Hi readers, have you enjoyed reading esotericism and esoteric research? Must be astonished? Think about me who has seen it and now I am telling you something more on this. Fasten your belts and get ready for more shocks because this will enable you to find an analogy with what is happening in the country and how have we reached here?
As I explained in earlier blog
Esotericism belongs to hard-core groups who possess similar qualities and pursue common academic interests that can be explained by “Dunning-Kruger effect” named after the two social psychologists “David Dunning” and “Justin Kruger”: who first described it.
But before that, let me admit that esotericism is one of the challenges that we as comity should consider and treat seriously because the phenomenon is being used to hide fraud in science both natural and social? How the preparators do it? Do they understand what they are doing, or they don’t? I will try to explain it through “Dunning-Kruger effect” or
A systematic way in which the context and framing of information influence decision-making and judgment of the affectees. It is a cognitive/mental bias in which individuals unknowingly or wrongly believe that they possess above-average abilities of performing a particular task whereas they are highly unskilled for that (Any analogy?)
These people are either mendacious/deceitful or they do not possess required skills needed to recognize their own incompetence. Combination of poor self-awareness and low mental ability leads them to overestimate their own capabilities.
Cognitive or mental biases are systematic feelings in human’s thinking and reasoning that often do not comply with logic. These people usually possessed a scientific problem which they do not immediately recognize as
“fools are blind to their own foolishness”.
Darwin says in “The Descent of Man” that, “ignorance more frequently produces confidence than does knowledge”. In simple words “ignorant people tried to pose themselves more confident than do the knowledgeable. It is perhaps that confidence and fluency which help these people adopt esotericism.
You must have observed that these people have been travelling a lot and roamed around in circles of individuals whom they think are extensively exposed to various kind of information and technologies therefore, people under Dunning Kruger effect trust their opinions. This “illusory truth effect” confers trustworthiness to their stories that are generally based on prior convictions (which cannot be used by prosecutors as evidence but can be used to question the credibility of the defendant’s testimony).
The Dunning Kruger affectees keep repeating such stories to practice upon the imagination and credulity of the public thus, making it easy for others to understand and process the statements for using it as a guide in investigation or to infer accuracy without realizing its impermanence. That is how Dunning-Kruger affectees keep their circle intact.
These misperceptions interfere with two main “competences”: heuristics and aggregation. In former case, a person recognizes his lack of knowledge, but misperception led him to wrong self-perception of being well informed. This is what the leader of the fraternal group consider himself.
Aggregation on the other hand is used by the organizations to balance random errors in individual’s (Dunning Kruger affectees) preferences but, in the presence of systematic misperceptions, aggregation can magnify individual’s misinformation to public level which can produce negative and/or disastrous consequences.
This is exactly what happened with cotton destruction and is being happening in entire Pakistan.
The consequences
The first and the foremost is that everyone in cotton biotechnology now looks for short cuts, produced variety after variety: the so-called Bt. cotton and keep growing it in the field without going through prescribed internationally standardized biosafety test.
Now, all these so-called varieties have spread onto the estimated 95 percent of cotton area, yet the yield and production are going down. The reason is that Bt., gene which dominates in cotton sector in Pakistan has now become a challenge for the farmers due to weak gene expression, and growing ineffectiveness against pink bollworms. This Bt., cotton was informally introduced in the absence of effective regulatory or intellectual property system.
Approval of these rules, acts and ordinance is a pre-requisite for official introduction of high-quality seed and of new technologies in the country.
This confirms without doubt that “cotton biotechnology” program initiated with ADB loan back in 1990 was based on un-official introduction of old and low efficiency Bt., gene which has now become a problem for cotton farmers.
Isn’t it amazing that, Pakistan initiated promulgating law of biosafety for developing Bt., cotton in 2017 (17 years latter) while the program on development of Bt., was initiated in 1990?
The fraternal group mostly used the word “production of technology” as title of their projects because this way they are not answerable for any practical outcome of their research except “fake data” and “fake research”: the two terms that were unheard of 20 years ago.
Now when there is a scarcity/paucity of research funds, the pseudo scientists have found another way of keeping them into business. They project themselves as accomplished scientists who contributed tremendously into science in the country (no wonder) and wanted to transfer their knowledge to younger generations by converting their institution into so called teaching institutions affiliated with established universities in the country.
The perception is that they are doing great job but, what they are teaching to the students is what they have been doing throughout their career.
To me, it appeared that some forces from within do not see Pakistani scientists and students to get true knowledge that can be used to build the nation and made the holder of degrees the real educated people. The education system of the country has been systematically destroyed to the extent that it is easier to talk to parrots than to the so called educated people of Pakistan.
Since they do not know the subject thus, they gave assignments on state-of-the-art progress made in biotechnology and genetic engineering research to the students making the completion mandatory for them to pass the exams. These assignments are then used as lectures by the senior professors who use such tactics to project them self as good teachers and the business goes on.
When this is the standard of the teaching, what will be the future of this country can be anybody’s guess. The reality is that you destroy education system, and the country will be destroyed automatically which appears true for Pakistan.
The story does not end here. The previous government has announced a policy of growing Cannabis (Bhang) on country wide basis in the cotton area. The 1961 “Single convention on Narcotic Drugs” was the first ever international treaty to have included cannabis (or marijuana) with other hard drugs and imposed a blanket ban on their production and supply except for medicinal and research purposes., but the
“Government says that “Cannabis will be cultivated only for production of medicines (really?)”.
“The perception is that after a couple of years, when people will start using cannabis and become addict to this cheap drug, there will be pressure from national and international agencies to ban the production in the country. The result will be “no cannabis and no cotton”: the backbone of the Agri-economy and number one cash crop of the country”
Do we need enemy from outside? I am sure not. We are enough for ourselves. What should we call it? Scientific fraud, cheating, getting falls fame, minting money or destroying the scientific culture in the country through “Fake science”? Though every facet has its role but, I am a staunch believer of the last “the fake science”
“A dead cow or sheep lying in a pasture is recognized as carrion (flash of dead animal) but the same sort of carcass dressed and hung up in butcher’s shop is passes or accessed as food”
Amazing, isn’t it?
What are you seeing dear readers in your beloved country can be amplified through this mirror?
See you next week with a new series on “climate change and agriculture”
Till then enjoy reading this,
Bye.
