Bad BBC Science

BBC Science: A Question of Control

Several times in the BBC’s history, from 1928 to around 1963, the world of professional science has attempted to influence, and even control, the BBC’s practices regarding science coverage. The main scientific lobbyists of the BBC were the Royal Society, the British Association for the Advancement of Science, and the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, together with less prominent...

Elite science and the BBC: a 1950s contest of ownership.

In the late 1950s and early 1960s, the elite world of institutional British science attempted to take control of the BBC's management of science broadcasting. Delegations of scientists met BBC managers to propose an increased role for scientists in planning science broadcasts to a degree that threatened to compromise the BBC's authority and autonomy. The culmination was a set of proposals to th...

Science, the 1930s and the BBC: competition and collaboration

The ‘social relations of science’ movement grew to prominence in the 1930s. Its story has been told by McGucken (1984), MacLeod and MacLeod (1976), and Werskey (1978) among others. The movement consisted of predominantly left-wing scientists who held that science could and should be applied to the alleviation of social problems, and that a rationally planned society was more just, and more effi...

Bioassay bashing is bad science.

The Spheres of Influence, “Assessing Assays” (Schmidt 2002), in the May 2002 issue of EHP criticizes the National Toxicology Program rodent bioassay (NTPRB) without discussing its importance in regulation and public health. The Spheres article (Schmidt 2002) does not express concern for the validity of alternative transgenic methods proposed to replace the NTPRB for detecting carcinogens. By fo...

The Good and Bad Science of Autism