NationStates Jolt Archive

We already have resolution 2, I know, but it's poorly written. With this resolution, it can be further defined without duplication or violating the rules (IMO, comments welcome).

Please approve

Freedom of Science
A resolution to improve worldwide human and civil rights.

Category: Human Rights
Strength: Strong
Proposed by: Groot Gouda

Description: The NationStates United Nations,

RECALLING the adoption of Resolution #2: Scientific Freedom,

NOTING WITH REGRET the lack of concrete protection this resolution provides for scientists,

ALSO NOTING that this resolution poorly defines science and scientists worthy of protection,

CONSIDERING the advantages of greater scientific freedom, such as economic prosperity, greater insight into how the world works, as well as possible advances in medical science,

ACKNOWLEDGING the value of religion, which however should be clearly separate from science,

1. AFFIRMS the Freedom of Science as a fundamental right across UN member nations,

2. DEFINES science as the system of knowledge covering general truths or the operation of general laws especially as obtained and tested through scientific methods, i.e. methodically trying to falsify hypotheses based on objective experimenting which can be reproduced,

3. MANDATES that no scientist may be prosecuted for conducting scientific research, publishing scientific research or reading scientific publications, nor unreasonably restricted in any other way,

4. AUTHORIZES individual nations to exempt scientific research from the general UN protection granted in clause 3 that:
a. is acquired through methods that violate human or animal rights according to UN or national legislation;
b. is aimed at warfare or otherwise damaging persons or animals or the environment (except where it is the only way greater damage can be prevented);
c. depends on "divine beings" as explanations for phenomena;
d. contains plagiarized material or material which by contract was not (yet) to be published;

5. EXPRESSES ITS HOPE that through science, the lives of UN citizens will improve in the centuries to come.


Freedom of Science
Human rights, strong

The NationStates United Nations,

RECALLING the passing of Resolution #2: Scientific Freedom,

NOTING WITH REGRET the lack of concrete protection this resolutions provides for scientists,

ALSO NOTING that this resolution poorly defines science and scientists worthy of protection,

CONSIDERING the advantages of greater scientific freedom, such as economic prosperity, but also greater insight in how the world works, as well as possible advances in medical science,

ACKNOWLEDGING the value of religion, which however should be clearly seperate from science,

1. AFFIRMS the Freedom of Science as a fundamental right accross UN member nations,

2. DEFINES science as the system of knowledge covering general truths or the operation of general laws especially as obtained and tested through scientific methods, i.e. methodically trying to falsify hypotheses based on objective experimenting which can be reproduced,

3. MANDATES that no scientist may be prosecuted for conducting scientific research, publishing scientific research or reading scientific publications,

4. EXEMPTS from general UN protection in clause 3 scientific research that:
a. is acquired through methods that violate human or animal rights according to UN or national legislation;
b. is aimed at warfare or otherwise damaging persons, animals;
c. depends on "divine beings" as explanations for phenomena;

but leaves it up to individual member nations to protect these sciences should they wish to do so.

5. EXPRESSES ITS HOPE that through science, the lives of UN citizens will improve in the centuries to come.

A couple of amendments for typos and phrasing:

"NOTING WITH REGRET ... this resolution provides for scientists"

"CONSIDERING ... prosperity, greater insight into how the world works, as well as possible advances in medical science"

"ACKNOWLEDGING the value of religion, which, however, should be clearly separate from science"

"1. AFFIRMS ... right across UN member nations"

Should this be ruled as legal, we will offer our full support.

Mathieu Vergniaud
Deputy Speaker to the UN

Very reasonable proposal. However, it does leave open science which is not 'aimed' at damaging other people but which would have the side-effect of so doing. For example, if I wanted to check the effects of feeding arsenic to babies, that wouldn't be 'aimed' at damaging other people, but it would have that effect. Of course, that would be covered under other legislation, but I think the wording needs to be tightened slightly...

The Most Serene Republic of Love and esterel will support this proposition.

it will not be easy to repeal UN RESOLUTION #2 Scientific Freedom first, but we wish you good luck

in 3.b, do you think it's possible to add something similar and better than:
"damaging persons or animals or damaging "significantly" environment"

Yeah, the exemptions do need to be broader, to cover environmental protection, as well as other crimes such as theft of other people's ideas

I think that is aimed at warfare or otherwise damaging persons, animals or the environment would be good, as it would allow scientists to perform experiments that require damaging animals or the environment to study other phenomenom, but forbids research that purely exists to damage animals or the environment.

e.g. giving dogs cigarettes to find cures for lung cancer would be okay, but giving dogs cigarettes in order to find news ways of killing dogs would not. Pouring petrol into a tank of fish to study the effects of pollution on fish in order to counter would be fine, but pouring petrol into the sea to see how many fish you can kill wouldn't be.

All in all a very good boundary, IMHO

As for stealing idea's, surely the Patents and Copyright resolution covers that already?

Thanks for your reactions and corrections of spelling mistakes (as you might know, English is not my first language).

On repealing Res. 2: I think it is not necessary. This resolution is not duplicating it, merely expanding it. Nothing stops anyone from repealing either resolution, nor does this resolution amend #2.

On the restrictions: remember, all these are for is to restrict those sciences that are protected. It doesn't forbid those sciences, and I will never propose a resolution that is so restricting. It's up to individual nations to draw that line; this is another line entirely. I will see if I can include environmental protection though.

About the theft, that too is another matter and I prefer to keep that out of this resolution.

I think any resolution that promotes vivisection or militaty research is bad. as in, not good.
I'm not going to vote for any resolution that gives scientists free reign.

As for stealing idea's, surely the Patents and Copyright resolution covers that already?
Ha! No, that resolution covers nothing, on account of being rubbish.

Mathieu Vergniaud
Deputy Speaker to the UN

On the restrictions: remember, all these are for is to restrict those sciences that are protected. It doesn't forbid those sciences, and I will never propose a resolution that is so restricting. It's up to individual nations to draw that line; this is another line entirely. I will see if I can include environmental protection though.

About the theft, that too is another matter and I prefer to keep that out of this resolution.

But by not including things like theft, this proposal would make it illegal for us to punish scientists who engage in those things.

I think any resolution that promotes vivisection or militaty research is bad. as in, not good.
I'm not going to vote for any resolution that gives scientists free reign.

This proposal does not promote those things. In fact, they are clearly excluded from the areas promoted by it.

It doesn't promote vivisection, nor does it ban it. It basically says that any research deliberately aimed at harming animals is not allowed, and therefore, by extention, we can assume that as long as the aim is not harm animals, any harming of animals that occurs as part of this research would be allowed.

And quite right too in my opinion.

What if we were researching how to eradicate mosquitos, or a foreign pest which had been accidentally introduced to our nation and was decimating our ecosystems? That would be research aimed at the most effective ways of killing or sterilising animals.

What if we were researching how to eradicate mosquitos, or a foreign pest which had been accidentally introduced to our nation and was decimating our ecosystems? That would be research aimed at the most effective ways of killing or sterilising animals.
Somehow I doubt that anyone would complain about you testing how to kill mosquitos effectivly, on the other hand I wouldn't be suprised if there's not a nation of mosquitos out there who would disagree with me.

Bob Flibble
UN Representative

But it's research directly aimed at harming animals.

Interesting point, however, the way I read is that scientist conducting research on mosquitoes are excempt from the international protection of scientist, but there is no reason why you could give them the right to investigate it. All it says is that scientist doing this sought of work aren't guarenteed protection, it doesn't ban it.

Oops, yeah good point. Too tired to do this properly.

My concerns still stand, though, over things like theft and other crimnes on the part of scientists, which this proposal inadvertantly protects.

On the whole, a good proposal. However, I am concerned that under this motion, scientists are not protected from influence of financial sponsors. An example of this is pharmacutcal (sic) company pushing scientists to say a particular product was safe, if there were sound scientific reasons to believe otherwise. Another example would be multinational oil companies subsidising research that "proves" the non-existence of climate change. This would fly in the face of firmly established scientific consensus. A suggestion for this proposal would be;

Scientific research is to be protected from influences other than established scientific protocols and peer review. Financial donors, whether public or private, individuals, institutions or other bodies, or such bodies associated with the donors, are forbidden from having any influence over the outcome of any scientific research that they fund.

On the whole, a good proposal. However, I am concerned that under this motion, scientists are not protected from influence of financial sponsors. An example of this is pharmacutcal (sic) company pushing scientists to say a particular product was safe, if there were sound scientific reasons to believe otherwise. Another example would be multinational oil companies subsidising research that "proves" the non-existence of climate change. This would fly in the face of firmly established scientific consensus. A suggestion for this proposal would be;

Scientific research is to be protected from influences other than established scientific protocols and peer review. Financial donors, whether public or private, individuals, institutions or other bodies, or such bodies associated with the donors, are forbidden from having any influence over the outcome of any scientific research that they fund.
I agree, though perhaps this could be addressed in another resolution. Remember that some nations are purely corporate in nature; the only funding and support available to scientists in such nations is from the private sector.

Originally posted byEcopoeia;Remember that some nations are purely corporate in nature; the only funding and support available to scientists in such nations is from the private sector.

I'm not suggesting a ban on private funding; just prohibiting influence from funders on the outcome of scientific research.

I've updated the draft on page one. Clause 4 is now this:

4. EXEMPTS from general UN protection in clause 3 scientific research that:
a. is acquired through methods that violate human or animal rights according to UN or national legislation;
b. is aimed at warfare or otherwise damaging persons or animals or the environment (except where it is the only way greater damage can be prevented);
c. depends on "divine beings" as explanations for phenomena;
d. contains plagiarized material;

So that excludes the theft (I decided to put it in anyway) and allows "dangerous" research if it's really the only way (for example: you could test a cancer cure on a few rabbits because that could cure millions of people).

That's about everything I want to include. Scientists don't need to be "protected" from money. I agree with the point made, but I don't see this resolution as the solution for that. I like to keep my resolutions to the point, aimed at a single goal, and not setting everything in stone if that's not absolutely necessary. That way, views on (in this case) the use of lab animals may change, but the resolution text still stands.

I suspect you'll encounter a lot of resistance from nations wishing to prosecute scientists who publish research which is supposed to be conducted in secret. Ditto with companies which don't want to reveal their results until their research is complete. I'd recommend a further exemption for when actions breach contracts, so that secrecy arrangements can be made between scientists and their employers.

b. is aimed at warfare or otherwise damaging persons or animals or the environment (except where it is the only way greater damage can be

we like that, thanks a lot

I suspect you'll encounter a lot of resistance from nations wishing to prosecute scientists who publish research which is supposed to be conducted in secret. Ditto with companies which don't want to reveal their results until their research is complete. I'd recommend a further exemption for when actions breach contracts, so that secrecy arrangements can be made between scientists and their employers.

Good point, but also one that could open a lot of loopholes for nations wanting to prosecute scientists. I'll see how I can put it in though.

Okay, see page 1 for the updated draft. Submitted as "Freedom of Science".

Okay, see page 1 for the updated draft. Submitted as "Freedom of Science".

approved, congrats

Submitted again. Didn't get the list of approving delegates because NS was unreachable sunday night.

Freedom of Science

A resolution to improve worldwide human and civil rights.


Category: Human Rights


Strength: Strong


Proposed by: Groot Gouda

Description: The NationStates United Nations,

RECALLING the adoption of Resolution #2: Scientific Freedom,

NOTING WITH REGRET the lack of concrete protection this resolution provides for scientists,

ALSO NOTING that this resolution poorly defines science and scientists worthy of protection,

CONSIDERING the advantages of greater scientific freedom, such as economic prosperity, greater insight into how the world works, as well as possible advances in medical science,

ACKNOWLEDGING the value of religion, which however should be clearly separate from science,

1. AFFIRMS the Freedom of Science as a fundamental right across UN member nations,

2. DEFINES science as the system of knowledge covering general truths or the operation of general laws especially as obtained and tested through scientific methods, i.e. methodically trying to falsify hypotheses based on objective experimenting which can be reproduced,

3. MANDATES that no scientist may be prosecuted for conducting scientific research, publishing scientific research or reading scientific publications, nor unreasonably restricted in any other way,

4. AUTHORIZES individual nations to exempt scientific research from the general UN protection granted in clause 3 that:
a. is acquired through methods that violate human or animal rights according to UN or national legislation;
b. is aimed at warfare or otherwise damaging persons or animals or the environment (except where it is the only way greater damage can be prevented);
c. depends on "divine beings" as explanations for phenomena;
d. contains plagiarized material or material which by contract was not (yet) to be published;

5. EXPRESSES ITS HOPE that through science, the lives of UN citizens will improve in the centuries to come.

Submitted again.

I authored a repeal of Resolution #2 about a week ago, and I would like to add my support of this resolution. I think that the wording is done well and I will continue to advocate it. However, I am not a delegate and thus the things I can do are limited. I will try and persuade my regional delegate to support it as well and continue to monitor the progress that it is making.