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Originally posted by Nganga:

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Originally posted by ledvm:

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If their degree is from a California school, likely anti hunting. If from Texas A&M, he's likely a hunter himself.

Caleb,
There is at least one exception...Paula White!

She studied at Berkley...arguably the most liberal school in the world. She works with lion in Zambia. She staunchly supports best-practice hunting as a conservation tool. She works with hunters routinely.

Lane,

Come now.....full disclosure here mate.

Steve,
Obviously you have something to add. Shoot.

quote:

Originally posted by ledvm:

Caleb,
There is at least one exception...Paula White!

She studied at Berkley...arguably the most liberal school in the world. She works with lion in Zambia. She staunchly supports best-practice hunting as a conservation tool. She works with hunters routinely.

A Berkley person pro hunting, and pro lion hunting

I feel too many so called "scientists" have an agenda; from financial to political concerns. I question anyone with an agenda, especially those with hidden motives. I voted "some are, some not."
LDK

I think that most of us would like to think that scientists base all of their decision making on logic and fact, follow the scientific method, and make impartial decisions. The truth is, scientists are normal humans just like the rest of us, not Vulcans.

Being a scientist, especially a field researcher is hard work. People who take on this career typically do so because they have a passion in about a particular subject. It's a lifestyle, not a job, and a person doesn't typically go into it with the intention of getting rich.

To pursue these passions, scientists need patrons who supply the money. And patrons usually have their own agendas which can effect what data is included and how it is interpreted. When you add the scientists own personal bias into the equation.....that's how we end up with a lot of junk science.

I'll put it this way. If I was a climate scientist with grants to study global warming, and my research showed that global warming wasn't happening, you can bet your ass that that research would never be published, or that I'd find a way to skew the data. No global warming would mean no grants for studying global warming, which would mean no more career. I think most people in that situation would do the same thing.

When I look at some of the things that have been posted here from some of the lion scientists, two of them stick out to me. One is the article by Dr. Luke Hunter from African Indaba and the other is from the email exchange between John Jackson and Dr. Packer.

In Dr. Hunter's article, he admits that while he see's killing animals at times as necessary, he finds sport hunting distasteful. By the same token, he's also smart enough to know where the money to protect habitat and pay for anti-poaching really comes from. To him, it seems hunting is the lesser of two evils.

In the email between John and Craig, it was the last sentence that stood out:

"Again, I think the biggest challenge will be to sell ADVENTURE rather than dead lions. It is the OPPORTUNITY to hunt a wild lion that must be emphasized, not a lion trophy."

What does this tell me? These guys are pragmatic enough to see the financial benefit of hunting for overall conservation. But in an ideal world for them, the hunters would keep coming and spending their money to hunt, but the rules would be such that very few would ever kill anything.

And that would be a very logical approach and position for them to have. I wouldn't expect anything else. They've devoted their lives to studying these animals; they really don't want to see them killed.

It doesn't put us on opposite sides of the issue, but it doesn't put us on the same side either. It's more "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" than anything else.

With all that being said, they are NOT the people who I'd have set the hunting regulations. Personally, I think that when it comes down to it, these guys will give continued hunting the nod even without any changes to how things are right now. Having young lions killed by sport hunters is still LESS of an impact to lion populations than what the locals would do if lion sport hunting collapsed. And if insinuating to us hunters that they might pull their support causes us to hamstring ourselves willingly, I'd do the same thing if I was in their shoes.

Pete

good post talentrec.

I would tend to believe that as some others have said that has multiple facets to it.

I have seen a lot of this in medical research, and it tends to color my view of most scientists a bit.

First, to get in to research you have to be almost obsessed with the subject at hand. People who are not tend to drop out of the research business when they get to a point where they could put their education to work and make a good living without a lot of the garbage that comes with the researcher's life style. There is a lot of risk in spending a lot of time and emotional investment in working a project only to have a negative finding (which is good science, but does not publish) or worse yet, an inconclusive result. One has to remember that in academic research, its publish or die. This means that typically only the very dedicated remain, and in my experience most of the truly dedicated are biased.

Secondly, there is a LOT of politics in academia. Look at the whole safety/public health/gun control thing. If you are not on the "right" side, good luck in getting in a journal that is considered reputable. It is possible for an established scientist who has made a name for himself to take a contrary view, but even so they take a fair amount of reputation hit. As I see it, right now it is not at all popular or acceptable with the academic cognoscenti to be pro sustainable use. The anti faction does have a considerable audience in academia who are biased which makes it difficult for the other side to be heard.

Then there is the bias of the funding sources. I don't care how well you research or what your personal beliefs are, you will not get a piece of pro hunting research out from a PETA or HSUS supported grant. Note how the information from our governmental research arms swings with who is currently in power (its not absolute, but the whole protectionist vs sustainable consumption thing (a la wolf) will swing based on who is in power during the formative time of the study.

So while I think that the scientists involved are trying to do what is right, its what's right by their lights, and is often horribly nonscientific in the end. Look at how they managed to massage the data about silicone implants until they put dow/corning out of business, and its only been relatively recently that medical researchers went back, looked at the data, saw huge obvious flaws and had to restudy the whole issue and came up with the opposite conclusion, or the way that the vaccine/autism link keeps being pushed even though they finally proved that the author deliberately lied to make his desired point.

It sounds like some of the current lot of "scientists" like Joubert are so ideologically bound that they can't be trusted to say 1+1=2, but they ARE listened to by folks like Salazar, and the guys that you are pinning your hopes on (Packer) freely admit bias against hunting, but have some scientific thought that allows them to at least state that they can see the opposite point of view.

I would like to believe that the hunting community can start supporting its own research to counter this, but then we also fall in the trap of being ideologically biased, which would also cause problems. Unfortunately, the fair and impartial referees are neither at this stage.