When science sounds stupid

The United States Secretary of Defence, Pete Hegseth, made headlines this June by claiming that the Department of Defence had been spending wastefully on a variety of research that was unnecessary, useless, or as he termed it, “boondoggles”. When pressed to explain what he was referring to, he laughed a little. “We’re talking about some stuff I shouldn’t, shouldn’t say in public, you know,” he said with an apparently bashful smile, “marbles in the rear ends of cats, tens of millions of dollars.”

Scandalous phrasing aside, it really does seem quite inexcusable that money is being poured into what appears to be such a pointless endeavour! It is practically inconceivable that such methodology could be of any use to the economy or the public good, and worse, it’s being done by the government! Could there really be an explanation for this apparent waste of our hard-earned taxpayers’ money?

Fortunately for everyone involved (except maybe Hegseth himself), there was. Groundbreaking research was being done behind the facade of an absurd experiment. What was this infamous work that made Hegseth lose his marbles? A USD $20 million grant awarded back in 2020 to the University of California to investigate new methods to treat individuals suffering from spinal cord injuries. These were technologies which were intended to not only stabilise the condition of wounded individuals, but also to aid in treatment plans that could help restore the structure of the spinal cord and aid in the daily function of the patient.

In fact, the marbles were themselves a vital part of testing this technology. By stimulating part of the sacral S2 spinal root, a nerve that controls motor function in the lower body, scientists were able to trigger muscle contraction in the colon of anaesthetised cats. The marbles were representations of cat defecate, serving to assess the success of the muscle contraction in facilitating excretion. Because those who suffer spinal cord injuries often face problems with defecation since they lose control of the nerves controlling the lower body, including the sacral S2 spinal root, this promising development could have tangible long-term benefits for humans for spinal cord treatment. Hardly the complete waste of $20 million that the Secretary characterised the study as, the study was in fact a vital step forward in helping these patients regain control of their excretion and, by extension, independent function.

Of course, we can be charitable about such an incident. After all, Hegseth’s qualifications are in politics and public policy, not in biology, medicine, or engineering. However, in that very same hearing, Hegseth was also grilled on his plan to eliminate two-thirds of the Department of Defence’s medical research budget, which he described as being used for “waste, fraud, and abuse”. It does call into question whether the intentions behind the cut (and the way the affected studies were being represented) were simply misguided, or if there was an ulterior motive to making the research sound so odd.

How many vital studies like the one with cats are being targeted simply because they sound ridiculous to the untrained ear? For the politicians (who happen not to be scientists) that are deciding budget allocation o, their lack of knowledge of the principles underlying a study could easily threaten its survival, denying thousands a life-changing or even life-saving treatment option.

Indeed, it seems that it is all too easy to take a scientific experiment, strip it of all context, and then present its bare bones for the public to see and ridicule. Consider some of the most famous experiments in history. What if we talked about Mendel as a priest who got a little too fond of peas, and that we have based our entire understanding of genetics around an overenthusiastic gardener’s fancy for certain colours? Or perhaps we could talk about the development of the smallpox vaccine as being the folly of a doctor who decided the best way to deal with the deadly disease was to open up a wound, insert a related pathogen into the blood, and to hope that it will protect you against what was effectively its own kind.

If these sound like things that no sane person would say, that is because you have the scientific context needed to parse these discoveries. Without the gift of hindsight, such discoveries could easily have been twisted in their day (and are being twisted today – look at those who oppose GMO foods or vaccination, for instance) to sound positively unhinged. But a vital part of scientific literacy is to be able to see through this ploy. If we happen to be unable to understand the basis of a certain experiment, it is too easy to fall into a distorted view that science is useless, esoteric, or only applicable in a handful of niche cases. And there are many who would like us to think this way, pushing anti-intellectual rhetoric in order to further their own causes. Think of those who want us to invest in their “revolutionary” medicine and deny the effectiveness of “Big Pharma’s” work, or shady politicians who garner votes by pushing conspiracy theories. We cannot afford to become their prey.

When we encounter something that sounds weird or far-removed from daily life, we should instead take the time to sit down, ponder over the aims and methods of the experiment, and allow the possible implications to society to simmer in our brains, instead of jumping to the mostly erroneous conclusion that science is a frivolous endeavour for the people in white lab coats to indulge in – or worse, conspire against us with.

Understanding this process and spending time to slow down and build up our scientific knowledge is the first step towards becoming resistant to manipulation by those with ulterior agendas that would benefit from you questioning the validity of science as a discipline. To become truly independent thinkers, we need to build up a skillset that allows us to find, verify, and evaluate information. It is no different when we think about research.

Indeed, when science sounds stupid, our first thought should never be to dismiss it, but to instead be intrigued by it, and to ponder how even the most bizarre investigations could yield fruit that has profound implications for our daily lives.

References

1. https://www.yahoo.com/news/marbles-rear-ends-cats-wgn-215447269.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAABh6YPhfxfXC34Okp5Wsw73KJV8KqkdDSITSf4GgBeG4jfhw90rHR3tzGr0_ABSTnndR7QMGbPKa9277dv_ADv8K5kdu2EUVAO67c1qUts3bBulv4wsmO7eDhPIVnZWozN-ERn12ncXWf_P_e_5NVViDQpeR8Izz-BRkvBieGTko

2. https://www.defense.gov/News/Contracts/contract/article/2367105/

3. https://journals.physiology.org/doi/pdf/10.1152/ajpgi.00269.2021

4. https://apnews.com/article/who-is-pete-hegseth-trump-defense-secretary-2e2bdd16c8e90f5d037f763cfadbde94