Under the leadership of Lord Rees, the Royal Society's reputation has sunk dramatically, with this once august body now widely seen as a political body and a surrogate arm of the government, more interested in the next tranche of funding than truth. Their role in Lord Oxburgh's whitewashing may well hang over them for a long time to come.
Rees's term of office is due to come to an end this year, and so one might have hoped that his replacement might represent a change of tack. Last week, the replacement's name was announced:
Paul Nurse has been nominated as the next president of the Royal Society, considered Britain's most prestigious scientific organization. The 61-year-old microbiologist is currently president of the Rockefeller University in New York City. Prior to his appointment at Rockefeller he headed Cancer Research UK, one of the country's largest medical charities, and University of Oxford's microbiology department.
Which all sounds quite reasonable. Unfortunately a reader has picked up some comments on science and the media made by Professor Nurse at the launch of the Society of Biology back in March:
"This programming is vital to keep everyone informed and aware of what is going on in science. It is also important to develop less confrontational approaches of ‘two sides’ especially when one side may simply be a non-starter. This lawyer-inspired confrontational approach so beloved by the Anglo Saxon media has really damaged both science and the use of science. Science cannot be reduced to sound bites and should not be subject to the forces of marketing. Look at the damage caused by the climate change skeptics playing right into the hands of certain elements desparate to avoid reductions in energy usage."
Fascinating to see such antipathy to the principle of arguments being settled by debate - all that yucky disagreement is so messy isn't it? One can imagine the kind of world Professor Nurse might favour, in which god-like scientists from the Royal Society handed down proclamations of the truth to the public, perhaps engraved on tablets of stone for theatrical effect. Dissenting opinions need not be heard.
Has this man been speaking to the BBC?
Professor Nurse's appointment is up for confirmation in July and one might hope that the fellows might take a dim view of someone who saw the world in such an old-fashioned way. Hope is, however, the operative word.