On the QT | The Official Newsletter of GWA September - October 2017 | Page 21

EDGI (Environmental Data and Governance Initiative) monitors nearly 25,000 web pages across the government, tracking changes to the language and code.
Whether academic, non-profit or governmen-
tal, all institutions are run by humans. However,
the scientific method, which Johnson described
as “elegant and clear” and “rational,” helps to
navigate the muddy, and often narrow, agenda
of any current trend. Which is why we need full
scientific data sets. Predictably, much of the
scientific community was up in arms about the
DOE and EPA website changes.
“Is it policy difference or an antagonistic
opinion to science?” asked Johnson, who helped
organize the Earth Day March for Science, which
saw thousands of people from 249 scientific
and academic partner organizations march in
514 places around the world. “This isn’t the only
country in which (the suppression or obfusca-
tion of scientific data) is going on,” Johnson said.
Prior to the 2017 inauguration, the Union
of Concerned Scientists, a March for Science
supporter, downloaded government data sets
on climate change and endangered species to
preserve the integrity of the information. The
City of Chicago did, too, by archiving EPA pages
on its own website (http://climatechange.
cityofchicago.org).
“I use a lot of internet resources,” Aker said.
“Extension resources are there still. The states
have very good resources for the things that I
need.”
The words ‘there still’ hint at the fact that other
resources are gone. Updating information based
on new research happens all the time. However,
retaining the data archive as a record of changes
is an important component in data set integrity.
Without that, we have no basis for comparison.
For example, the EPA website now simply states
the new emissions standards for cars and trucks.
It does not include the former standards for
an apples-to-apples comparison. Some insist
that the argument over the simplified website’s
changes reflect a difference of opinion. Most
scientists disagree.
“When government data sets start disap-
pearing from government websites, that’s not a
difference of opinion,” insisted Johnson. For ex-
ample, The Washington Post reported on May 22,
2017, that the Department of the Interior deleted
a sentence from a U.S. Geological Survey press
release that highlighted the link between climate
change and sea level rise. “When scientists are
not allowed to talk about their research, that’s
suppressing evidence. Science is being sidelined
in the policymaking process,” Johnson said.
The USDA Agricultural Research Services
never received “an edict” to delete what’s offered
on its website or to change how information
is vetted before it’s posted, said Aker. A science
agency means that it deals in data, based on
peer-reviewed research. “Anything that we put
out there has to be scientifically accurate.”
P L AY I N G W I T H T H E N U M B E R S
However, purposeful data selection can
skew a conclusion. One person, who requested
anonymity, confessed that while working at
Homeland Security, he had seen carefully select-
ed data used to reinforce a policy rather than
basing policy on full and complete data.
Virtually every human endeavor has an
agenda. For some, it’s financial, as in follow the
money. For the scientific community, the agen-
da is, or should always be curiosity, exploration
and discovery, which is how we learned that
the world wasn’t flat and the sun didn’t revolve
around the Earth. For us as garden communica-
tors, our agenda is to inspire our audiences and
encourage them to live in ways that science tells
us are beneficial for the earth and for us.
C R E AT E YO U R O W N A R C H I V E S
So, what should we do? Cast our informa-
tion-seeking nets wide and download critical
material. Interview the scientists, the researchers
and the collators of data. Support our state
university extensions and others who do the
research. And look for archival background for
the data we find on the web.
“Internet archive sites such as the Wayback
Machine https://web.archive.org/ and research
libraries that scan all of their documents are
two sources,” said Sclar. “Once a link to another
resource is broken, the forensic work begins. The
best thing is to try to find the (original) author.”
For more resources on this topic, please use the URL
to activate the GWA Sustainability Committee’s
web page. visit https://www.gardenwriters.org/
files/galleries/Resources_for_Disappearing_In-
formation.pdf

GWA member Nancy Taylor Robson lives on the
rural Eastern Shore of Maryland, where wildlife both
enhances and challenges gardening, as well as other
aspects of life.
Lois J. de Vries chairs the GWA Sustainability Committee
and is Founding Executive Director of the Sustainable
Gardening Institute and the Sustainable Gardening
Library. She works and gardens in Northwestern New
Jersey.
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