Corruption: Is It Measurable?
Dean
One of the bigger misconceptions about the social sciences is that they are not "real" science because they use arbitrary standards, don't use math, or don't make predictions. In some areas this is probably a legitimate criticism (especially in some areas of psychology), but in many cases it's simply wrong. Demography, for example, is a science that has been one of the most influential in the last 100 years, right up there with discoveries in physics and medicine in changing how we live our lives. We see instances of demography every day without even being aware of it: the very concept of an "ethnic minority" depends upon it, as do public opinion polls (which influence how politicians govern) and census data, which provide an enormously useful look at at populations and trends over time.
Another area that really is a science is political science. One of the most easily accessible data sets in political science is the Freedom House data set, which measures freedom around the world. You think it can't be measured? They've been using the same measurement standards for well over 30 years, and that data set has been used to make remarkably vigorous predictions.
Yes, of course, there's some arbitrariness and subjectivity to some of the measurements used in political science, but so what? If you think other fields don't have that problem, try some time to get a biologist to give you a specific, concrete, universally understood and agreed-upon definition of "species" that all of his colleagues will agree with. Or ask a physicist how you determine both the position and velocity of a subatomic particle.
The Freedom House data has been used to make some remarkable predictions: for example, no two nations ranked at least 4,4 or better has ever gone to war with any other nation ranked 4,4 or better, and the Democratic Peace Theory holds that they never will. So far there have been literally hundreds of thousands of opportunities for that to be falsified, and it never has been. Thus what you have here is a strong theory. (There's a weak version which says merely that it will be rare, but so far the proposed exceptions are very weak indeed.)
Interestingly, political scientists have also put together indexes to measure corruption. While it might surprise a few folks, political scientist Rudy Rummel notes that his fellow scientists have found that the more democratic a nation is, the less corruption there is in government.
This should be no surprise if you think hard about it. Free speech, free press, and free elections make corruption much riskier. When we see evidence of corruption in the new, it's not evidence of how corrupt our system is, it's evidence that it's working properly.
Think of it another way: if you come down with a fever, is that proof your body is hopelessly corrupted with infection? In some rare cases yes, especially if the fever goes completely out of control. But most often, in the vast majority of cases, it's just a symptom of your body successfully fighting off an infection.
Rudy also makes the interesting observation that sometimes in science you get a theory that people seem obsessed over. The Democratic Peace Theory is just such a theory, because it's shown through rigorous data analysis and specific predictions that democracy reduces war, reduces poverty, reduces starvation, and, yes, reduces corruption. People hear you talk like that and it sounds like you think you've found a panacea, but all you have to do is look at the data, folks.
I had a similar experience some years ago experimenting with low-carbohydrate diets. I was part of a community of people who used them. Those who advocated low-carb diets routinely said they weren't for everybody but that in a substantial number of people they could a) help lose weight, b) help diabetics attain blood sugar control, c) reduce blood pressure, and d) improve serum cholesterol numbers.
This by eating a diet consisting of things like red meat, bacon, eggs, and cheese on a daily basis.
I remember the howls of rage I would get from some people, the incredible scorn, and yes, the warnings that I was advocating something dangerous that would kill myself and others. Dr. Robert Atkins was a flake, a liar, a con artist, and even possibly a murderer.
It was amusing to watch over the last decade as controlled study after controlled study showed that, indeed, for at least some people, those were the exactly predictable results of such diets. For years Atkins had advocated that such studies be done because of the results he was seeing in his patients, but no one wanted to do them. They preferred to abuse him and a few of his colleagues who said they had the same results instead.
I think that was my first experience in dealing with fulminating bullies in science and medicine. It was most instructive, and is something I've never forgotten. When the data is on his side, even a mouse can stand up to a lion.
Social scientists have either invented or popularized lots of cool math techniques in the past 50 or so years ... I can think of a bunch of examples Chomsky's Syntactic Structures, from 1957, Eugene Fama, James Hamilton, etc.
I haven't found the killer book or books that would introduce the gentle reader to a wide range of such techniques though. You always want to be up on the latest terms to win intellectual pissing contests:
"Apparently you didn't consider lagged cross-sectional correlation".
You know, psychotherapists need to develop stuff like this. They're close with cognitive behavioral therapy but they haves a long way to go.
The burgeoning field of "Neuroeconomics" is causing a lot of smart people from the physical and social sciences to collaborate, so I am optimistic.
I do have two quibbles here, however. First, two equate the Uncertainty Principle with "arbitrariness and subjectivity" seems all wrong to me. I believe the Uncertainty Principle is neither arbitrary nor subjective, but rather defines a fundamental limit to what is knowable in the universe.
And second, I think it's important to point out that they use a very specific definition of corruption: "such as the misuse of public
power for private benefit, for example bribing
of public officials, kickbacks in public
procurement, or embezzlement of public
funds." Just as you point out how the Democratic Peace Theory is only demonstrable if you first understand their definition of "democracy", so too is it important to understand this definition of "corruption" before you can understand this study. For instance, some people might easily argue that it is a form of corruption to pass laws that favor a particular voting bloc at the expense of the populace as a whole, merely to gain political support. In other words, "pork" might fit many people's definition of corruption. And if you use that definition, it may be that you'll reach almost the opposite conclusion from this study: dictators do just enough pork to keep the people from starting a revolution, while democracies are rife with pork.
I think that definitions are part of what complicate any social science question, since so many of their topics of study have precise meanings to the scientists, but a wide range of varied meanings in general use. So people think they understand what the scientists are talking about, when they really don't.
I've been doing a version the low-carb thing for several years now (my first and last meals of the day hav no or very low carbs). Protein Power is probably the best book on the subject. It recounts the history of the low-carb diet, which believe it or not goes all the way back to an 18th century British pamphleteer's "Letter on Corpulence."
Another interesting example from the book was a man in the 1930s who volunteered to eat nothing but caribou meat for a year, as explorers had claimed Eskimos did. The doctors monitoring him thought he would die in months. He not only survived, he actually lost weight an appeared generally healthier.
The basic premise is simple: blood sugar is toxic. The insulin your body must produce to control it is also bad for you.
The explorer you're speaking of is Vilhjalmur Stefansson, a Harvard anthropologist who was born in Iceland and who spent many years in the arctic, where he discovered that the inuit typically went about nine months of the year eating nothing but meat and fish. He also found that he was perfectly healthy on their diet.
There's a very interesting fact associated with that by the way. The conventional wisdom is that explorers in the arctic and antarctic are at huge danger from developing scurvy due to lack of vitamin C. So they stock up on citrus fruits or, these days, vitamin c pills. But the interesting fact is that if you eat an all-meat diet, without any supplementation, you will never develop scurvy. Stefansson proved it by not only pointing to the anthropological data of the Inuit, but also by submitting himself and a colleague to a year-long experiment overseen by the Journal of the American Medical Association. And yes, you are correct, many experts of the day predicted that both men would become sick within a very short time period and would certainly be harmed significantly. Yet they went an entire year just fine--and it was a real experiment, they were accompanied at all times by paid scientific observers who made sure they weren't cheating somehow.
The funny thing is that some arctic explorers still use the all-meat diet in lieu of bringing vitamin C supplments. They do just fine. To this day no one's really sure exactly why it avoids scurvy, but it does.
What used to offend me, but now just amuses me, is that when you tell some people these things, they turn purple with rage, spittle spewing and name-calling and issuing dire warnings about what a great threat you and your pernicious ideas are.
But I'm not a scientist or a doctor, and I respect Dean's testimony as at least as strong as mine. Moreover, I was a co-worker for a while of Dean's, and have been amazed at the pictures I've seen lately. It's hard to argue with results.
So which of us is right? I doubt either of us is. The truth is likely to be somewhere in between.
But people like Atkins, and Duesberg, and Dembski (and Lomborg, and even non-scientists like Den Beste, when they bring facts and logic to the table) absolutely need to be allowed to speak, and have their theories and data propagated far and wide, even if they're wrong. That's science. Ending careers, rumor-mongering, lawsuits, and public humiliation are not science, no matter the practices of so-called scientists.
Just ask Semmelweis, or better, ask one of the dead mothers his research could have saved.
It is not a panacea, but the truth is that obesity is a rising problem and if we have multiple avenues of attack then more people will find help.
The benefit of the low-carb approach is that it has been shown to clearly reduce hunger pangs. On the other hand, it increases cravings in some people (they may seem like the same thing but once you've clearly experienced the difference you realize it's a big one). Some people who try them feel like crap. Some feel wonderful.
The point is, however, this is no longer my own radical idea, or Atkins'. It's been vindicated with actual double-blind study and peer-reviewed research--which is why med students are no longer taught that it's a raging recipe for death, which is what they were still being told up to 10 years ago.
"Science", indeed.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
Probably need to do more Atkins, and less Atkins lite.
I do think that their is no one single answer for diet. Some people Atkins is not right for, and so on.
Ideally, in the future, everyone has their individualized diet as well as their individualized exercise program.
Sounds like Dave Barry's explanation of why the Indians were healthy. After a few thousand years of just bison, they mostly just picked at their food.