“The line had to be drawn somewhere.” This, said by Michael Gove, is part of the problem. In his recent exchange with Toby Young, Gove defended the COVID-19 policy with the following logic:
- There is the science.
- It may be wrong, science is contested, etc.
- However, at any time there is a scientific consensus.
- And we trust science. (Isaac Newton, Charles Babbage, Alan Turing etc.)
- So political action is justified by whatever the state of science is at any time.
This, it has to be said, is rubbish. The logic is rubbish. The science may be rubbish. But ‘the science’ is irrelevant. (As everyone should now say, “There is no such thing as settled science.“)
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