Within an area of knowledge is it more important to have credibility or power? Discuss with reference to the natural sciences and one other area of knowledge.

At first, one could argue that power and credibility are intrinsically intertwined and inherent to one another. After all, from the French Revolution to the Iroquois Confederacy to nowadays’ most common government system, a democracy, it has always been desirable that those in power have the support from the people, and thus, credibility. Even Plato's metaphor of the ship of state, which argued against democracy, supports this premise by noting that those who usually rise to power have public endorsement and credibility, even if they are not totally competent at the role of governing. Nevertheless, is this always the case? Do power and credibility always go hand-in-hand? And is it possible to claim one is ‘more important’ than the other? Through examining pragmatic examples from the natural sciences and the arts, I shall explore the clash between power and credibility to ultimately ascertain that, in both areas of knowledge, power is more important than credibility in the short-term, but after time passes and a paradigm shift takes place, power can no longer suppress credibility and the previously rejected model may well become part of the new paradigm.

 

Throughout its history, and further reinforced with the advent of the scientific method, the natural sciences have always been closely related to empirical observations that drive conclusions substantiated on replicable evidence and ‘facts’. The natural sciences are therefore commonly deemed as impartial and unbiased; however, this supposition would suggest that neither credibility nor power affect the extent to which a scientific idea is supported, promoted, and disseminated, as it is independent of extraneous factors such as prior assumptions and power groups. A clear example that contradicts this claim can be observed in how the scientific community initially regarded the contributions about genetic transposition of Barbara McClintock, an American Nobel laureate in physiology or medicine for her work on maize cytogenetics. McClintock was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1983 at the age of 81 since, despite having “discovered mobile genetic elements in plants more than 30 years ago” and being one of the most influential scientists working on maize cytogenetics, her discoveries and contributions were made on plants, which contradicted the contemporary paradigm and theoretical knowledge that disregarded any connection between human or animal genetics with plant genetics. It was not until new discoveries were found that the “biological and medical significance of mobile genetic elements” became apparent. In this example, notwithstanding the conspicuous credibility Barbara McClintock had in her field, the power of the scientific community – understood as the ability to heavily influence others’ perception about a scientific work – led people to constantly ignore and belittle her contributions, as they challenged the time’s paradigm and conception. This shows that, in the short-term, power was more important than credibility, as it impeded the wide dissemination and objective judgement of McClintock’s findings. However, as time passed and a paradigm shift took place, the previously rejected model became part of the new paradigm, which demonstrates that the power of the scientific community could no longer influence others to disparage McClintock’s contributions, and thus credibility proved to be more important than power in the long-run.

 

Similar conclusions can be drawn from Peter Higgs’ proposal of the Higgs field in 1964. Its existence was confirmed in 2012 at CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research), but this theory did not have much success when first suggested. Indeed, Higgs submitted his proposal of the Higgs field to a prominent physics journal in 1964, but was rapidly rejected by the editors who deemed “the premise of an invisible something permeating space, interacting with particles to provide their mass” purely speculative. However, after time passed and new discoveries were made, physicists’ perception of the Higgs field drastically changed, to the extent that they were even certain it was real in spite of not being experimentally confirmed. Similarly (though considering a different type of power), Giordano Bruno and Galileo Galilei’s censorship, incarceration, and torture for their advocacy of copernican heliocentrism, which endorsed a radical change in the view at the time’s accepted geocentric model, further support this premise. Despite the credibility of both Bruno and Galilei in diverse natural sciences areas, the church decided to use its institutional power to silence and censor any ideas opposing the contemporary paradigm, which resulted in Bruno burned alive and Galilei incarcerated and tortured. However, in the long-run, (institutional) power could no longer suppress credibility, and copernican heliocentrism gained popularity and became the ‘accepted model’.

 

Although there are cases within the natural sciences where theories opposing a time’s scientific paradigm were not initially silenced or disparaged, such as Bohr-Einstein debates on quantum physics or Isaac Newton’s Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, these cases are only exceptions since the contemporary paradigm on their fields were indeed open to change and acknowledged the accepted models were not immutable. The explored examples, nevertheless, focus on theories challenging an epoch’s paradigm characterized by a total absence of an openness to change, in which, regardless of the type of power, theories challenging the current paradigm suffer from censorship and being constantly belittled and ignored in the short-term. However, once time passes and a paradigm shift takes place, power can no longer suppress credibility, and the previously rejected model may well become part of the future paradigm. This conclusion, if true, implies that we should be wary of our beliefs and the societal paradigm, as we might currently disregard theories that seem ludicrous at first, but might be endorsed and accepted in the future.

 

On the other hand, the arts are an Area of Knowledge that, contrary to the natural sciences, can be deemed as based on subjectiviness, implicit messages, and non- replicability. The interpretation of an artwork, for instance, is greatly dependent on the context and the conventions of both the author and the audience. Moreover, artworks are normally used by authors as a way to express themselves and convey messages, thoughts, and ideas they would otherwise not transmit. For this reason, one can argue that the credibility of an author will precondition how a certain artwork is interpreted, and since they are a compelling way to convey messages and thoughts, power groups might intend to avoid and control any artwork directly defying their ideals, dogmas, and principles, which establishes an opposition between both concepts. The several works of Federico García Lorca, a prominent Spanish poet and playwright from the early 1900s, are examples of the tension between credibility and power. Lorca’s works tended to criticize the traditional Spanish society by underscoring the consequences of immoderate authoritarianism, social conventions, and constant repression, which created conflict between Lorca and Francisco Franco’s dictatorial government. Lorca’s works defied the values, principles, and ideology of the government, which led him to constantly be censored and silenced, as observed by the fact that his three-act tragedy, La casa de Bernarda Alba, was published in Argentina before than in Spain, where it was written. Thus, similar to the conclusions we drew from the natural sciences, Lorca’s defiance of the Spanish government’s values led them to exert their institutional power to avoid the immediate dissemination of opposing writings. However, these short-term measures proved to be ineffective in the long-run since, as time passed, his works were pervaded and popularized and eventually became classics of Spanish literature. This premise of short-term measures to suppress credibility can also be observed in the more contemporary example of Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks, an artist well-known for creating satiric and offensive sketches about religions, such as islam and christianity. Vilks was death threatened by terrorist organizations and lived under police protection since 2007 for his sketch of Prophet Muhammed with a dog’s body, which shows the fundamentalist organizations’ short-term attempt to utilize their (organizational) power to suppress credibility and censor artworks that attack their religion and beliefs. Although there are also cases within the arts where artworks defying the contemporary paradigm of a group of people with power were not immediately threatened, such as Pablo Picasso’s Guernica or Max Ernst’s Europe After the Rain, these cases are only exceptions since these artworks did not challenge directly the ideals and dogmas of those in power. The explored examples, on the other hand, suggest that those who are in power will incessantly try to devise short-term measures to disparage, censor, and silence artworks that explicitly attack or challenge their current ideals, beliefs, values, or paradigm. However, after time passes and values within a determined context evolve, power can no longer suppress credibility, and the proliferation of an artwork becomes inevitable in the long-run. Therefore, if true, the implications of this conclusion is that we should constantly reflect on why we deem a certain artwork as controversial and needed to be ‘canceled’, as it might be because we hold a biased perspective on a topic and try to censor works that directly defy our ideals and values, although they might well be lauded and praised in the future.

 

To conclude, regardless of the type of power, works, in both the natural sciences and the arts, that directly challenge the values, ideals, beliefs, and paradigm of those in power at a specific epoch will normally be censored, silenced, belittled, and ignored in the short-term. This suggests that power can be deemed as more important than credibility in the short-term, as it will hinder the immediate dissemination of theories and artworks; however, as time passes and a paradigm shift takes place, credibility shows to be more important than power, as no type of power, whether institutional, organizational, governmental, or from the scientific community, will be able to further disparage and censor these theories or artworks.

At first, one could argue that power and credibility are intrinsically intertwined and inherent to one another. After all, from the French Revolution to the Iroquois Confederacy to nowadays’ most common government system, a democracy, it has always been desirable that those in power have the support from the people, and thus, credibility. Even Plato's metaphor of the ship of state, which argued against democracy, supports this premise by noting that those who usually rise to power have public endorsement and credibility, even if they are not totally competent at the role of governing. Nevertheless, is this always the case? Do power and credibility always go hand-in-hand? And is it possible to claim one is ‘more important’ than the other? Through examining pragmatic examples from the natural sciences and the arts, I shall explore the clash between power and credibility to ultimately ascertain that, in both areas of knowledge, power is more important than credibility in the short-term, but after time passes and a paradigm shift takes place, power can no longer suppress credibility and the previously rejected model may well become part of the new paradigm.

 

Throughout its history, and further reinforced with the advent of the scientific method, the natural sciences have always been closely related to empirical observations that drive conclusions substantiated on replicable evidence and ‘facts’. The natural sciences are therefore commonly deemed as impartial and unbiased; however, this supposition would suggest that neither credibility nor power affect the extent to which a scientific idea is supported, promoted, and disseminated, as it is independent of extraneous factors such as prior assumptions and power groups. A clear example that contradicts this claim can be observed in how the scientific community initially regarded the contributions about genetic transposition of Barbara McClintock, an American Nobel laureate in physiology or medicine for her work on maize cytogenetics. McClintock was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1983 at the age of 81 since, despite having “discovered mobile genetic elements in plants more than 30 years ago” and being one of the most influential scientists working on maize cytogenetics, her discoveries and contributions were made on plants, which contradicted the contemporary paradigm and theoretical knowledge that disregarded any connection between human or animal genetics with plant genetics. It was not until new discoveries were found that the “biological and medical significance of mobile genetic elements” became apparent. In this example, notwithstanding the conspicuous credibility Barbara McClintock had in her field, the power of the scientific community – understood as the ability to heavily influence others’ perception about a scientific work – led people to constantly ignore and belittle her contributions, as they challenged the time’s paradigm and conception. This shows that, in the short-term, power was more important than credibility, as it impeded the wide dissemination and objective judgement of McClintock’s findings. However, as time passed and a paradigm shift took place, the previously rejected model became part of the new paradigm, which demonstrates that the power of the scientific community could no longer influence others to disparage McClintock’s contributions, and thus credibility proved to be more important than power in the long-run.

 

Similar conclusions can be drawn from Peter Higgs’ proposal of the Higgs field in 1964. Its existence was confirmed in 2012 at CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research), but this theory did not have much success when first suggested. Indeed, Higgs submitted his proposal of the Higgs field to a prominent physics journal in 1964, but was rapidly rejected by the editors who deemed “the premise of an invisible something permeating space, interacting with particles to provide their mass” purely speculative. However, after time passed and new discoveries were made, physicists’ perception of the Higgs field drastically changed, to the extent that they were even certain it was real in spite of not being experimentally confirmed. Similarly (though considering a different type of power), Giordano Bruno and Galileo Galilei’s censorship, incarceration, and torture for their advocacy of copernican heliocentrism, which endorsed a radical change in the view at the time’s accepted geocentric model, further support this premise. Despite the credibility of both Bruno and Galilei in diverse natural sciences areas, the church decided to use its institutional power to silence and censor any ideas opposing the contemporary paradigm, which resulted in Bruno burned alive and Galilei incarcerated and tortured. However, in the long-run, (institutional) power could no longer suppress credibility, and copernican heliocentrism gained popularity and became the ‘accepted model’.

 

Although there are cases within the natural sciences where theories opposing a time’s scientific paradigm were not initially silenced or disparaged, such as Bohr-Einstein debates on quantum physics or Isaac Newton’s Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, these cases are only exceptions since the contemporary paradigm on their fields were indeed open to change and acknowledged the accepted models were not immutable. The explored examples, nevertheless, focus on theories challenging an epoch’s paradigm characterized by a total absence of an openness to change, in which, regardless of the type of power, theories challenging the current paradigm suffer from censorship and being constantly belittled and ignored in the short-term. However, once time passes and a paradigm shift takes place, power can no longer suppress credibility, and the previously rejected model may well become part of the future paradigm. This conclusion, if true, implies that we should be wary of our beliefs and the societal paradigm, as we might currently disregard theories that seem ludicrous at first, but might be endorsed and accepted in the future.

 

On the other hand, the arts are an Area of Knowledge that, contrary to the natural sciences, can be deemed as based on subjectiviness, implicit messages, and non- replicability. The interpretation of an artwork, for instance, is greatly dependent on the context and the conventions of both the author and the audience. Moreover, artworks are normally used by authors as a way to express themselves and convey messages, thoughts, and ideas they would otherwise not transmit. For this reason, one can argue that the credibility of an author will precondition how a certain artwork is interpreted, and since they are a compelling way to convey messages and thoughts, power groups might intend to avoid and control any artwork directly defying their ideals, dogmas, and principles, which establishes an opposition between both concepts. The several works of Federico García Lorca, a prominent Spanish poet and playwright from the early 1900s, are examples of the tension between credibility and power. Lorca’s works tended to criticize the traditional Spanish society by underscoring the consequences of immoderate authoritarianism, social conventions, and constant repression, which created conflict between Lorca and Francisco Franco’s dictatorial government. Lorca’s works defied the values, principles, and ideology of the government, which led him to constantly be censored and silenced, as observed by the fact that his three-act tragedy, La casa de Bernarda Alba, was published in Argentina before than in Spain, where it was written. Thus, similar to the conclusions we drew from the natural sciences, Lorca’s defiance of the Spanish government’s values led them to exert their institutional power to avoid the immediate dissemination of opposing writings. However, these short-term measures proved to be ineffective in the long-run since, as time passed, his works were pervaded and popularized and eventually became classics of Spanish literature. This premise of short-term measures to suppress credibility can also be observed in the more contemporary example of Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks, an artist well-known for creating satiric and offensive sketches about religions, such as islam and christianity. Vilks was death threatened by terrorist organizations and lived under police protection since 2007 for his sketch of Prophet Muhammed with a dog’s body, which shows the fundamentalist organizations’ short-term attempt to utilize their (organizational) power to suppress credibility and censor artworks that attack their religion and beliefs. Although there are also cases within the arts where artworks defying the contemporary paradigm of a group of people with power were not immediately threatened, such as Pablo Picasso’s Guernica or Max Ernst’s Europe After the Rain, these cases are only exceptions since these artworks did not challenge directly the ideals and dogmas of those in power. The explored examples, on the other hand, suggest that those who are in power will incessantly try to devise short-term measures to disparage, censor, and silence artworks that explicitly attack or challenge their current ideals, beliefs, values, or paradigm. However, after time passes and values within a determined context evolve, power can no longer suppress credibility, and the proliferation of an artwork becomes inevitable in the long-run. Therefore, if true, the implications of this conclusion is that we should constantly reflect on why we deem a certain artwork as controversial and needed to be ‘canceled’, as it might be because we hold a biased perspective on a topic and try to censor works that directly defy our ideals and values, although they might well be lauded and praised in the future.

 

To conclude, regardless of the type of power, works, in both the natural sciences and the arts, that directly challenge the values, ideals, beliefs, and paradigm of those in power at a specific epoch will normally be censored, silenced, belittled, and ignored in the short-term. This suggests that power can be deemed as more important than credibility in the short-term, as it will hinder the immediate dissemination of theories and artworks; however, as time passes and a paradigm shift takes place, credibility shows to be more important than power, as no type of power, whether institutional, organizational, governmental, or from the scientific community, will be able to further disparage and censor these theories or artworks.

Greene, Brian. "How the Higgs Boson Was Found." SmithsonianMagazine. July 2013. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/how-the-higgs-boson-was- found-4723520/.

 

"Press Release 1983." TheNobelPrize.org. Nobel Prize Outreach AB 2022. 4 September, 2022. https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/1983/press- release/.