Birch Jonathan
Department of Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method, London School of Economics and Political Science, Houghton Street, London, WC2A 2AE UK.
Eur J Philos Sci. 2021;11(3):90. doi: 10.1007/s13194-021-00407-z. Epub 2021 Aug 25.
Drawing on the SAGE minutes and other documents, I consider the wider lessons for norms of scientific advising that can be learned from the UK's initial response to coronavirus in the period January-March 2020, when an initial strategy that planned to avoid total suppression of transmission was abruptly replaced by an aggressive suppression strategy. I introduce a distinction between "normatively light advice", in which no specific policy option is recommended, and "normatively heavy advice" that does make an explicit recommendation. I argue that, although scientific advisers should avoid normatively heavy advice in normal times in order to facilitate democratic accountability, this norm can be permissibly overridden in situations of grave emergency. SAGE's major mistake in early 2020 was not that of endorsing a particular strategy, nor that of being insufficiently precautionary, but that of relying too heavily on a specific set of "reasonable worst-case" planning assumptions. I formulate some proposals that assign a more circumscribed role to "worst-case" thinking in emergency planning. In an epilogue, I consider what the implications of my proposals would have been for the UK's response to the "second wave" of late 2020.
借鉴科学咨询小组（SAGE）的会议记录和其他文件，我思考了科学咨询规范方面更广泛的经验教训，这些经验教训可从英国在2020年1月至3月期间对新冠病毒的最初应对中汲取。当时，一项原本计划避免全面抑制病毒传播的初始策略突然被激进的抑制策略所取代。我区分了“规范性较轻的建议”（即不推荐任何具体政策选项）和“规范性较重的建议”（即做出明确推荐）。我认为，尽管科学顾问在正常时期应避免提出规范性较重的建议，以促进民主问责，但在严重紧急情况下，这一规范可以被合理推翻。科学咨询小组在2020年初的主要错误，既不是支持某一特定策略，也不是预防措施不够充分，而是过于依赖一套特定的“合理最坏情况”规划假设。我提出了一些建议，在应急规划中为“最坏情况”思维设定一个更有限的角色。在结语中，我思考了我的建议对英国应对2020年末“第二波疫情”的影响。
