Canada Needs an Active Science Advisor

The CBC reports that Canada's National Science Advisor, Arthur Carty, will retire on March 31, and that the office will be closed. (Hat tip to Pharyngula.)

Although it's shortsighted and foolhardy to eliminate the office of National Science Advisor, we really needed someone with more willingness to stand up to the anti-science faction at SSHRC, the social science granting agency.

You may recall that SSHRC turned down a grant application of McGill professor Brian Alters, who had proposed to study how intelligent design advocates have a malign influence on biological education, because there was inadequate justification that "the theory of Evolution, and not Intelligent Design theory, was correct."

Many scientists, including me, wrote to Carty asking him to take a stand on this ridiculous position. Carty never even responded. His secretary promised action that never occurred.

Canada needs a science advisor office, and it needs a science advisor that is willing to defend evolution.