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Which science book should the next US president read?

Nature volume 455, pages 466–467 (2008)Cite this article

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Science, Money, and Politics

  • Daniel S. Greenberg
(Univ. Chicago Press, 2001)

What a president needs to understand is not science — which science, after all? — but the role of scientific expertise in the democratic political process. Daniel S. Greenberg is the outstanding writer on the politics of modern US science, and this is his most pertinent book. He takes for granted that the institutional framework for mobilizing and channelling scientific expertise works fairly well and should not be subject to cynical subversion. But he also understands that scientists enter a political arena when they advise, and presidents must take decisions that reflect social and political priorities. Scientists, like anyone else, must hope that presidents have good priorities. No book of biology, physics or meteorology will ensure that they do. Steven Shapin

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. professor of the history of science, Harvard University ,

    Steven Shapin

  2. professor of ecology and evolution, University of Chicago, Illinois ,

    Jerry Coyne

  3. chairman of Canon US Life Sciences and distinguished university professor at the University of Maryland, College Park, and at Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, Maryland ,

    Rita Colwell

  4. professor of biology and mathematics at Harvard University ,

    Martin Nowak

  5. fellow of the James Martin Institute, University of Oxford, UK ,

    Jerry Ravetz

  6. professor of integrative biology and curator of the Museum of Paleontology, University of California, Berkeley ,

    Kevin Padian

Authors
  1. Steven Shapin
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  2. Jerry Coyne
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  3. Rita Colwell
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  4. Martin Nowak
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  5. Jerry Ravetz
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  6. Kevin Padian
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More on the US election. What book would you recommend? Give us your opinion at the Nature Network forum.

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Shapin, S., Coyne, J., Colwell, R. et al. Which science book should the next US president read?. Nature 455, 466–467 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1038/455464b

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