of these procedures are triggered by agglom- most attuned to racist material in Western erating data from multiple sources, and look- societies tend to be younger White males, a ing for patterns — patterns that are known somewhat affluent category with disposable to be profitable, though often cloaked in incomes, highly sought after by mainstream the language of enhancing user experience. advertisers for products such as Coca-Cola The tie-in of the algorithms to the business and the UK military recruitment. Affluent models underpinning the Google empire males are also sought by media outlets such (including YouTube) and Facebook makes as . These were the types of them extremely difficult to change. In these advertisers that in March 2017 found their circumstances, the platforms have been messages appearing on racist, sexist and vio- trying to find ways to limit the use of expen- lent sites, and those associated with extrem- sive human staff to monitor breaches of their ist White Power and Islamist organisations user codes of conduct, while discovering that (young males not necessarily White). Many they have often been gamed by extremist advertisers withdrew their campaigns from Internet users and hackers who trip the faults YouTube and Facebook, and tried to have deep inside the algorithmic hold-alls (Green- Google change its ranking algorithms to berg, 2016). avoid their placement in unacceptable loca- tions during online searches (Statt, 2017) (Mostrous, 2017) (England, 2017).

Figure 1.

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Readers can try this experiment them- In other situations, algorithms may learn selves as I did. I am an occasional customer or be programmed to exclude people of for a well-known men’s clothing brand; I buy colour from access to more highly valued in-store although the company has my email user experiences. A review article in Science for marketing purposes. When I searched the recently reported how “machine learning U.S. White Power Breitbart site for informa- of semantics automatically shapes itself to tion using Google and Chrome, I was served human biases in language, in terms of race advertisements for that clothing brand (see gender and disability” (Caliskan et al., 2017). Figure 1). I also received arthritis treatment In another instance, some facial recognition information, suggesting that Chrome had software cannot “read” the faces of people been logging my online therapy visits follow- of colour and thus excludes them or their ing my recent knee replacement operation. responses. In discussing these instances, the Both advertisements relate to White males: U.S.-based advocacy group, the Algorith- both Breitbart and the arthritis pill target mic Justice League, conceptualises the issue older White males amongst their primary as “the bias of the coded gaze” (Algorithmic targets. Breitbart was intent to increase the Justice League, 2016, Buolamwini, 2016). spread of alt-right post-truth and pro-White Facebook has been alleged to have been Power discourses among its visitors, a process involved in “multicultural affinity targeted that both the advertiser and Alphabet were advertising” by offering redlining algorithms facilitating and helping to fund (through that identify people on the basis of their race click-through visit payments where these and restrict their access to offers of housing, occurred) (Amend and Morgan, 2017) employment or loans, thereby segmenting (Anglin, 2016). markets and populations into those who are

How does Cyber Racism grow?

Social and State ideologies psychological that constrain affordances of intervention human/ computer interaction (HCI)

Algorithms that Rising ethno- underpin religious conflicts economics of under the impact social media Cyber of globalisation Racism

Figure 2.

73 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Jakubowicz — Algorithms of Hate acceptable and exploitable, and those who time the empires of the European centuries are rendered unacceptable and discardable. of expansion had not quite dissolved and (Chaykowski, 2016) their subordinated racially-justified colonial The four factors that contribute to the subjects had not yet reached independence. extent and composition of cyber racism When the UN once more addressed what in specific jurisdictions can be summa- racism was in 1967, the world had changed. rised through the four “feeders” portrayed A global convention against racial discrimi- in Figure 2. All four are necessary to allow nation had been passed, any notion that race cyber racism to flourish, although the extent had a scientific meaning had been abandoned, of each may vary across the globe. However, with UNESCO concluding “Racism stulti- global, national, scientific and individual fies the development of those who suffer factors all play a role, while political action from it, perverts those who apply it, divides can have some impact on raising or reducing nations within themselves, aggravates inter- the “volume” of each parameter. national conflict and threatens world peace” (UNESCO, 1950/1954/1957/1969). Racism on line If we take this to be a widely verifiable Racism has a long and controversial rela- truth about the effects of racism, then the tionship to science. In 1875 Charles Darwin next factor that effects the extent and nature wrote that, as the science of humanity of racism in Australia lies in the ideologies improves, so then human kind (and espe- that are expressed through legislation and cially his peers of white European men of action by the state that might follow such wealth and social status) would be drawn laws (McGonagle, 2012). Unlike many other to “extend our sympathies to all men” (Paul, countries, race hate speech is not criminal- 1988). However, we know the actual tra- ised in Australia at the national level. Indeed, jectory of human history drew exactly the Australia shares with the USA the reality that opposite perspective, creating from Darwin’s one can say anything about other ethnic and insights the most cruel and vicious separa- racial groups up to the point where advocacy tions between peoples. The differences that of a crime or of violence is expressed. Aus- Darwin saw within humanity became hierar- tralia in 1966 followed the lead of the US chies of superordination in the ideologies of (Harris, 2008) to include a reservation in racism, where the empires of his time drew its ratification to article 4a of the Interna- on poorly understood “truths” to generate tional Convention on the Elimination of All overwhelming technologies of destruction. Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD). If “race” in all its manifestations finally Throughout 2016 the Federal Government proved to be an unacceptable framework sought for a second time in recent memory for building human societies, it did not (previously in 2013/2014) to reduce the cov- depart human consciousness at the end of erage of the Racial Vilification provisions of the Second World War. the Racial Discrimination Act, which had When UNESCO in 1950 first sought to been introduced (as Section 18c) in 1976 deal with the science of race, it concluded (Baxendale, 2017). that races were real categories of differ- While both those moves failed, the clear entiation, though quite “inter-breedable” message from government was that racial (UNESCO, 1950/1954/1957/1969). At the

74 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Jakubowicz — Algorithms of Hate vilification would be an acceptable practice ganda and dissimulation. Thus, the technol- to be defended behind the rubric of freedom ogy and the circumstances have interacted of speech. However research by the CRaCR and exponentially expanded the impact of team (Jakubowicz et al., 2017b, Jakubowicz, hatred on fearful communities. Over the past 2017) in 2013 and 2016 demonstrated that decade or more, such divisions have become only a small minority of Australians wanted normalised in stereotypical and increasingly there to be unrestricted freedom to vilify hostile and hurtful encounters, the veracity people on the basis of their race or ethnic- of which has become impossible to test. ity (Parliament of Australia, 2017). Even so, The Internet depends on the easy ano- Australia remains one of the easiest places nymity of its users, the effective asynchro- to be racist online (Hunyor, 2008), provid- nicity of its interactions, and the isolated ing only slow and difficult systems to file circumstances under which most people complaints, a reluctant and resistant set of engage with others online. Such human/ corporate providers of Internet services, and computer/human interaction allows for a confusing and overlapping set of regulatory social and psychological opportunities that regimes. would be far more difficult in the everyday All these interactions take place in a world. So using the Internet intensifies “dis- global environment of heightened fear and inhibition” (Martin, 2013) (Suler, 2004), by tension associated with distinctions based allowing sadistic, egoistic and manipulative on ideas about race, religion, ethnicity and behaviour to spread more fluidly (Brown, nationhood. In large part these tensions have 2017, Stein, 2016). There is considerable grown far beyond the earlier penetration of evidence that such dynamics are reflected in such issues during epochs dominated by the small number of people who apparently print, audio or even television communi- “produce” racism online, with a large number cation, because of the omnipresence of the of people encountering it, in its many forms, Internet and the surge of post-truth propa- as bystanders.

Extent Online: Target Perpetrator Bystander of racism Opponent of racism/ 2.2% 0.7% 15.3% not prejudiced Often seen as carrying Asserts own ethno- Once alerted to issues, responsibility; opposes religious group superiority becomes more aware; racism online; defends while decrying racism. often seen as main from attack. bulwark against racism. Unconcerned/ 7.9% 2.8% 63.1% moderately prejudiced Alerted to racism when Unaware amplifier; likes Doesn’t recognise or targeted; tends to racist joking etc; drawn to withdraws from exposure; withdraw from exposure. swarm. can be unaware supporter. Proponent of racism/ 1% 3.7% 5.7% strongly prejudiced Activist responder engaged Sharp end of racist Lurks to like; aware in fight with perceived propaganda; seeks to build amplifier; not pro-active harassers. following; advance racist but strong supporter. agendas. Table 1. Algorithms of Hate tables etc.

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A 2000+N online survey undertaken for the seeking to normalise hate speech and thereby CRaCR project in 2013 (Jakubowicz et al., transform the social relations of the Internet 2017a, ch.3) provided data for an explora- into one infused with racist ideology and tion of the relationship between the range or perspectives. Each Internet user category is type of encounters online, and the attitudes positioned in specific ways in relation to the of the subjects on issues associated with expansion of online racism. racism. Six items from a 20+ compilation However, Targets are often expected to of items eliciting responses to attitudes on carry the burden of response, or are aban- ethnic and cultural differences on a seven- doned to that fate. In the Australian context point original scale, provided a three-point agencies such as MulticulturalNSW have scale of attitudes. Target, Perpetrator and been charged by their political managers Bystander were discrete categories, although in recent times with implementing an anti- a few individuals were in two or all. racism/pro-multicultural agenda online; From this distribution, it is possible to however, these can easily be wound back have a sense of how different users of the under ministerial direction should ideolo- Internet, based on their own levels of preju- gies change and predilections for addressing dice, deal with encounters with racism. The racism become less pressing. In the federal picture is quite complex, demonstrating sphere there have been no such agencies, as the interactive nature of the web and the political attacks on the Australian Human changing position of people who are activ- Rights Commission from the Government ist. About 10% of Targets show high levels have limited its capacities to do so. However, of prejudice while most Targets show little the AHRC has been active in the Racism It (71%) or none. Over 50% of Perpetrators Stops With Me campaign, and associated are strongly prejudiced, while only 10% online and broadcast advertisements about show no signs of prejudice. The largest group racism. Even so the Commission cannot in relation to racism by far are Bystanders, intervene in the online world without direct who make up over 80% of Internet users. complaints to pursue. However, the Chil- Of their number about 7% are highly preju- dren’s E Safety Commissioner has begun to diced, about 75% moderately so, and 18% initiate workshops and strategies to build show very low levels of prejudice. capacity among threatened communities to The distinctions, based on the level of defend themselves and advance alternative prejudice and type of encounter, point to “truths” against racist attacks. the online activities associated with each Increasingly, Bystanders are recognised as category, and thereby, what policy and prac- extremely important potential defenders of tice responses may be appropriate. These are Targets and crucial participants in pushing summarised in each cell. The dynamic of the back against racist hate speech (Nelson et Internet world of race hate becomes evident al., 2012). Given that racists want to ensure — users are making decisions, engaging or that every space they enter becomes infected withdrawing, being harassed or harassing, and then permeated by their ideology and in a constantly moving environment. For discourses, resisting such entry-ism and the Perpetrators one of the goals is to “game” denying racists these local victories, how- those defences that platforms provide, while

76 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Jakubowicz — Algorithms of Hate ever appalling, cruel and foul their language, The bad behaviour that promotes the contributes to a more open Internet. spread of race hate can be quickly and widely Strong proponents of racism who are Per- replicated (Phillips, 2015). In the process the petrators make up less than 4% of users, yet Internet emotionally and often financially they generate and stimulate the vast array rewards the dark triad behaviour of narcis- of hate speech in its text, meme and video sism, manipulation, and lack of empathy forms. They are supported by a larger group (Binns, 2012). The Perpetrators gain emo- of Bystanders, who “lurk to like”, and want tional reinforcement, a sense of purpose, and to extend the reach of their swarm leaders a continuing stream of supportive follow- into the moderately prejudiced huge bulk ers when they are left unchecked and unre- of Bystanders. Their attachment to such dis- stricted; even more so when they are morally courses is closely associated with their belief castigated but effectively allowed to continue that their views are widely shared, a posi- unconstrained. Yet, for anti-racists, taking tion reinforced when they find the sites they on the Perpetrators and inventively resisting like carry no opposition messages or signs of racist hate speech remains a challenging and antiracist arguments. wearying activity, with little of the emotional The complexity of the field indicates the reinforcement that sustains and rewards the need for more coherent and science-based Perpetrators (Gagliardone et al., 2015). policy; government and civil society inter- The resistance to racism can be further ventions in such situations would help re- weakened where political leaders are averse assert both the value of truth, and the right to taking courageous positions on difficult to a democratic and civil Internet (Daniels, issues, being more likely to be drawn to 2010). Without an Internet in which truth the pressures from conservative post-truth can be asserted and demonstrated, the over- groups that they celebrate freedoms rather all edifice of evidence-based argument and than constraints (Group of Eminent Persons policy continues to crumble, and issues far of the Council of Europe, 2011). removed from racism are caught in a wave The major corporations such as Facebook of beliefs in which truth and science have and the Alphabet stable (Google, Facebook, no hold (Miller, 2016). Instagram etc.) appear more interested in We can summarise the current nexus in protecting their economic interests than Australia through these CRaCR project find- in resolving the questions of social impact ings. The basic technologies underlying the generated by their business models (Levine, spread of race-hate filled social media and 2013) (Zuckerberg, 2017). For example, they related technologies are not easily amenable are reluctant to expose themselves to criti- to state action, especially where the algo- cal scholarly research. They will respond to rithms are so rooted in the profitability of Parliamentary interrogation, however, when the platforms. Governments fail to realise they perceive their interests may be served how much the social cohesion they promote (Garlick, 2017, Garlick, 2018). Despite constantly faces attacks that seek to unwind widespread criticism by organisations such as the trust and social capital upon which it the Simon Wiesenthal Institute in the USA depends. (Simon Wiesenthal Center, 2017) and the Online Hate Prevention Institute in Aus-

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tralia (Online Hate Prevention Institute, back against the German law that criminal- 2015), the two great Internet behemoths ises activities of companies that fail to meet have gone to great lengths to protect their take-down standards, Facebook believed underlying business models from changes that “There is no place on Facebook for hate that might be thought necessary by critics to speech … industry codes are a more collabo- address the pervasiveness of racism through- rative and effective [way] of achieving the out their services. results we all want to see” (Garlick, 2018). In 2017 and into 2018 the Australian Australia has nothing like the European Senate Standing Committee on Legal and Commission Code of Conduct; Facebook Constitutional Affairs undertook an exami- made no offer that they would collaborate nation of the adequacy of Australian crimi- with civil society and government to ensure nal offences in relation to cyber-bullying. that one could be established. While racist hate-speech is often part of cyber-bullying, it is far less likely to attract Building resilience attention than do other dimensions of bul- However, associations that bring together lying and harassment. Facebook made two people concerned with both civility and written submissions in addition to its oral truth do have avenues open for them. They evidence. In the first (Garlick, 2017) the can be part of the move to build civil society company stressed that platforms should be alliances that abhor racism, and seek to push excused from any responsibility for mate- back against the acceptance or legitimisa- rial published in their pages by their users, tion of racism and racist discourses. Where as the company was not a publisher in the initiatives in the legal sphere are opening, as traditional pre-Internet sense, and that it a consequence for instance of the decision already responded quickly to requests from of the E Safety commissioner to recognise affected parties, or the police, for bullying racism as a problem, then innovations such material to be taken down. In a return sub- as the New Zealand Harmful Digital Com- mission responding to questions on notice munications Act could be considered (New from the Committee, the company repre- Zealand Law Commission, 2012). The Aus- sentative described the strategies adopted to tralian Human Rights Commission could deal with complaints and problematic users: be both permitted and resourced to identify Facebook noted it had 14,000 people work- and pursue particularly egregious cases of ing worldwide on community operations cyber racism where no Target would oth- in 2017, and was planning to increase this erwise be prepared to come forward. Civil number to 20,000 in 2018. society groups could call out and publicise, That is, one key area was human inter- through social media, advertisers who allow vention, leaving the fundamental algorithms their names to be associated with race hate tweaked but not significantly changed. Dis- sites, thus putting pressure on the large plat- cussing Facebook’s “removal of hateful con- form providers to find strategies to reduce tent in Europe,” the company pointed to such associations. the agreement between social media firms Perhaps the Royal Society and the Acad- and the European Commission to tackle the emies, with their aspirations to link science “problem of hate speech in Europe”. Pushing with human prosperity and well-being, might well take on strategy development that looks

78 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Jakubowicz — Algorithms of Hate to public policy based on science as a way online communities, Journalism Practice, 6(4), forward (Came and Griffith, 2017). A small pp. 547-562. group of mathematicians, philosophers, Brown, A. (2017) What is so special about online (as compared to offline) hate speech?, social scientists and others might workshop Ethnicities, Sage. http://journals.sagepub.com/ such ideas to contribute to crowd-sourcing doi/10.1177/1468796817709846 (Accessed resilience strategies, so that the algorithms 3 June 2017). that underpin social media in the future are Buni, C. and Chemaly, S. (2016) The secret not so conducive to the proliferation of hate: rules of the Internet, The Verge. http://www. theverge.com/2016/4/13/11387934/internet- indeed, algorithms if not of love then at least moderator-history-youtube-facebook-reddit- of peace might eventuate. Ultimately resil- censorship-free-speech. ience requires strong networks that build Buolamwini, J. (2016) InCoding — in the active cells of knowledge, where racism can beginning, Medium.com. https://medium. find no place to flourish. com/mit-media-lab/incoding-in-the- beginning-4e2a5c51a45d. References Caliskan, A., Brysin, J. and Narayan, A. (2017) Semantics derived automatically from Algorithmic Justice League (2016) The Coded language corpora contain human-like biases, Gaze https://www.ajlunited.org/the-coded- Science, 356(6334). http://science.sciencemag. gaze 2018). org/content/356/6334/183.full. Amend, A. and Morgan, J. (2017) Breitbart Came, H. and Griffith, D. (2017) Tackling under Bannon: Breitbart’s comment section racism as a “wicked” public health problem: reflects alt-right, anti-Semitic language, enabling allies in anti-racism praxis, Social Hatewatch. https://www.splcenter.org/ Science and Medicine, Elsevier. http://dx.doi. hatewatch/2017/02/21/breitbart-under- org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2017.03.028. bannon-breitbarts-comment-section-reflects- Chaykowski, K. (2016) Facebook to ban alt-right-anti-semitic-language (Accessed 23 “ethnic affinity” targeting for housing, February 2017). employment, credit-related ads, Forbes/ Anglin, A. (2016) A normie’s guide to the Tech/#Getting Buzz. alt-right, The Daily Stormer. http://www. Daniels, J. (2010) Cyber racism & the future dailystormer.com/a-normies-guide-to-the-alt- of free speech (updated), Racism Review: right/ (Accessed 15 January 2017). scholarship and activism towards racial Baxendale, R. (2017) Ethnic leaders united justice, 2016(13 November). http://www. against substantive changes to section 18C, racismreview.com/blog/2010/11/16/cyber- The Australian, 22 March. http://www. racism-future-of-free-speech/ (Accessed 16 theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/ethnic- December 2016). leaders-united-against-substantive-changes- Di Stefano, M. and Esposito, B. (2016) to-section-18c/news-story/534963bdb7dc43 Australia has an alt-right movement and it’s 46bc75dbafad7fb688. Racial Discrimination Amendment Bill 2016 called #DingoTwitter: the white nationalists are down under, Buzzfeed News. https:// Explanatory Memorandum. www.buzzfeed.com/markdisefano/gday-pepe Berners-Lee, T. (2017) Tim Berners- (Accessed 4 May 2017). Lee: I invented the web. Here are three England, C. (2017) Pewdiepie dropped by things we need to change to save it, The Disney over YouTube star’s anti-Semitic Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/ videos, Independent 2017]. technology/2017/mar/11/tim-berners-lee- Gagliardone, I., Gal, D., Alves, T. and web-inventor-save-internet (Accessed 15 Martinez, G. (2015) Countering Online Hate March). Speech Paris: UNESCO. http://unesdoc. Binns, A. (2012) Don’t feed the Trolls! Managing troublemakers in magazines’

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unesco.org/images/0023/002332/233231e. of-speech-and-18c-not-what-the-ipa-said-it- pdf (Accessed: 21 February 2017). did-72197 (Accessed 3 February). Garlick, M. (2017) Submission 4 by Facebook Jakubowicz, A., Dunn, K., Paradies, Y., Mason, to Senate Constitutional and Legal Affairs G., Bliuc, A.-M., Bahfen, N., Atie, R., References Committee, Reference: Adequacy Connelly, K. and Oboler, A. (2017a) Cyber of existing offences in the Commonwealth Racism and Community Resilience: Strategies Criminal Code and of state and territory for Combating Online Race Hate London: criminal laws to capture cyberbullying. Palgrave Macmillan. http://www.palgrave. https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_ com/de/book/9783319643878 (Accessed: 5 Business/Committees/Senate/Legal_and_ October 2017). Constitutional_Affairs/Cyberbullying/ Jakubowicz, A., Dunn, K. and Sharples, R. Submissions. (2017b) Australians believe 18C protections Garlick, M. (2018) Facebook and Instagram should stay, The Conversation. https:// answers to questions on notice, Senate theconversation.com/australians-believe-18c- Constitutional and Legal Affairs References protections-should-stay-73049 (Accessed 17 Committee, Reference: Adequacy of existing February). offences in the Commonwealth Criminal Code Kymlicka, W. (2007) Multicultural Odysseys: and of state and territory criminal laws to Navigating the New International Politics of capture cyberbullying. Diversity. Oxford: Oxford U. P. Greenberg, A. (2016) Inside Google’s Internet Levine, M. (2013) Controversial, harmful Justice League and its AI-powered war on and hateful speech on Facebook. https:// trolls, Wired, October. www.facebook.com/notes/facebook-safety/ Group of Eminent Persons of the Council of controversial-harmful-and-hateful-speech-on- Europe (2011) Living together: Combining facebook/574430655911054/. diversity and freedom in 21st-century Europe Markus, A. (2015) Mapping social cohesion: Council of Europe. The Scanlon Foundation surveys 2015, Harris, H. (2008) Race across borders: the Available: Scanlon Foundation, Australian U.S. and ICERD, Harvard BlackLetter Law Multicultural Foundation, Monash Journal, 24, pp. 61-67. http://hjrej.com/ University. http://scanlonfoundation.org. wp-content/uploads/2012/11/vol24/Harris. au/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/2015- pdf (Accessed 20 April 2016). Mapping-Social-Cohesion-Report.pdf Hunyor, J. (2008) Cyber-racism: can the (Accessed 14 November 2016). RDA prevent it? Law Society Journal May, pp. Martin, A. (2013) Online disinhibition and 34-35. the psychology of trolling, Wired. http:// Jakubowicz, A. (2015) “Hating to know”: www.wired.co.uk/article/online-aggression government and social policy research in (Accessed 17 August 2016). multicultural Australia, in Husband, C. (ed.) McGonagle, T. (2012) The troubled Research and Policy in Ethnic Relations. Bristol: relationship between free speech and Policy Press, pp. 53-78. racist hate speech: the ambiguous roles of Jakubowicz, A. (2016) First the word, the media and internet, Day of Thematic then the deed: how an “ethnocracy” like Discussion “Racist Hate Speech”, Available: Australia works, The Conversation. https:// UN Committee on the Elimination of theconversation.com/first-the-word-then- Racial Discrimiantion. https://www.ivir.nl/ the-deed-how-an-ethnocracy-like-australia- publicaties/download/Expert_Paper_Racist_ works-69972 (Accessed 12 March 2017). Hate_Speech_UN.pdf (Accessed 24 May Jakubowicz, A. (2017) What did Galaxy’s 2016). poll tell us about freedom of speech and Miller, T. (2016) Cybertarian flexibility—when 18C? Not what the IPA said it did, The prosumers join the cognitariat, All That Is Conversation. https://theconversation.com/ Scholarship Melts into Air, in Curtin, M. & what-did-galaxys-poll-tell-us-about-freedom- Sanson, K. (eds.) Precarious Creativity: global

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media, local labor. California: University of Phillips, W. (2015) This Is Why We Can’t Have California Press. Nice Things: Mapping the Relationship between Mostrous, A. (2017) YouTube hate preachers Online Trolling and Mainstream Culture. share screens with household names, The Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. Times (17 March). http://www.thetimes. Simon Wiesenthal Center (2017) Simon co.uk/article/youtube-hate-preachers-share- Wiesenthal Center’s 2017 Digital Terrorism & screens-with-household-names-kdmpmkkjk Hate Report Card: Social Media Giants Fail to (Accessed 25 March 2017). Curb Online Extremism, Simon Wiesenthal Nelson, J., Paradies, Y. and Dunn, K. (2012) Center. http://www.wiesenthal.com/site/apps/ Bystander anti-racism: a review of the nlnet/content2.aspx?c=lsKWLbPJLnF&b= literature, Analyses of Social Issues and Public 4441467&ct=14988437 (Accessed 15 April Policy, Accepted 26.08.11. 2017). New Zealand Law Commission (2012) Solon, O. (2017) Tim Berners-Lee on the Harmful Digital Communication: The future of the web: “The system is failing”, adequacy of the current sanction and The Guardian(16 Nov), TheGuardian. remedies, Ministerial Briefing Paper, The com. https://www.theguardian.com/ New Zealand Law Commission, New Zealand technology/2017/nov/15/tim-berners-lee- Parliament. world-wide-web-net-neutrality (Accessed 16 Nicholas, F. and Bliuc, A.-M. (2016) “It’s okay March 2018). to be racist”: moral disengagement in online Statt, N. (2017) YouTube is facing a discussions of racist incidents in Australia, full-scale advertising boycott over hate Ethnic and Racial Studies, 39(14), pp. 2545- speech: The biggest brands continue to 2563. leave, The Verge. https://www.theverge. Online Hate Prevention Institute (2015) Fight com/2017/3/24/15053990/google-youtube- Against Hate, OHPI. https://fightagainsthate. advertising-boycott-hate-speech. com/ (Accessed 13 March 2016). Stein, J. (2016) How trolls are ruining the Parish, E. (2017) Mapping the geography Internet, Time (18 August/ 12 September) of racism: why deep dives in data matter, (Accessed 21 February 2017). hastac. https://www.hastac.org/blogs/ Suler, J. (2004) The online disinhibition erinparish/2017/04/24/mapping-geography- effect, Cyberpsychol Behav., 7(3), pp. 321-6, racism-why-deep-dives-data-matter-0 Cyberpsychology and behaviour: the impact of (Accessed 4 June 2017). the Internet, multimedia and virtual reality on Parliament of Australia (2017) Freedom of behavior and society. https://www.ncbi.nlm. speech in Australia: Inquiry into the operation nih.gov/pubmed/15257832 (Accessed 23 of Part IIA of the Racial Discrimination Act September 2016). 1975 (Cth) and related procedures under the Tierney, S. (2007) Multiculturalism and the Australian Human Rights Commission Act Canadian constitution. Vancouver: UBC Press. 1986 (Cth) Canberra: Parliament of Australia. UNESCO (1950/1954/1957/1969) Four http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_ statements on the race question Paris: Business/Committees/Joint/Human_Rights_ Unesco. http://unesdoc.unesco.org/ inquiries/FreedomspeechAustralia/Report images/0012/001229/122962eo.pdf. (Accessed: 3 April 2017). Zuckerberg, M. (2017) Building global Paul, D. (1988) The selection of the “Survival community, Facebook. https://www.facebook. of the Fittest”, Journal of the History of Biology, com/notes/mark-zuckerberg/building-global- 21(3), pp. 411-424. http://www.jstor.org/ community/10154544292806634/ (Accessed stable/4331067 (Accessed 2 March 2017). 2 May 2017).

81 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 82–90. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010082-09

Mind, language, and rational discourse

N. J. Enfield Arts and Social Sciences, University of Sydney E-mail: [email protected]

Introduction Scientific evidence shows conclusively hen Pope Francis banned the sale of that tobacco smoking is extremely dangerous Wcigarettes in the Vatican in 2017, his (see Bero, this issue). Why would a person announcement stated: “The Holy See cannot promote smoking to citizens who would be be cooperating with a practice that is clearly voting for him, and for whom he is cam- harming the people.” The World Health paigning to serve and protect? Farage’s state- Organisation tweeted their support—“WHO ments are irrational. They disregard reality, welcomes the Vatican’s decision to ban the which is, as author Phillip K. Dick defined sale of cigarettes as of next year”—with an it, “that which, when you stop believing in infographic summarizing some deadly facts it, doesn’t go away”. No matter what Farage about tobacco, including “12% of deaths of says or believes about the effects of smok- all people aged over 30 are due to tobacco”, ing, the toxic fumes will have their effects on “global annual costs from tobacco use are his respiratory and circulatory systems, and US$1.4 trillion in healthcare expenditure beyond. You can dismiss expert testimony, and lost productivity”, and “tobacco kills you can persuade people to do dangerous more than 7 million people every year”. things, but your words won’t make the dan- This in turn attracted a response from Nigel gers of reality disappear. Farage, a politician and businessperson with In recent times, scientists have had to no qualifications in medicine or health sci- publicly defend this point, for example, in ence. To his many thousands of social media the recent global March for Science. Many followers, he wrote: “The World Health initiatives have been launched to draw atten- Organisation is just another club of ‘clever tion to the post-truth problem. For example, people’ who want to bully and tell us what to the website https://www.protruthpledge.org/ do. Ignore.” If the scientific findings behind allows you to pledge your earnest efforts to WHO’s infographic are sound, then Farage share, honour and encourage truth. Among is potentially endangering the lives of his other things, you pledge to fact-check infor- hundreds and thousands of followers by lit- mation to confirm that it is true before accept- erally instructing them to disregard WHO’s ing or sharing it; to distinguish between your expert advice. At least Farage practices what opinion and the facts; to re-evaluate if your he preaches. During the Brexit campaign, information is challenged; to retract if you journalist Michael Deacon noted that Farage cannot verify. Most importantly, you agree had taken up smoking again, and asked him to be accountable to the pledge, encouraging why. Farage’s response, delivered with ciga- others to hold you to the pledge in case you rette in hand, was, “I think the doctors have transgress it at any point. got it wrong on smoking.”

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Cognitive biases In this illusion, our perceptual systems These commitments are not only crucial to encounter exactly the same local input, but rational discourse, they are central to sound our cognitive systems add inferences and science. But at the same time, our cognition interpretations of what we’re seeing, based is biased in ways that make it hard for us to on assumptions about where light is coming understand and process things methodically from, and what we believe about the colour or dispassionately (see Hector, this issue). of the object itself. Even in our lowest-level Decades of research have uncovered numer- perceptual experience of reality, our firm ous cognitive biases that help explain why beliefs about what we see do not necessarily the Pro-Truth Pledge is so challenging to correspond to what is demonstrably there. uphold. At higher levels of cognitive processing, An example is the Checkershadow illu- there is the availability heuristic, a cognitive sion, shown in Figure 1: principle that minimizes processing effort, but that leads us to confidently make wrong decisions. In a study of this heuristic, Tversky and Kahneman (1973) asked people to esti- mate the proportion of words in the diction- ary that have the letter R as their first letter versus those that have R as their third letter. People tend to guess that more words in Eng- lish will begin with R. But, with systematic testing of the question, we find that the ratio is actually about 2:1 in the other direction. Figure 1. Roughly, for every word in the dictionary that starts with R there are two words that People are surprised to learn that the squares have R as their third letter. A belief that more A and B are identical in colour and shade. words start with R is false, but it makes sense This is demonstrated in Figure 2, where a from the point of view of the locally-rational bar of the same shade joins the two squares, agent who is trying to answer the question revealing the exact match in surface qual- that was posed in Tversky and Kahneman’s ity: study. The error is a side-effect of the avail- ability heuristic. Words that start with R are simply more available to us—a fact that has to do with how our vocabulary is mentally organized—and they come more readily to mind, so we are led to imagine that there must be more of them. By using the avail- ability heuristic in this way, people minimize their effort in coming to a conclusion about what they believe, but through this, they can arrive at a false belief, which in turn may Figure 2. lead to poor decision-making.

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The example of words beginning with R was that people in his experiment literally illustrates the trade-off between effort and seek only confirmation, and when they get accuracy that is the essence of biased cogni- it they take this to be sufficient to support tion. The upside is that we have methods by their hypothesis. which to quickly come to a conclusion and This apparently natural approach is anti- lock off our processing of a problem at hand, thetical to the scientific method. As Popper thus freeing ourselves to move on to the next (1959) defined it, what we must seek is not pressing matter. The downside is that we may confirmation butfalsification of our hypoth- be wrongly confident about conclusions that eses. “My proposal is based upon an asym- turn out not to be supported by empirical metry between verifiability and falsifiability; data. an asymmetry which results from the logical Another example is the . form of universal statements. For these are More than half a century ago, pioneering never derivable from singular statements, cognitive psychologist Peter Wason (1960) but can be contradicted by singular state- presented subjects with triplets of numerals, ments” (Popper 1959:19). such as 2-4-6. He told subjects that each In Wason’s experiment, the rule for 2-4-6 triplet was generated by a specific rule, and was ‘each numeral is greater than the previ- that their task was to discover the rule. Sub- ous’. Both 4-6-8 and 4-8-12 fit this rule and jects were allowed to devise their own novel so simply asking for confirmation does not triplets and ask the experimenter whether provide evidence to test between the two their made-up triplets fitted the rule or not. competing hypotheses mentioned above. Then, based on the evidence they received, As Popper advised, to seek falsification, we they would state what they thought the would have to check triplets that are not rule was. Wason found that people would generated by the rule. Were Person A to often approach this task by starting with a check only strings that were generated by hypothesized rule, generating novel triplets her own hypothesized rule—such as 4-6-8, using that rule, and asking for confirma- 8-10-12, 23-25-27—a confirmation would tion as to whether the new triplets fitted the not be ruling out other possible rules, such experimenter’s rule. For example, if Person A as Wason’s actual rule in the experiment. If hypothesizes that the string 2-4-6 is gener- she were to check strings that she did not ated by the rule “increase by 2 at each step”, expect to fit, she would quickly learn that her they might offer strings that are generated hypothesis needs revision. The confirmation by that rule—for example, 4-6-8—and ask bias, which leads us to take mere confirma- for confirmation as to whether these strings tion to be evidence that we are correct, is fit the rule. Or if Person B hypothesizes one of the most powerful contaminants of that the string 2-4-6 is generated by the our thinking. rule “increase by the first numeral’s value at In July 2017, author J. K. Rowling tweeted each step”, they might ask whether 4-8-12 a 23-second film clip of Donald Trump host- fits the rule. After they are both told “yes”, ing visitors at the White House. The clip they each become more confident that their shows Trump shaking hands with members hypothesis is correct (although of course they of a group standing in line. At the bottom of cannot both be correct). What Wason found the frame we see the raised arm of a little boy

84 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Enfield — Mind, Language, and Rational Discourse who is in a wheelchair. It looks like he wants Southern Cross—the constellation that Trump to shake his hand. In the clip, Trump appears on the Australian flag—covering his keeps his gaze up, greeting people who are entire back. From this you might infer that standing in line behind the boy. He walks he identifies as a patriotic Australian, but past the boy, strides off, and leaves the room. you might also expect certain other things To her 14 million social media followers, J.K. to be true. For example, you might expect Rowling wrote: “Trump imitated a disabled him to lean towards conservative stances reporter. We all saw that in the election cycle. on issues that are not necessarily or logi- Now he pretends not see a child in a wheel- cally connected to pride in the nation: for chair, as though frightened he might catch example, being against same-sex marriage, his condition.” The post received more than in favour of coal mining, anti gun-control, 12,000 retweets and more than 50,000 likes. or sceptical of climate change. You might But the next day a longer clip from the same also form clear assumptions about his level video was circulated, showing what had hap- of education and likely place of upbringing. pened in the moments immediately prior These expectations and assumptions might to the scene circulated by Rowling. In the be wrong. There is no necessary or logical longer clip, we see Trump directly address- connection between a flamboyant stance of ing and chatting with the little boy, not only patriotism and any of those other views or shaking his hand but kneeling down to talk qualities. And yet many people are confi- to him face-to-face. Rowling’s error (for dent in using a person’s social identity as a which she later apologized) was the result of reliable indicator of a set of fundamentally confirmation bias in action. She started with unrelated things. a firm belief that Trump is a bad person, she The identity bias underlies the crisis of saw something that seemed to confirm this, identity politics in public discourse today. We and she came to a conclusion that matched not only make assumptions about a person’s her belief, then locking off further consid- beliefs based on their professed or assumed eration of the situation. We all regularly fall social identity, but even stronger, one’s social prey to this bias. identity can be used as a criterion for citing A final bias I want to consider here is greater, or lesser, rights to introduce a given an identity bias. This is where a decision proposition into an otherwise rational argu- or judgment about a person, and particu- ment. If unchecked, an identity bias leads to larly about a statement that the person an inability to distinguish between an argu- makes, is affected by one’s beliefs about the ment and the person making it. When we social identity of that person. The heuristic equate an argument and a person, to attack involved here assumes that a person’s iden- a point is to attack the person making it, tity, as evidenced for example by a visible and thus it can be grounds for disallowing sign such as their clothing or other aspect or disregarding arguments, and ultimately of their appearance, allows us to predict a shutting down logical discussions before range of things about them, including their their logical conclusions. This is a threat to knowledge, background, beliefs, and aspi- rational discourse, and may be a threat to rations. Suppose that you observe a young free speech. man at a Sydney beach with a tattoo of the

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The effects of identity bias have been bill—not endorsing them but asking her increasingly visible in university life in North students to evaluate them together with the America. In 2017, Master’s student Lindsay pro C-16 arguments—she has been accused Shepherd was teaching a class at Wilfrid Lau- of siding with political conservatives, con- rier University in Toronto to undergraduate doning violence, and hurting students. This students in relation to issues of free speech, is the identity bias in action. It can confuse, language use, and human rights.1 The Cana- derail, and stifle ideas and debate. dian Parliament’s Bill C-16 added gender Overcoming cognitive biases expression and identity to grounds for dis- crimination under the Canadian Human As individuals, we are all subject to the kinds Rights Act, requiring people to use non- of cognitive biases reviewed above, among gendered pronouns (for example ‘they’ to many more. Why do we have these biases refer to singular persons) as a way of avoid- given their apparently maladaptive nature? ing possible offence to those who do not Could biased forms of thinking have had identify with either male or female gender advantages in our evolutionary context? assignment. Shepherd played her students Why do they seem damaging in today’s some segments from a public debate on TV context? What’s fascinating about human Ontario between two academics, psycholo- cognition is that we are able to focus on our gist Jordan Peterson and historian Nicholas own biases, and, in some cases, override or Matte. She was later called to a meeting by outsmart them. A recent initiative set up at her supervisor and a representative of the Harvard called Outsmarting Human Minds university’s diversity office, among others, is promoting this idea, following insights of who said that a complaint had been made pioneers like Herbert Simon, Amos Tver- by one or more students. She was told that sky, Daniel Kahneman, and Gerd Gigerenzer. she should not have played the recording The idea is that with effort we can detect of the debate, as it risked traumatising her these problematic biases in our own cog- students, by exposing them to hateful ideas, nition and we can overcome them, we can based on the view that Peterson was a hate- outsmart them, and we can do better. These ful person. On the recording of the meeting biases not only result in us coming to wrong- that Lindsay Shepherd gave to the media, her ful conclusions in everyday life, but they supervisor can be heard saying that playing a present a personal challenge for every scien- clip of Jordan Peterson arguing against C-16 tist. When we apply the scientific method, was the same as uncritically playing a video we are designedly working to avoid falling of Adolf Hitler giving a speech. Here, an prey to our own natural biases, such as the assessment of Peterson as a person was given confirmation bias, among many others. To as grounds for silencing the arguments that do science well, we must work against our- he was offering. selves to minimize bias. Lindsay Shepherd identifies as politically Reasons for action liberal in as many ways as you can think of. But by airing arguments against the C-16 Language plays a key role in all of this. When we try to support our arguments with evi- dence, we seldom if ever supply the evidence 1 http://www.macleans.ca/lindsay-shepherd-wilfrid- laurier/ in pure form. We take that evidence and put

86 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Enfield — Mind, Language, and Rational Discourse it into words, and into utterances, or at the When, as Prime Minister of Australia, least we point to some sign of the evidence Tony Abbott stated that “Coal is good for and frame it in verbal form, such as when a Humanity,”2 it was in the context of opening bar chart is used in a scientific paper. And the multi-billion-dollar Caval Ridge mine when we use words, we introduce a host of in Central Queensland in 2014. The state- collateral effects. ment was given as a vindication or justifi- To understand these collateral effects, cation of the government’s support of the think about what it means to make a simple mine, to give reason to think it was a good assertion using language. Consider a sentence thing. Abbott’s present-tense statement was like “This material expands when it comes false, given what we now know about the into contact with hydrogen.” When I say link between fossil fuels and climate change, this in English I make certain sounds. With and the effects that this is having, and will these sounds, I’m coding a proposition. I’m have, on humanity.3 To be sure, as Gittins making a statement about the world which (this issue) suggests, a charitable reading of you could attempt to falsify. But I am inevi- Abbott’s statement is possible (though tan- tably doing more than this. When a person gential, given Abbot’s reference to “the future makes an assertion, it is never heard as a of the coal industry”), if taken out of its completely independent, standalone, disem- context to refer to a beneficial role that coal bodied statement. People will always look may have played in the history of human for motivations. People will always perceive technological progress. But on that reading, a statement as a reason. This phenomenon is the statement could not stand as a reason to like a Checkershadow illusion in the realm of believe that investing in coal production is reasoning. We are presented with something a good idea today. Statements get their full but we are wired not to take it at face value. meanings only in context, and a crucial part We cannot help but project structure onto of that context is the role any statement plays what is given, compensating so as to match in giving reasons for action. our expectations. One of our key assump- Consider the statements made by the tions about people is that they must have George W. Bush administration in 2003 reasons for the things they do and say, and that Saddam Hussein’s government in Iraq we cannot help but try to infer those reasons. possessed weapons of mass destruction (see So, if I say to you, “This material expands Colin Powell’s Feb 5, 2003, address to the when it comes into contact with hydrogen,” UN Security Council). What was important I might be giving you a reason not to use for the Bush administration was that the the material (e.g., because we know that statement be made, not because it was true hydrogen will be present but we need the (it was not), but because it would stand as structure to remain fixed in shape and size) a reason for US forces to invade Iraq. It has or I might be suggesting that we should use since been acknowledged that there were it (e.g., if we are building a hydrogen sensor). But we are never “just saying” something. A 2 http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-10-13/coal-is- statement always gives a possible reason for good-for-humanity-pm-tony-abbott-says/5810244 action, and this imports much else into the 3 https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/ discourse. nov/17/were-in-a-post-truth-world-with-eroding- trust-and-accountability-it-cant-end-well

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no weapons of mass destruction. In trying We will always look for reasons behind to interpret this in hindsight, people do not people’s words and actions, and if the claimed conclude that there was, therefore, simply reasons are in doubt, unclear, or not to our no reason for the military action. People liking, we will imagine new reasons (typi- will either assume that those who made the cally in line with our existing biases). This assertion were mistaken, or that they were infects much of our thinking, and it drives lying, and if they were lying, then there must conspiracy theories. have been another reason for the US mili- Choice of words tary actions in 2003. Alternative reasons that have been suggested include revenge or duty In sum, whenever someone makes a state- to respond to what happened on 9/11, or a ment, it will be interpreted as a reason for desire to possess and control Iraq’s oil. Other action. I want to go further, and suggest that reasons can be imagined. our incorrigible tendency to seek and pro- Another example is that of Veronique pose reasons is not just a property of human Pozner, mother of six-year-old Noah Pozner, cognition, but it is centrally entwined with who was slaughtered along with 19 other our capacity for language. Without language, first grade children, and 7 adults, at the we would be unable to thematize reasons, Sandy Hook shooting in December 2012 which is to say we would be unable to intro- in Newtown, Connecticut. Noah’s mother duce reasons into a collective focus of atten- gave public testimony in relation to her tion, in order to justify or question people’s son’s death, and has since campaigned for (including our own) actions and decisions. gun control in the US. Conspiracy theo- This is one important sense in which facts rists claim that the Sandy Hook incident is have to go through language to get to us. a hoax, and have mounted a campaign to A final sense in which facts have to go expose the parents of slain children as actors. through language to get to us has to do In June 2017, Lucy Richards was convicted with the words that we choose when we by a Florida court for harassing and threaten- describe a state of affairs. Because we can ing Noah Pozner’s parents. Hoaxers such as choose our words, this means that natural Richards have alleged that Veronique Pozner facts—while in themselves independent of is not who she says she is, that she is a Swiss human language—are necessarily framed in government agent, that there was no mas- a particular way in discourse, and therefore sacre at Sandy Hook, and that her son never not in the many other ways they might have existed. The key idea behind this theory is been framed on that occasion. that it proposes an alternative reason why The philosopher Gottlob Frege famously Pozner has made anti-gun statements: it dis- pointed out that a single entity can be misses her stated reason — that her son was described in different ways (Frege 1892). murdered, along with other first-graders — His example was “the morning star” versus and suggests that she independently wanted “the evening star”. Both descriptions pick out to promote gun control, for political reasons. the planet Venus, but they do so by means In a photo of her posted online, conspiracy of different “modes of presentation”. This theorists refer to Veronique Pozner as a is the principle behind all framing differ- “long-time gun grabber”. ences, from “dog” versus “mutt” to “terrorist” versus “freedom fighter”.

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When 25-year-old Freddie Gray died from the test question was “How fast were the cars spinal injuries incurred while in police cus- going when they bumped into each other?” tody in April 2015 in Baltimore, the result- For the other group it was “How fast were ing civil unrest was linguistically framed in the cars going when they smashed into each different ways, depending on the political other?” The people who were asked about leaning of the news outlet. A study of the lan- the cars’ speed using the phrase “smashed guage used by different websites to describe into” estimated a higher speed than those the same events compared frequency of word who were asked using the phrase “bumped use: specifically, the choice of words between into”, even though both groups saw the exact “riot” and “protest”.4 Conservative outlet Fox same scene. This shows that linguistic fram- News used the word “riot” more often than ing is not a nicety. It literally affects what liberal outlet CNN. This might be expected, people believe about a scene, even when they given the political leanings of the two outlets have witnessed the scene directly. and their likely different stance toward the legitimacy (or not) of those taking action Conclusion on the streets. The points I have made here about reality, But choice of words is more than a matter cognitive biases, language, and rational dis- of connotation or style. When words frame course have implications for how we should a proposition, they drive yet another bias understand critical thinking around truth. that demonstrably affects our thinking. Any question about truth starts with a state- Dean (2017:18) gives the following exam- ment being made by someone, to someone, ple. “Suppose a deadly epidemic has broken in a context. We need to ask what motivates out and the disease is expected to kill 600 the person. What is their reason for making people. Which drug is better: Drug A, which the statement? What words are they using, will save 200 people for sure, but only 200 and what words could they have used but people; or Drug B, which has a 1/3 probabil- chose not to? What biases may they be sub- ity of curing everyone and a 2/3 probability ject to, and what biases are we, as interpreters of saving no one? Given this choice, most of their words, subject to? Our cognitive people will choose Drug A, the drug that biases, combined with the limited tools of will certainly save 200 people. Yet if Drug language, put a veil over reality. But reality A is described as dooming 400 people for is there whether we like it or not. Behind sure, most people choose Drug B.” Different any relativism of perspectives or alternative descriptions of a scene can be equally true, framings there is a brute reality that provides but can point people’s reasoning processes sound reasons for action. The challenge is in different directions. to know that brute reality when we see it, Memory is especially susceptible. Eliza- and to keep it in view, without falling prey beth Loftus and John Palmer (1974) played to the many biases that conspire to obscure a film clip of two cars colliding to two dif- the truth. ferent groups of people and later tested them I want to conclude on an optimistic note. on their memory of the scene. For one group, In a recent panel discussion about the post- truth crisis, an audience member asked: “If 4 https://linguisticpulse.com/2015/04/29/covering- online information is to be regulated, who baltimore-protest-or-riot/ will be the gatekeeper?” The answer is that

89 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Enfield — Mind, Language, and Rational Discourse it cannot be regulated in any top-down way. Frege, G. 1892. On sense and reference. Not even the best fact-checking, nor the most In P. Geach and M. Black (eds), 1960, well-intentioned filtering, could stem the Translations from the philosophical writings of Gottlob Frege, 56–78. Oxford: tide of falsehood and spin. But as individuals, Blackwell. we can be the ultimate gatekeepers. There is Gittins, R. 2018. Rapporteur summary of an economy of information, and our brains the Forum. Journal & Proceedings of the and minds are conduits and filters for its Royal Society of New South Wales, 151(1), circulation. To take control of that economy, this issue. we need to develop a culture of discerning, Hector, D. 2018. The future of rationality in a post-truth world. Journal & rational thought, by promoting and valu- Proceedings of the Royal Society of New ing cognitive literacy. If we are aware of our South Wales, 151(1), this issue. biases, and are willing and able to recognize Loftus, E.F., and Palmer, J.C. 1974. and pre-empt them, both in others and in Reconstruction of automobile ourselves, then together we can put a stop destruction: an example of the interaction between language and to this age of irrational discourse. memory. Journal of Verbal Learning and References Verbal Behavior 13(5): 585–89. Popper, K. 1959. The Logic of Scientific Bero, L. 2018. Influences on evidence: Discovery. London: Hutchinson and Co. Putting the cart before the horse. Journal (Translation of Popper, Karl, 1935, Logik & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New der Forschung, Vienna: Julius Springer.) South Wales, 151(1), this issue. Tversky, A., and Kahneman, D. 1973. Dean, C. 2017. Making Sense of Availability: a heuristic for judging Science: Separating Substance from Spin. frequency and probability. Cognitive Cambridge, MA, and London: The Psychology. 5: 207-232. Belknap Press of Harvard University Wason, P. 1960. On the failure to Press. eliminate hypotheses in a conceptual task. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology. 12.3: 129–140.

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The role of evidence and expertise in policy-making: the politics and practice of science advice

Sir Peter Gluckman ONZ FRS Chief Science Advisor to the Prime Minister of New Zealand Chair, International Network of Government Science Advice E-mail: [email protected]

Abstract What is the role of the institution of science in a world where trust is declining? How do we ensure respect for scientifically derived knowledge in this environment, and particularly for policymaking? How do we ensure that policymakers are more likely to take into account the role of scientifically derived evidence in their decision-making?

Introduction the positioning of the different publics in ’m going to focus on three questions, relationship to the policy community and Iwhich, in many ways, follow on from it is increasingly affecting the way the policy Emma Johnston’s talk (Johnston 2018). community operates. What is the role of the institution of sci- The science-policy nexus ence in the world where trust is declining? For virtually every government at any level, How do we ensure respect for scientifically every issue they face has a scientific com- derived knowledge in this environment, and ponent to it. I must emphasise I’m using particularly for policymaking? How do we science in the broadest definition you can ensure that policymakers are more likely to imagine to include the knowledge-based take into account the role of scientifically humanities as well. derived evidence in their decision-making? We also need to remember that science Post-trust, post-elite, post-truth will never alone make policy, which is why I’m not going to dwell on the post-truth, I’ve eradicated the words “evidence-based post-trust, post-elite, post-whatever world policy making” from my lexicon, because, we’re in now because others have addressed while evidence can inform, it cannot be the this. Let’s just remember that the manipu- only construct in which policy was made. lation of facts and evidence is not new: it’s And where science is of most use is actu- been going on since religion was invented, ally where the science is most contested. since various forms of power structures Governments are usually making decisions developed ten thousand years ago in vil- in situations where the science is not com- lages and in cities. What we have rather is a plete; it can never be complete and it’s often massive amplification of the effect because most contested. And we now face this chal- of the powers of digitalisation, which have lenge that the science of the most interest to got many effects which I won’t go into now. governments is actually in areas which are It’s also had this dramatic effect of changing most contested in terms of public values.

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The issue is: how do we ensure that the really talking about the changing nature of science is reliable, robust and how will it science. be used? Will it be used well or will it be The changing nature of science misused or ignored altogether? Science has changed dramatically in the What is evidence? last 50 years and it’s going to change much I think we need to remember that science more in the next decade or two, as we see the is not the only form of evidence. For most shift from linear to complex science, from people, science is not their primary source of deterministic to probabilistic science. And evidence. For them, evidence is tradition and from normal to what Jerry Ravetz (2005) folk knowledge, evidence is the knowledge calls post-normal science, that is science that’s within their peer community: it’s reli- where we’re dealing with systems, where it’s gion for some people and it’s anecdote, expe- complex, there are many unknowns, and no rience and observation. And certainly, for matter how much science we do there’ll still most politicians, anecdote and observation be unknowns left at the end of the day, and are the primary things that influence them. residual uncertainties. So where does science sit in that hierarchy Science should not be a proxy for values and how do we work to ensure privilege for debates science in that hierarchy? Here the stakes are high, decisions are urgent Science and values and it intersects dramatically with commu- As discussed by other speakers, science is nity values, and those community values are defined largely by its processes. Science is not in dispute: climate change, environmental a collection of facts; science is a collection of matters, public health matters. Virtually processes which are defined to eliminate bias every contentious issue that government to the extent they can. That’s not to say that considers actually falls into this definition. science is value free, as Nick Enfield spoke It’s complex, we don’t have all the answers, about, of course there are values involved in it intersects with public values, which are what we choose to study and how we study in dispute and of course that’s where a lot it. But in the context of my talk the most of the conflicts emerge and where the dif- important value judgement within science ficulties of how policy and science intersect is the sufficiency of evidence on which to are so great. reach a conclusion. We will come back to And now we’re seeing a new phase of that, because I think many of the debates development, which again was talked about that we have are really over the quality of by Nick Enright (Enright 2018). How do evidence and its sufficiency on which to we address these conflicts? The emergence of draw a conclusion. extended peer review involving the commu- As Heather Douglas (2009) wrote about nity rather than just professionals to review in her brilliant book, it’s this inferential science. The true development of co-design gap between what we know and what we and coproduction are all part of the solu- conclude which is of so much importance tion. But that’s not my talk for today, that’s in policy space. And within all this we are another talk.

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But because we are engaging in science peer-reviewed journals, and papers which which engages with disputed public values, are likely never to be read. science can easily become the proxy for Think about this system. We’ve had a debates which are not about science. We’ve massive utilitarian transition in public sci- seen that in climate change, where the real ence, which we’ve all welcomed because it’s debate is an economic debate and it’s about invited governments to put more money intergenerational and north-south economic into science, but that science has now been issues, not about the science of climate positioned in a much more utilitarian way change. We’ve seen it in relation to geneti- and that’s led to this raft of incentives, par- cally modified organisms, GMOs; we’ve seen ticularly on universities, which have led to a it in fluoridation of water; we’ve seen it in “bibliometric disease”, which I would love to the United States about stem cells and about treat although I’m not sure how. reproductive technologies. We’re seeing the overt politicisation of sci- There are many issues in which it’s easier ence in many places. We’re seeing increasing for people to debate complex science and numbers of these proxy debates reflecting cherry-pick the odd observation, rather than the issue of the relationship of science to deal with the true issues that underlie the the publics. If I’d had a chance to ask a ques- debate. In my experience the best way to tion of Nick Enright, I would suggested that deal with climate change sceptics has been a challenge we now have is actually what to challenge them and say, “You know this guidelines and ethics should surround public is not a scientific debate. You know this is communication by scientists, because on the really a debate about values and you’re not one hand as citizens they’ve got the right of being honest and having a debate that you free speech, but on the other hand they’re should be having.” And we have now a lot standing up and saying they are speaking of evidence, particularly from the GMO for science and there are some real issues and from the climate-change literature, of there that we may need to grasp. I encour- course, that just pushing more science on age you to look at the Science Council of people with different world views will not Japan (2014) work done after the Fukushima resolve the matters and indeed might make debate to see how they are struggling to deal matters worse. with this. And then we have — again it’s been Trust in science as an institution? mentioned — intellectual silos and the real The issue of trust in science as an institu- challenge of trans-disciplinarity. How do we tion, which two other papers in this meeting marry the humanities and social sciences also allude to, has become more complex with the natural sciences? We say we do it, in an environment where science is now but very few people do it. dealing with these complex issues where societal values are in dispute. But there are Science and policy making other issues we must acknowledge; some of Science and policy are very different cultures: them have been alluded to. The other side they have distinct methods and epistemolo- of the endeavour: three million papers last gies. The arrangements between them are year, seven million authors, many allegedly influenced very much by societal culture. What has become clearer is that there’s a need

93 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Gluckman — Politics and Practice of Science Advice for boundary structures to act as translators between these two communities. I spend much time helping countries through my chairmanship of the International Net- work and Government for Science Advice (INGSA)1 discussing these issues. Policy is rarely determined solely by evi- dence. Policy is really made around a whole lot of considerations, public opinion, politi- cal ideology, electoral contracts et cetera. But what science can do, and uniquely do if it’s well presented, is deal with the issues of the evidence of need, the possible solutions and the impacts and the multiple impacts of any possible solution chosen. Figure 1. The ‘policy cycle’ Science at the policy-society nexus There are challenges at the interface: too Policy works far more like Fig. 2, which much science of varying quality, the chang- is itself somewhat simplified, because how ing nature of science, the post-normal nature policy emerges is often unclear. It comes of science, the different perceptions of risk from the work of both formal and infor- that scientists have — which is often actu- mal actors, elected and unelected actors that arial as opposed to the perceptions of risk the somehow coalesces to influence — in this public have — and the perceptions of risk case — the executive of government. One that politicians have, which are largely about can see how confused and complicated poli- the ballot box. And as all of this plays out, cymaking really is. there are different perceptions of expertise: increasingly policymakers or policy analysts think that Wikipedia or Google searching is enough on which to come to a scientific conclusion. We have hubris on behalf of the scientists, we have hubris on behalf of the policymakers, and there are all sorts of issues at the interface and I could go on. Now I have found that many scientists imagine that policy works through a well-defined cycle as shown in Fig. 1, but it’s a total myth.

1 https://ingsa.org/

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executive of gov’t Policy decisions

legislators Private sector

Public

Depends on constitutional arrangments Policy analysts Advocates Lobbyists

Figure 2.

The issue is: how and where does evidential and I think this is a really important point, input work? Well, evidential input has to which is often forgotten, that it needs a con- work all over the place in this system (Fig. 3) certed effort to maintain evidence in front of the policymakers.

executive of gov’t Policy decisions Evidential input

legislators Private sector

Public

Policy analysts Advocates Lobbyists

Figure 3.

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The primary functions of science advice Policy makers What are the primary functions of science At its simplest, policymaking is about making advice? First of all, I think it’s to help the choices between different options which policy community actually understand a affect different stakeholders in different ways, complex system; be it a social problem, be with different consequences, many of which it an environmental problem, be it a trans- are not certain. I think that the major role port, an urban issue. Often, they have only and the core presumption of scientific advice seen bits of the system and system thinking is that it’s more likely to allow government by scientists can help in clarifying what can to choose between the options in a way that possibly be done. will result in better outcomes. It is not always appreciated that policymakers have limited Scientific input to policy-making bandwidth. The policy cycle is short and Second, it’s about helping policymakers see getting shorter because of the impact of digi- the range of options that could be applied talisation. The science they need is usually and understanding the implications of each incomplete and much ambiguous and yet of those options, because policymakers the words “more research is needed” are not always have options: they always have the the words that help the policymaker. option of doing nothing, which is often Governments must make decisions; if their default position. and from that they they don’t have a policy-acceptable solution have got a range of options, each of which to them at a point in time, they will usually will have spill-over effects. Third, there’s a move on to another issue. And you cannot role in evaluating policies that have been expect politicians to be scientific referees; implemented. you can see contested science being argued And then there is a distinct role in emer- in a way that can be very confusing. gencies. Most emergencies, be they natural disasters or a terrorist event, have a scientific Scientists and policy making or a technological component. Often there What are scientists good at? We are very is a need to make sure the policymakers good at problem definition. Climate science understand what the evidence is saying in has done a great job. We’re less so at finding such situations. the solutions that the science tells us about Then you have the issue of technology because usually it involves different disci- assessment and forecasting. Then there is the plines from the disciplines that define the diplomatic dimension as seen in the global problem in the first place. Climate change challenges that we face and are encapsulated was all about physical scientists, but climate in the Sustainable Development Goals. Most change solutions is about economics, about have a scientific dimension and science diplo- social science, about different technologies macy is going to be critical at both national et cetera; it’s got a whole different basis to and global levels in making progress. it. Too often scientists approach the policy- maker with a fixed solution in mind, one that is not policy-acceptable and are sur- prised when it is rejected.

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Elements in a science advisory ecosystem Individual academics, universities, There are many potential elements in a sci- research institutes ence advisory ecosystem. I’ve listed them in Academic societies/professional bodies Fig. 4, from the role of individual scientists and universities, research institutes, through Government employed practicing to the national academies, the government scientists advisory boards, to science advisors such as Scientists within policy agencies myself, the role of parliamentary libraries and so forth. There’s an immense number Scientists within regulatory agencies of possible players in this ecosystem and Independent think tanks you don’t need just one, you need several What works units elements. National academies Government advisory boards/science councils Science advisors to executive of government Parliamentary libraries, parliamentary advice units Figure 4. Many potential elements in a sci- ence advisory ecosystem

Knowledge Knowledge Knowledge Policy generators synthesizers brokers Evaluation Individual academics +++ ++ + Academic societies/professional bodies + Government employed practicing +++ + ++ scientists Scientists within policy agencies ++ ++ ++ Scientists within regulatory agency ++ ++ Independent think tanks ++ + What works units etc +++ + ++ National academies +++ + Government advisory boards/science ++ + councils Science advisors to the executive of + ++++ government Science advice to legislators + ++

Figure 5. Different roles in a science advisory ecosystem

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Different roles in the ecosystem science system operates. Then there’s evi- In Fig. 5 I have broken this up into what I dence for policy development, implemen- think are the four categories of roles in this tation and evaluation, and the functions of interface. There are the knowledge genera- crisis management and horizon scanning. tors, the scientists who generate knowledge; And again you can see that there’s a raft of there are the knowledge synthesisers such as structures and institutions that can assist we heard from in the last talk (Bero 2018). and are needed to achieve a fully effective There are scientists and units that aggregate interface. the knowledge and try and make sense of The concept of brokerage what it means. And then there are the knowl- edge brokers who have to translate that sci- I’ve used this word “brokerage” and I want ence to the policymaker and translate the to talk about it a little bit more. Roger Pielke The Honest Broker policymakers’ needs to the scientists. And wrote a book, (2007), in then there are the policy evaluators. You can which he defined that there were different see that you need more than one structure in ways we can communicate. We can be advo- your interface if it’s to be effective. cates who want a particular solution or a particular outcome, or we can be brokers The nature of science advice where we actually transmit the knowledge Then you can think about other ways too. in an appropriate, reasonably values-free way You can think of another set of dimensions — because it can never be absolutely values- (Fig. 6): policy for science, that is how the free — to the policy community, allowing

Policy for Evidence for Evidence for Evidence for Horizon Crises science policy: policy policy scanning options implementation evaluation

Individual academics + ± ± ± ± Academic societies/profess’l bodies +++ + + ± ± Gov’t employed scientists + ++ + + + Scientists within policy agencies + ++ ++ + ++ + Scientists within regulatory agencies + ++ ++ Independent think tanks ++ ± ± + What works units ++ ± National academies +++ + + Gov’t advisory bds/science councils ++ + + + Science advisors + ++++ ++ ++ ++ +++

Figure 6. The nature of science advice

98 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Gluckman — Politics and Practice of Science Advice them to overlay the values dimensions they Informal and formal mechanisms have responsibility for. Brokerage is largely Another way to look at this division is to about what is known, what the consensus is; think about informal and formal mecha- if advice goes beyond the consensus, why so? nisms. Informal mechanisms are what advi- It is also about what is not known. Often the sors do when they brainstorm with the prime most important thing you can say to a gov- minister or a minister or suggest they may ernment is, “We do not know.” Other cave- like a report on this, or suggest, “There’s a ats may be needed to put on the data, the problem with their thinking.” Such inter- inferential gap between what we know and actions and challenges rely on trusted rela- what we don’t know needs to be clarified, as tionships between science advisors and the do the risks involved. What are the options executive of government. and trade-offs? What are the consequences This is distinct from the writing of the outside the science that each option might formal reports. It matters whether such bring? I prefer not to make a recommen- reports are requested or proffered unsolicited. dation, I’m always talking about what the It is important that reports are not written implications of each option are. It’s for the to show off the intellectual brilliance of the policymakers to make the value judgements, report writers but are designed to answer weighing up all those other considerations the questions that policymakers and society that come into play. need. This realisation is leading academies to Internal v. external inputs change their style of report writing. And then you have this other classification. Academies and science advice People like myself are inside the system. I This brings me to the role of Academies, can talk to the prime minister or ministers since this Forum is being conducted by the any day. I talk to the cabinet office regularly Royal Society of New South Wales. Acad- and that means that I can see the many dif- emies have a critical role. They are a place at ferent interactions that are in play within which multiple disciplines can come together the complex policy process. That is the and write a critical report, a report on any advantage of science advisors and scientists subject. But sadly too many academy reports within the system: they can often see what are not read and that is because most are is possible in a policy sense. On the other not, shall we say, negotiated before they’re hand, they’re not as fully independent as an started with the government of the day to academy or academics on the outside. But see if the government actually wants to get the latter are often better placed to do the it. Because if you put a question forward deliberative reports on complex issues, but that the government doesn’t want to hear here the advisor may still have a key role in the answers to, it’s probably not going to ensuring the academy understands the ques- succeed. Often even when they are given a tion government is asking. Effective science question by the government, academies do advice needs a balance between internal and not always realise what the government will external inputs. find useful by way of response. There are a

99 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Gluckman — Politics and Practice of Science Advice whole lot of other issues and I think acad- One needs to maintain integrity and trust emies will have a challenge in this post-trust with all four audiences and there’s obviously world of how they’ll reinvent themselves, but a hierarchy of trust. I can’t do my job if I that’s another story. don’t have the trust of the prime minister, the ministers, the policymakers but it’s also The skillset needed, underlying principles critical to have the trust of the public. Summing up, the skillset needed at the sci- The most important thing academies can ence-policy interface, whether it’s outside do is to maintain the trust of the academic from academies, from other think-tanks, or community, otherwise they lose their stand- whatever, and that needed from those inside ing as an academy. So, you see there are dif- the system such as science advisors are com- ferent hierarchies of trust involved. patible but differ in emphasis. I have focused One needs an ecosystem; few countries largely in this talk on what I think are really have a comprehensive ecosystem. Britain key for those who are inside the system. does reasonably well, I think New Zealand I think anybody who’s engaged in the does very well, I’m not going to comment interface needs to understand the com- on Australia. plexities of policymaking. They need to get We have real challenges: what is a fact? beyond single disciplines and realise that vir- Is robust science available? Who decides tually everything that a government deals whether the knowledge is robust and reli- with in science has a social component to able? We have this huge emerging issue of it as well as a natural science component. social licence for new technologies. As the They need to employ brokerage rather than innovation and science machine gets faster advocacy. Hubris must be avoided. If you go and faster with the nanotech, biotech, digital in there saying, “You must do that,” you’ll tech, geo-tech, wherever it will be, there’ll be find a tribe of policy analysts soon writing more and more issues of social licence emerg- briefing papers as to why that’s not the case ing. The natural scientist community and the and why the scientists don’t understand the innovators need to think more about how nuances of policy making. to develop and maintain social licence and It needs diplomacy, it needs policy entre- they cannot do this without engaging social preneurship, it needs good and trusted com- science. I’m heavily involved with the OECD munication to the four distinct audiences: on the issues of what the impact of digitisa- the politician, the policymaker, the public tion will be and all that’s associated with it on and media, and the science community. the concept of human wellbeing. What does Humility is the most important skill you it mean at a level of individual, the level of can have in talking to a policymaker. You society, at the level of the nation state? must never try and take their role away from And what I’ve argued for in this talk is them — they are the ones who are there to that any effective advisory system needs to judge the trade-offs that each option sug- have an informal, that is, an internal com- gests. They are the ones that need to opine ponent, but it cannot work unless there’s on values and consequences, not us. an effective external deliberative component coming from the broader science commu- nity, and particularly from academies.

100 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Gluckman — Politics and Practice of Science Advice

References Pielke, R., (2007) The Honest Broker: Making Bero, L, (2018) Influences on evidence: Sense of Science in Policy and Politics, Cambridge putting the cart before the horse. Journal & U.P. Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Ravetz, J.R. (2005) The No-Nonsense Guide to Wales, 151, this issue Science. Oxford: New Internationalist Douglas, H. (2009) Science, Policy, and the Science Council of Japan, (2014) A review Value-Free Ideal, Pittsburgh U.P. of the model comparison of transportation Enright, N.J. (2018) Mind, language, and and deposition of radioactive materials rational discourse. Journal & Proceedings of the released to the environment as a result of the Royal Society of New South Wales, 151, this issue. Tokyo Electric Power Company’s Fukushima Johnston, E.L. (2018) Why are scientists so Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident . quiet? Cultural and philosophical constrainrs Tokyo: SCJ http://www.scj.go.jp/ja/info/ on the public voice of the scientist. Journal & kohyo/pdf/kohyo-22-h140902-e1.pdf Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, 151, this issue.

101 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 102–105. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010102-04

The view from Grubb Street — has it all just been fake news?

Ross Gittins Economics Editor, The Sydney Morning Herald, Sydney, Australia E-mail: [email protected]

Abstract As the rapporteur of the Forum, Ross Gittins FRSN gave the concluding address.

e have had a lot of interesting and line that some have regarded as spine-chill- Wvaried contributions on the topic of ing: “People in this country have had enough Truth, Rationality and Post-Truth, and I of experts.”1 As a political scientist he put a know from what people have said to me lot of our worries about truth and post-truth during the breaks how much you have into a more realistic context, making them enjoyed them. In summarising the various less spine-chilling. talks, I will try to draw out the range of views Emma Johnston said we were in a post- pertaining particularly to the central topic. truth era of virulent attacks on science and Opening proceedings, Don Hector asked online trolls, in which the truth can be virtu- us what had happened to reason, then told ally impossible to distinguish from fake news. us that the post-modernists and relativists As a profession, scientists needed to shore up were in the ascendency, rejecting estab- their standing in the community, asserting lished sources of reason and accepting that the importance of their work in contribut- belief should have equal sway with fact, and ing to evidence-informed decision-making. thereby putting an open, free society in great They needed to help the public recognise danger. credible scientific knowledge within the new Simon Chapman, hero of the long-run- “information free-for-all”. They needed to ning battle against the tobacco companies to change the culture that discourages scientists get restrictions on smoking and the harm it from speaking out. Genuine partnerships does, told us about his latest crusade, against with communities, businesses and industries the unfounded fear of wind turbines. Here, could go a long way to re-establishing trust rather than battling powerful industrial in science. interests, he’s been battling uninformed Lisa Bero, from pharmacy, took a different, individuals, whose fears have been taken far more professionally self-critical tack, remind- too seriously by a conservative government ing us of the way conflicts of interest arising containing many climate-change deniers. from financial gain can reduce the influence James Wilsdon’s written contribution of research evidence in policymaking, but (spoken by the forum’s chairman, Paul Grif- then asking whether we should be paying fiths) told us about the Brexit experience, more attention to the way conflicts of inter- with its many fanciful claims and rejection of est can bias the design, methods, conduct, evidence and the views of experts. He quoted interpretation and publication of research. the leading Tory Brexiteer Michael Gove’s 1 Financial Times, 4 June 2016.

102 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Gittins — The view from Grubb Street

We need to make our research trustworthy, contribution to our material living stand- she concluded. I conclude that some scepti- ards since the Industrial Revolution, I would cism about the findings of scientific papers have thought that coal, too, has benefits as may indeed be justified. well as costs.) But then Nick made a very Then Peter Gluckman spoke about the role pertinent contribution, joining Don Hector of evidence and expertise in policymaking, in reminding us of the findings of the psy- making a host of realistic and enlightening chologist Daniel Kahneman, who won the points drawn from his extensive experience Nobel memorial prize in economics for his as New Zealand’s chief science advisor. He role as a founder of behavioural econom- observed that science is not the only source ics. Kahneman demonstrated that, most of of evidence political leaders take notice of the time, humans are unthinking, emotion- (with a lot of attention given to advice from driven, non-rational animals notorious for those less scientific beings, economists). And their poor reasoning, even though they can, evidence is not the only thing policymakers at times, reach the heights of rational rea- take into account in the decisions they make. soning we see our scientists attaining in, for In a democracy, it’s not surprising they take instance, Newtonian physics and Einstein’s account of public opinion. Nor that their theory of relativity. Which of those two, by attitudes are influenced by ideology. And, of the way, is or was the truth? course, their decisions often involve a degree So, what are my thoughts about all this? of compromise in the face of conflicting Sorry, but the journalistic scepticism which is interest groups. my substitute for scientific scepticism leaves Andrew Jakubowicz explained how the me unconvinced by much of it. As a journo internet facilitates the spread of racism and would put it, I think it’s a beat up. I can reduces trust, damaging the functioning of understand how frustrating scientists must multicultural societies. He proposed ways to find it to discover there are uninformed reduce the problem. people who simply reject the scientific evi- Nick Enfield argued it was not remotely dence of global warming, and are impervi- in the community’s interests to dismiss ous to counter argument. Indeed, the psy- expert testimony from scientists, in the chologists tell us, the more dire the scientists’ process diminishing our trust in them, in warnings about how little time we have left this “post-truth era” where we feel free to to prevent hugely damaging climate change, substitute “alternative facts”. Rather than the more the deniers are reinforced in their simply criticising the things anonymous denial. I can understand how shocking many people say on social media, he singled out scientists find it to be told to their face that Tony Abbott’s assertion that “coal is good they’re not believed, not telling the truth, but for humanity”,2 when “the overwhelming are making up crises to get more research majority of people who are professionally funding. But I don’t find this evidence-deny- qualified to evaluate scientific evidence on ing, unreasonable, irrational behaviour, this the matter know otherwise”. (Economists refusal to use one’s brain, all that surprising. are trained to weight the costs of actions I’ve lived with it every week of the 40 years against their benefits; taking account of its I’ve been a commentator on economics. It

2 ABC, 13 Oct. 2014.

103 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Gittins — The view from Grubb Street strikes me that hard scientists know a lot where many chose not to use their brains about how the physical world works, but for the purposes scientists think they should, not a lot about how humans work. where they much prefer to give their emo- Nor do they seem to know much about tions free rein, where anti-intellectualism is how the political game is played. Did you common. To me, this isn’t something new, know, for instance, that people are given a it’s a description of the human condition. vote regardless of how uneducated they are, To attribute it to the ascendancy of post- how unthinking they are, how willing they modernist intellectualising rather than the are to give free rein to their instant, emo- prevalence of mug punters is to engage in tional reactions to developments, and their intellectual delusion. refusal to use their grey matter for anything What’s changed is that the internet and other than enhancing their encyclopaedic social media have given the anti-intellectu- knowledge of cricket scores and reality televi- als and tribalists and racists a microphone sion? Did you know that humans are prone through which to broadcast. One effect of to tribal behaviour? That politicians have, this is to make our tribe far more aware of for their own venal reasons, turned climate the terrible things other tribes have always change into a tribal issue, where your tribe thought and said about us while out of our believes in it, but my tribe doesn’t? That I can hearing. This does mean there’s now a lot close my mind to all your incomprehensible more scope for people to be shocked and arguments, can simply refuse to accept that hurt by the new knowledge of the terrible your professed expertise means you know the things other people think and say about truth but I don’t, for no reason other than them. The internet and social media have that I and my tribe don’t believe that sh*t? also made it far easier for disparate members I’m not convinced we live in the post-truth of particular tribes (including the science era. As we have heard, the Oxford diction- tribe) to find each other and engage in orgies ary defines “post-truth” as “circumstances in of confirmation bias. To rev each other up. which objective facts are less influential in As has been observed today, social media shaping public opinion than appeals to emo- has facilitated the development of many and tion and personal belief”. And this is some- varied echo chambers. What’s less obvious to thing new, is it? We used to live in a world me is how much real difference this upsurge where rational analysis reigned supreme, in preaching to the choir makes. It probably where no one ever used facts selectively, no does contribute to the other forces making one quoted a fact that needed checking, and our politics and our community more polar- all the policy decisions politicians made were ised. Many speakers today have implied that based strictly on evidence, where anything there’s been a big increase in the communi- said by someone wearing a lab coat was ty’s anti-intellectual attitudes and behaviour. accepted without question, but then along This may or may not be true. Ironically, no came the internet and social media, and sud- one produced any hard statistical evidence denly all respect for the truth, and facts and that it is. One alternative explanation for the evidence and experts went out the window. trends we think we see and attribute to the Really? I think we’ve always lived in a world digital revolution, but which hardly rated a where a lot of people are pretty dumb, mention today, is the longstanding decline

104 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Gittins — The view from Grubb Street in standards of political behaviour by the ever been, and one of the things they try to mainstream parties, which is prompting teach you at uni is to think critically about increasing numbers of voters to flirt with the pronouncements authority figures make, various strains of populism. even those who tell you they’re experts. Don’t I think I detected a fair bit of tribal, ra-ra just nod when your doctor tells you some- thinking by the science tribe in what was thing, put them through their paces. said today. Science and scientists are being The digital age has made us more con- disrespected as never before and we must lift scious of the anti-intellectualism and intol- our game and fight back. I suspect I heard erance that has always been with us. It may echoes of nostalgia for the good old days also have added to the quantity of that dys- when the pronouncements of scientists were functional thinking and behaviour. In any accepted with respect and without question, event, it has made us more conscious of the much as people in olden times wanted their need to find new and more psychologically priests just to tell them what to do, and not effective ways of getting through to those do, to live moral life. Let me remind you that we believe need the benefit of our enlight- our population is better educated than it’s enment.

105 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 106–107. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010106-02

Thesis abstract

An empirical analysis of the investment and profitability effects

Brendan P. Elliot Abstract of a thesis for a Doctorate of Philosophy submitted to the University of Newcastle, Callaghan, Australia

Asset pricing factors formed on the level of whilst the profitability factor is not. These firm investment and profitability are shown results are robust to the choice of asset pric- to have significantex post explanatory power ing model, as well as a battery of robustness in the cross-section of stock returns. Whilst tests. asset pricing models incorporating these fac- The second empirical chapter examines tors exhibit improved explanatory power in the relationship between discount rates1 and the cross‑section of returns, conjecture exists the returns attributable to portfolios formed as to the underlying drivers of the invest- on either investment or profitability. Theo- ment and profitability effects. This thesis retical explanations for the investment and contains three empirical asset pricing studies profitability effects suggest that the level of examining the investment and profitability discount rates, relative to macroeconomic effects, providing tests of the efficacy of these conditions, drives the premium attributable factors. The results presented consider the to the investment and profitability factors. It pervasiveness of these factors across global is expected that the returns of high‑invest- equity markets, as well as examining two key ment and low‑profitability stocks will experi- theoretical explanations for these anomalies: ence greater changes as a result of shocks to shocks to the discount rate, and state vari- the discount rate. The results in this chapter ables containing information on the future are supportive of these theoretical explana- investment opportunity set. tions, indicating the underlying market state The first empirical chapter examines is a significant factor in explaining the rela- whether asset pricing models that incor- tionship between unexpected changes in the porate investment and profitability factors discount rate and the returns attributable to should be considered ex ante predictors of portfolios formed on investment and profit- stock returns. The study focusses on the ability. Australian stock market, as it is characterised The third empirical chapter examines by small, high‑investing, and low‑profita- whether the returns of investment and prof- bility firms. This subset of the investment itability hedge portfolios are explained by opportunity set has proven problematic for return dispersion. This assertion is tested US investment and profitability factors. The on portfolio returns formed on stocks segre- results in this chapter demonstrate that the investment factor is persistently and per- 1 Monetary policy shocks are used as a proxy for unex- vasively related to Australian stock returns, pected changes to the discount rate.

106 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Elliot — PhD Abstract gated by region, as well as a global portfolio state variable that captures the time‑varying of stocks. The results of this chapter support investment opportunity set. the assertion that return dispersion explains future investment and profitability hedge Dr Brendan P Elliot portfolio returns across all regional and the Newcastle Business School global portfolios. The results demonstrate The University of Newcastle that the explanatory power of return disper- Callaghan NSW 2308 sion relates to hedge portfolio returns up AUSTRALIA to twelve months in the future, indicating E-mail: [email protected] that return dispersion may be a proxy for a Thesis: http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/ 1342403

107 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, p. 108. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010108-01

Thesis abstract

Extending and testing the components of evidence accumulation models of decision-making

Nathan Evans Abstract of a thesis for a Doctorate of Philosophy submitted to the University of Newcastle, Callaghan, Australia

Past decades of research within the area of two areas previously unexplored with EAMs. decision-making have had a large focus on The second goal is addressed in Chapters 4 advancing process models, which contain and 5, which assess whether a newly pro- theoretically meaningful parameters, in posed component of EAMs, a threshold that order to better understand the processes decreases over the course of a trial (collaps- that underlie decision-making. One of the ing threshold; or a mathematically similar most popular types of process models in urgency signal) can be justified in empirical decision-making research have been evi- data. The final goal is addressed in Chapter dence accumulation models (EAMs), which 6, which presents a new method of calculat- propose that decision-making is made up of ing Bayes factors — a method of selecting some process where evidence for the vari- between competing models — for the LBA ous alternatives accumulates over the course using Monte-Carlo integration and general- of a decision, until it reaches some thresh- purpose graphics processing unit computing. old value, where the decision is triggered. Generally speaking, the findings indicate: Importantly, EAMs have enjoyed a great that EAMs are capable of extending to the deal of success in being fitted to empirical fields of personality and genetics, that the data, being able to successfully account for proposed component of a collapsing thresh- a wide range of phenomena and helping to old is not necessarily justified within the answer theoretical questions that would have EAM framework, and that the use of Bayes been nearly impossible to answer without factors through Monte-Carlo integration the use of a process model. This thesis aims improves upon previous methods of model to accomplish three main goals: to extend selection. EAMs to new research areas to help solve novel empirical questions, to test newly pro- Dr Nathan Evans posed components that could potentially be Faculty of Science added to existing EAMs, and to propose a University of Newcastle new method of how to test between models Newcastle NSW 2308 in the EAM framework to answer empirical AUSTRALIA research questions. The first goal is addressed E-mail: [email protected] in Chapters 2 and 3, which apply the linear ballistic accumulator (LBA) to personality Thesis: http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/ and genetics research, respectively, which are 1333595

108 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 109–110. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010109-02

Thesis abstract

Entrepreneurial decision-making and expertise acquisition: A study among Sri Lankan microfinance borrowers

Nadeera Ranabahu Abstract of a thesis for a Doctorate of Philosophy submitted to University of Wollongong, Wollongong, Australia

Microfinance institutions (MFIs) — organi- personal savings during business start-up sations that provide small-scale loans, sav- and development. With the microfinance ings, insurance and other financial services loan, entrepreneurs considered losses beyond to individuals who lack access to traditional financial aspects, such as their reputation banking services — are often criticised for within the community, business and per- not being able to create viable and profit- sonal assets, and time required to borrow able new ventures among their borrowers. money and repay loans. Entrepreneurs also Although the ability to create and manage formed agreements with customers and sup- businesses also depends on the social and pliers and adapted products to meet seasonal, human capital of the borrowers, little is technological, and economic changes. Spe- known about how microfinance lending cifically, women entrepreneurs were careful principles and procedures contribute to to adapt their business practices according to MFI-funded entrepreneurs’ business deci- social, cultural and gender norms. Similarly, sion-making and their human and social consistent with predictive thinking, MFI- capital development. Using data collected funded entrepreneurs set short-term goals, from a mixed method approach (i.e., a calculated returns, and considered market survey, interviews, daily activity journals, and competitor information. group discussions, focus groups, and obser- To acquire expertise, entrepreneurs prac- vations), this thesis examined MFI-funded tised and rehearsed both means-driven and entrepreneurs’ business decisions, their ven- predictive thinking using unstructured and ture start-up and development process and self-regulated business tasks. Less often, expertise acquisition. they used structured tasks, such as attend- The study findings demonstrate that ing training programs, meeting experts and MFI-funded entrepreneurs, in their busi- obtaining feedback to sharpen their exper- ness start-up and development, used both tise. These business tasks included pre-ven- means-driven (i.e., effectuation) and pre- turing activities, such as experimentation, dictive (i.e., causation) decision-making and then sharpening business skills gradually logics. They thought about available means by conducting technical, “tangible” business such as the knowledge they have, available establishment tasks, “abstract” management resources, relied on social networks for sup- tasks, and business complexity management port, and attempted to minimise financial tasks. losses by using inexpensive resources and

109 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Ranabahu — PhD Abstract

This study contributes theoretically and use microfinance lending to enhance entre- practically to the entrepreneurship and preneurial expertise among borrowers and microfinance domains by linking means- enhance their social and human capital. driven and predictive thinking to continu- ous practice and task rehearsal, highlighting Dr Nadeera Ranabahu how MFI-funded entrepreneurs use social Faculty of Business and other factors in business decision-mak- University of Wollongong ing, and constructing a conceptual model for Wollongong NSW 2522 the development of entrepreneurial exper- AUSTRALIA tise. This study also outlines how MFIs can E-mail: [email protected] Thesis: http://ro.uow.edu.au/theses1/193/

110 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, p. 111. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010111-01

Thesis abstract

Self-sensing, estimation and control in multifrequency Atomic Force Microscopy

Michael G. Ruppert Abstract of a thesis for a Doctorate of Philosophy submitted to the University of Newcastle, Callaghan, Australia

Despite the undeniable success of the atomic arbitrarily modifying the quality factor of force microscope (AFM), dynamic tech- multiple eigenmodes and comes with inher- niques still face limitations in terms of spatial ent stability robustness. The experimental resolution, imaging speed and high cost of results demonstrate improved imaging sta- acquisition. In order to expand the capabili- bility, higher scan speeds and adjustable ties of the instrument, it was realized that contrast when mapping nano-mechanical the information about the nano-mechanical properties of soft samples. properties of a sample are encoded over a Last, in light of the demand for constantly range of frequencies and the excitation and increasing imaging speeds while providing detection of higher-order eigenmodes of the multi-frequency flexibility, the estimation of micro-cantilever open up further informa- multiple components of the high-frequency tion channels. The ability to control these deflection signal is performed with a linear modes and their fast responses to excitation time-varying multi-frequency Kalman filter. is believed to be the key to unravelling the The chosen representation allows for an effi- true potential of these methods. This work cient high-bandwidth implementation on a addresses three major drawbacks of the Field Programmable Gate Array. Tracking standard AFM setup, which limit the feasi- bandwidth, noise performance and trimodal bility of multi-frequency approaches. AFM imaging on a two-component polymer First, microelectromechanical system sample are verified and shown to be supe- (MEMS) probes with integrated piezoelec- rior to that of the commonly used lock-in tric layers is motivated, enabling the develop- amplifier. ment of novel multimode self-sensing and self-actuating techniques. Specifically, these Dr Michael G. Ruppert piezoelectric transduction schemes permit School of Electrical Engineering the miniaturization of the entire AFM and Computing towards a cost-effective single-chip device The University of Newcastle with nanoscale precision in a much smaller Callaghan NSW 2308 form factor than that of conventional mac- AUSTRALIA roscale instruments. E-mail: [email protected] Second, the integrated actuation enables the development of multimode controllers Thesis: http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/ which exhibits remarkable performance in 1335831

111 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 112–113. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010112-02

Thesis abstract

Critical reflections on the vital importance of soft skills, and the strategies for the integration of essential soft skills into the curriculum of higher education business institutions in Vietnam

Hang Thi Thu Truong Abstract of a thesis for a Doctorate of Philosophy submitted to University of Newcastle, Callaghan, Australia

Investing in human capital is one of the and global business standards increasingly most relevant factors affecting the economic exhibited within the current objectives of growth of a country, and one of the most their potential employers. This being so, it important aspects of this investment is edu- is essential that the formal curriculum of cation. Thus, in developing countries such as Vietnam’s business schools be restructured Vietnam it is imperative that the government to incorporate an up-to-date and effective supports policy priorities committed to strat- coursework component for the delivery and egies for creating a knowledge foundation for development of business soft skills. the development of a skilled and adaptable To fulfil the requirements of curriculum workforce capable of contributing to the reform, the thesis focuses on three objectives. goals of business competitiveness at the local First, to assess the status of soft skills profi- and especially the global level. Within Viet- ciency possessed by tertiary business gradu- nam’s system of higher education, its schools ates, thereby revealing the presence and qual- of business do play a vital role in supporting ity of any soft skills programs in Vietnamese the country’s economic objectives. However, business higher education institutions. The one of the major objectives in this thesis is second purpose is two twofold: the first to show that the crucial contribution which task is to make explicit the extent to which soft skills are capable of making to achieve major Vietnamese stakeholders acknowledge maximal success within the business sector and value the potential role which soft skill has to date not been adequately recognized competencies can play in maximizing busi- by its business schools. This being so, the ness success. Through that, the second task development of the business school curricu- is to determine which particular soft skills lum in Vietnam has not been able to “catch these stakeholders discern as best serving to up,” so to say, with the requirements of the improve Vietnam’s economic competitive- local and global business market. This being ness within the national and global market- so, the central argument of my thesis is that place. Third, to identify the most efficacious in Vietnam there is a burgeoning need to strategies for the development of soft skills provide students with comprehensive a soft programs in Vietnamese business schools. skills program designed to meet the national

112 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Truong — PhD Abstract

A Sequential Exploratory Mixed-methods utilization of resources to enhance the effec- Approach was deployed in which in the first tiveness of soft skills training. phase semi-structured telephone interviews In summary, this study represents a com- were conducted, with 15 business employers prehensive investigation of strategies for soft representing the reputedly largest business skills curriculum development which draws enterprises across Vietnam. In the second upon the contributions of relevant key stake- phase, a questionnaire was conducted with holders, namely, those Vietnamese business 577 business educators from three major employers who are most likely to hire busi- universities of business, representing differ- ness school graduates, and the university ent regions of the country. educators of business who are responsible for The study makes four main contributions: their soft skills training in accord with the First, this is the first comprehensive explora- reformed curriculum of Vietnamese busi- tion and collation of the literature exploring ness schools. Thus, the study bridges the the definition and importance of soft skills in hiatus between the soft skills competencies the field of business, thereby accumulating a required by Vietnamese employers on the legacy of valuable information for employer one hand, and the adequate provision of soft and educational stakeholders in Vietnam skills development programs by soft skills to better understand the status of soft skills educators in Vietnam’s higher education in the local business workplace and global business institutions on the other. Findings market. Second, the results of the study from this study could be used productively identified the essential soft skills for success to inform and shape the nature of the curric- selected by Vietnamese business employers ulum reforms and pedagogic interventions which can be integrated into the formal busi- that need to be undertaken collaboratively ness curriculum of business higher education by knowledgeable staff from both tertiary institutions. This contribution also serves as business universities and business employ- a benchmark skill checklist for staff develop- ment organizations. ment and recruitment for employers. Third, preferred approaches to soft skills develop- Dr Hang Thi Thu Truong ment were identified by employers and busi- Faculty of Education ness educators that are suitable for the cur- University of Newcastle rent status of the country’s higher education Callaghan NSW 2308 system, culture and economy. Finally, the AUSTRALIA findings indicate that increased collabora- E-mail: [email protected] tion between educational institutions and business enterprises in the development of Thesis: http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/ soft skills for Vietnamese business schools 1333846 is more likely to result in accrued benefits to the economy. This has been achieved by focusing on the development of the specific soft skills needed to increase the employabil- ity of business graduates and upon a shared

113 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, vol. 151, part 1, 2018, pp. 114–121. ISSN 0035-9173/18/010114-08

Awards 2018 The following awards are offered by the Royal Society in 2018. Please see the specific page for details of each award.

Award Eligibility Closing date Clarke Medal Field: Botany 30th September, Seniority: Any 2018 Work considered: “Significant contribution” Location of work: Australia Application by: Nomination1 Edgeworth Field: Any 30th September, David Medal Seniority: < 35 2018 Work considered: “Distinguished contribution” Location of work: Australia Application by: Nomination James Cook Field: “Science & human welfare” 30th September, Medal Seniority: Any 2018 Work considered: “Outstanding contribution” Location of work: Southern Hemisphere Application by: Nomination Warren Prize Field: Engineering or technology 30th September, Seniority: In professional practice 2018 Work considered: “of national or international significance” Location of work: NSW Application by: Paper submitted to Journal History and Field: History and philosophy of science 30th September, Philosophy of Seniority: Any 2018 Science Medal Work considered: “significant contribution to the understanding of the history and philosophy of science” Location of work: Any Application by: Nomination or direct submission RSNSW Field: Any 30th September, Scholarships Seniority: Enrolled research student on 1 July 2018 Jak Kelly Award Work considered: Research project Location of work: NSW or ACT Application by: Application by student/endorsed by supervisor Note 1 Nomination by a senior member of the nominee’s organisation (for example Dean, Pro Vice Chancellor of a university, Section or Division Head of CSIRO), or a member of the Royal Society of New South Wales.

114 Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales Awards — 2018

Each year, the Royal Society of New South Wales makes a number of awards, mainly in the sciences, but also in the history and philosophy of science. They are among the oldest and most prestigious awards in Australia. These awards are now open for nomination. Nominations close on 30 September 2018. They should be sent to the Presiding Member of the Awards Committee at: [email protected] . The awards and the criteria for nomination are described below. All nominations must include: • A letter of nomination setting out the case for the award; • The nominee’s full curriculum vitæ; • Other supporting material as specified for the description of the award. A nominator does not need to be a member or fellow of the Society. For some awards, research- ers may nominate themselves. Awards allowing self-nomination will be noted below. The awards will be presented at the Society’s next Annual Dinner, tentatively in May 2019. Clarke Medal 2018 The Clarke Medal was established to acknowledge the contribution by Rev William Bran- white Clarke MA FRS FGS, Vice-President of the Royal Society of New South Wales from 1866 to 1878. The Medal is awarded annually for distinguished work in the natural sciences conducted in Australia and its territories. The Medal is awarded by rotation in the fields of geology, botany and zoology. This year’s award is in the field of Zoology in all its aspects, and nominations are called for the names of suitable persons who have contributed significantly to this science. The recipient may be resident in Australia or elsewhere. The Council requests that every nomination should be accompanied by a list of publications, a full curriculum vitæ, and also by a statement clearly indicating which part of the nominee’s work was done in Australia and which part was done overseas. Agreement of the nominee must be obtained by the nominator before submission and included with the nomination. The winner will be expected to write a review paper of their work for submission to the Soci- ety’s Journal & Proceedings. In cases where the Council of the Society is unable to distinguish between two persons of equal merit, preference will be given to a Member of the Society. Nominations and supporting material should be submitted by email to the Royal Society of New South Wales ([email protected]) marked to the attention of the Honorary Secretary, not later than 30th September 2018. The winner will be notified in December. The winner will be announced and the Medal presented at the Annual Dinner of the Royal Society usually held in May in the year follow- ing the award.

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Edgeworth David Medal 2018 The Edgeworth David Medal, established in memory of Professor Sir Tannatt William Edge- worth David FRS, a past President of the Society, is awarded for distinguished contributions by a young scientist. The conditions of the award of the Medal are: The recipient must be under the age of 35 years at 1 January 2018; and the Medal will be for work done mainly in Australia or its Ter- ritories or contributing to the advancement of Australian science. Nominations are called for the names of suitable persons who have contributed signifi- cantly to science, including scientific aspects of agriculture, engineering, dentistry, medicine and veterinary science. The Council requests that every nomination should be accompanied by a list of publications, a full curriculum vitæ, and also by a statement clearly indicating which part of the nominee’s work was done in Australia and which part was done overseas. Agreement of the nominee must be obtained by the nominator before submission and included with the nomination. The winner will be expected to write a review paper of their work for submission to the Soci- ety’s Journal & Proceedings. In cases where the Council of the Society is unable to distinguish between two persons of equal merit, preference will be given to a Member of the Society. Nominations and supporting material should be submitted by email to the Royal Society of New South Wales ([email protected]) marked to the attention of the Honorary Secretary, not later than 30th September 2018. The winner will be notified in December. The winner will be announced and the Medal presented at the Annual Dinner of the Royal Society to be held in the year following the award. James Cook Medal 2018 The James Cook Medal is awarded at intervals for outstanding contributions to science and human welfare in and for the Southern Hemisphere. The James Cook Medal was established in 1947 with funding by Henry Ferdinand Hal- loran. Halloran, who had joined the Society in 1892 as a 23 year-old, was a surveyor, engineer and town planner. He did not publish anything in the Society’s Journal, but he was a very enthusiastic supporter of research. Halloran funded what were to become the Society’s two most prestigious awards, the James Cook Medal and the Edgeworth David Medal, the latter medal being for young scientists. The Council requests that every nomination should be accompanied by a list of publications, a full curriculum vitæ, and also by a statement clearly indicating which part of the nominee’s work was done in Australia and which part was done overseas. Agreement of the nominee must be obtained by the nominator before submission and included with the nomination. The winner will be expected to write a review paper of their work for submission to the Soci- ety’s Journal & Proceedings. In cases where the Council of the Society is unable to distinguish between two persons of equal merit, preference will be given to a Member of the Society.

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Nominations and supporting material should be submitted by email to the Royal Society of New South Wales ([email protected]) marked to the attention of the Honorary Secretary, not later than 30th September 2018. The winner will be notified in December. The winner will be announced and the Medal presented at the Annual Dinner of the Royal Society to be held in May in the year following the award. Warren Prize (Medal & Lectureship) 2018 William Henry Warren established the first faculty of engineering in New South Wales and was appointed as its Professor at the University of Sydney in 1884. Professor Warren was President of the Royal Society of New South Wales on two occasions. He had a long career of more than 40 years and during this time was considered to be the most eminent engineer in Australia. When the Institution of Engineers, Australia was established in 1919, Professor Warren was elected as its first President. He established an internationally respected reputation for the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Sydney and published extensively, with many of his papers being published in the Journal & Proceedings. The Warren Prize has been established by the Royal Society of NSW to acknowledge Professor Warren’s contribution both to the Society and to the technological disciplines in Australia and internationally. The aim of the award is to recognise research of national or international significance by engineers and technologists in their professional practice. The research must have originated or have been carried out principally in New South Wales. The prize is $500. Entries are by submission of an original paper which reviews the research field, highlighting the contributions of the candidate, and identifying its national or international significance. Preference will be given to entries that demonstrate relevance across the spectrum of knowl- edge — science, art, literature and philosophy — that the Society promotes. The winning paper and a selection of other entries submitted will be peer-reviewed and are expected to be published in the Society’s Journal & Proceedings. Depending on the number of acceptable entries, there may be a special edition of the Journal & Proceedings that would be intended to showcase research by early- and mid-career Australian researchers. The paper should be submitted by email ([email protected]) to the Royal Society of New South Wales marked to the attention of the Honorary Secretary, not later than 30th September 2018. The manuscript will be passed on to the Editor of the Journal & Proceed- ings for peer review. The winner will be notified in December. The winner will be announced and the Medal presented at the Annual Dinner of the Royal Society to be held in May in the year following the award. History and Philosophy of Science Medal 2018 The Royal Society of NSW History and Philosophy of Science Prize was established in 2014 to recognise outstanding achievement in the History and Philosophy of Science, and the inaugural award was made to Ann Moyal in 2015. It is anticipated that this Prize, like the

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Society’s other awards, will become one of the most prestigious awards offered in Australia in this field. The winner will be awarded a medal. Persons nominated will have made a significant contribution to the understanding of the history and philosophy of science, with preference being given to the study of ideas, institu- tions and individuals of significance to the practice of the natural sciences in Australia. Entries may be made by nomination or direct submission. All entries should be accom- panied by a full curriculum vitæ and include a one-page statement setting out the case for award. In the case of nominations, the agreement of the nominee must be obtained by the nominator before submission and included with the entry. The winner will be expected to submit an unpublished essay, drawing on recent work, which will be considered for publication in the Society’s Journal & Proceedings during the following year. Nominations and supporting material should be submitted by email to the Royal Society of New South Wales ([email protected]) marked to the attention of the Honorary Secretary, not later than 30th September 2018. The winner will be notified in December. The winner will be announced and the Medal presented at the Annual Dinner of the Royal Society to be held in May in the year following the award. Royal Society of NSW Scholarships 2018 The Royal Society of New South Wales is the oldest learned society in Australia, tracing its origins to 1821. It has a long tradition of encouraging and supporting scientific research and leading intellectual life in the State. The Council of the Society funds the Royal Society of New South Wales Scholarships in order to acknowledge outstanding achievements by early- career individuals working towards a research degree in a science-related field. Three scholarships of $500 plus and a complimentary year of membership of the Society are awarded each year in order to recognise outstanding achievements by young researchers in any field of science. Applicants must be enrolled as research students in a university in either NSW or the ACT, and must be Australian citizens or Permanent Residents of Australia. The winners will be expected to deliver a 20-min presentation of their work at the monthly meeting of the Society on 6 February 2019. Scholarship recipients will be asked to submit an original paper to the Society’s Journal & Proceedings. Submissions should be sent to the Editor ([email protected]). Manu- scripts should conform to the “Information for Authors” . Manuscripts will be peer reviewed. Nominations for a 2018 awards will close on 30 September 2018. Self-nominations are allowed for this award. The following documents should be sent as a single package to the Awards Committee at [email protected]: • The letter of nomination should clearly state the significance of the student’s project. • The student’scurriculum vitæ containing a list publications, details of the student’s under- graduate study, and any professional experience. • An abstract of 500 words describing the project

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• A statement of support from the student’s supervisor, confirming details of the student’s candidature. The applications will be considered by a selection committee appointed by the Council of the Society and the decision will be made before the end of November. The decision of the committee is final. The scholarships will be awarded on merit. The award will be presented at the Society’s monthly meeting at the State Library of NSW on Wednesday, 6 November 2019, at which time the winners will deliver their presentations about their work. Jak Kelly Award 2018 The Jak Kelly Award is awarded jointly with the Australian Institute of Physics to the best Ph.D. student talk presented at a joint meeting with the AIP. The award consists of an engraved plaque, a $500 prize and a year of membership of the Society. The successful applicants will present their work to a meeting of the Royal Society in 2017, and will be asked to prepare a paper for the Society’s Journal & Proceedings. The winners of both awards will be notified in December. The Royal Society of New South Wales Medal The Society’s Bronze Medal is awarded from time to time to a member of the Society who has made meritorious contributions to the advancement of science, including administration and organisation of scientific endeavour and for services to the Society.

119 Archibald Liversidge: Imperial Science under the Southern Cross Roy MacLeod Royal Society of New South Wales, in association with Sydney University Press ISBN 9781-9208-9880-9 When Archibald Liversidge first arrived at the University of Sydney in 1872 as Reader in Geology and Assistant in the Laboratory, he had about ten students and two rooms in the main building. In 1874, he became Professor of Geology and Mineralogy and by 1879 he had persuaded the University Senate to open a Faculty of Science. He became its first Dean in 1882. In 1880, he visited Europe as a trustee of the Australian Museum and his report helped to establish the Industrial, Technological and Sanitary Museum which formed the basis of the present Powerhouse Museum’s collection. Liversidge also played a major role in establish- ing the Australasian Association for the Advance- ment of Science which held its first congress in 1888. This book is essential reading for those interested in the development of science in colonial Australia, particularly the fields of crystallography, mineral chemistry, chemical geology and strategic minerals policy.

To order your copy, please complete the Liversidge Book Order Form available at: http://royalsoc.org.au/publications/books/McLeod_Liversidge_Order_Form.pdf and return it together with your payment to: The Royal Society of NSW, (Liversidge Book), PO Box 576, Crows Nest NSW 1585, Australia or contact the Society: Phone: +61 2 9431 8691 Fax: +61 2 9431 8677 Email: [email protected] The Royal Society of New South Wales

Information for authors

Details of submission guidelines can be found in the on-line Style Guide for Authors at: https://royalsoc.org.au/society-publications/information-for-authors Manuscripts are only accepted in digital format and should be e-mailed to: [email protected] The templates available on the Journal website should be used for preparing manuscripts. Full instruc- tions for preparing submissions are also given on the website. If the file-size is too large to email it should be placed on a CD-ROM or other digital media and posted to: The Honorary Secretary (Editorial), The Royal Society of New South Wales, PO Box 576, Crows Nest, NSW 1585 Australia Manuscripts will be reviewed by the Editor, in consultation with the Editorial Board, to decide whether the paper will be considered for publication in the Journal. Manuscripts are subjected to peer review by at least one independent reviewer. In the event of initial rejection, manuscripts may be sent to other reviewers. Papers (other than those specially invited by the Editorial Board) will only be considered if the content is either substantially new material that has not been published previously, or is a review of a major research programme. Papers presenting aspects of the historical record of research carried out within Australia are particularly encouraged. In the case of papers presenting new research, the author must certify that the material has not been submitted concurrently elsewhere nor is likely to be published elsewhere in substantially the same form. In the case of papers reviewing a major research programme, the author must certify that the material has not been published substantially in the same form else- where and that permission for the Society to publish has been granted by all copyright holders. Letters to the Editor, Discourses, Short Notes and Abstracts of Australian PhD theses may also be submitted for publication. Please contact the Editor if you would like to discuss a possible article for inclusion in the Journal. The Society does not require authors to transfer the copyright of their manuscript to the Society but authors are required to grant the Society an unrestricted licence to reproduce in any form manuscripts accepted for publication in the Journal and Proceedings. Enquiries relating to copyright or reproduc- tion of an article should be directed to the Editor. Volume 151 Par t 12018 Numbers 467 & 468 CONTENTS Rober t E. Marks:Editorial. 1 DISTINGUISHED FELLOW ’S ADDRESS: TomKeneally:Mungo Man imagined: writing the ultimate historical novel. 5 AUSTRALIAN OF THE YEAR ADDRESS: Michelle Simmons:Wemust set the bar high and tell students weexpect them to jump overit. 14 THE ROYAL SOCIET Y OF NEW SOUTH WALES AND FOUR ACADEMIES FORUM: THE FUTURE OF REASON IN A POST-TRUTH WORLD: The Gov ernor,David Hurley:Opening address. 22 Mary O’Kane:The Chief Scientist & Engineer’s vie w. 25 Donald Hector:Rationality and post-truth — the threat to democratic society. 28 Simon Chapman:Wind Turbine Syndrome: a communicated disease. 39 James Wilsdon:The Brexit experience — evidence, expertise and post-truth politics. 45 Emma Johnston:Why arescientists so quiet? Cultural and philosophical constraints on the public 50 voice of the scientist. Lisa Bero:Influences on evidence: putting the cartbeforethe horse. 59 Andrew Jakubowicz:Algorithms of hate: howthe Internet facilitates the spread of racism and how 69 public policy might help stem the impact. N. J. Enfield:Mind, language, and rational discourse. 82 SirPeter Gluckman:Role of evidence and expertise in policymaking: the politics and practice of 91 scientific advice. Ross Gittins:The viewfromGrubb Street — has it all just been fake news? 102 Ph.D. THESIS ABSTRACTS: Brendan P.Elliot:Anempirical analysis of the investment and profitability effects. 106 Nathan Evans:Extending and testing the components of evidence accumulation models of 108 decision-making. NadeeraRanabahu:Entrepreneurial decision-making and expertise acquisition: a study among Sri 109 Lankan microfinance borrow ers. Michael G. Rupper t:Self-sensing, estimation and control in multifrequency Atomic Force 111 Microscopy. Hang Thi Thu Truong:Strategies for the integration of essential soft skills into the curriculum of 112 higher education business institutions in Vietnam. ROYAL SOCIET Y OF NEW SOUTH WALES AWARDS FOR 2018: 114 The Clarke Medal, The Edge worth David Medal, The James Cook Medal, The Warren Prize, The Histor y and Philosophy of Science Medal, RSNSW Scholarships, The Jak Kelly Award, The Royal Society Medal.

INFORMATION FOR AUTHORS Inside Back Cover The Royal Society of New South Wales P. O. Box 576 Crows Nest, NSW 1585, Australia [email protected] (general) [email protected] (editorial) www.royalsoc.au www.facebook.com/royalsoc Published June 2018