TICAP AND THE BRUSSELS DECLARATION ON SCIENTIFIC INTEGRITY

TICAP (The International Coalition Against Prohibition) came into fruition in May 2008. TICAP was founded with the British Smoking Ban Experiment in mind, but not exclusively, because the founding members saw the writing on the wall, they knew this did not exclusively include smokers, they knew that drinkers, and those that do not fit into the BMI factor, would be on a “hit list.”  of the “I hate you” brigade.  They knew that this was an international war!

About TICAP

We are regional, national, and international organisations, now bound in solidarity against the damaging prohibitions which in most cases serve to enrich special interests through scientific fraud and political manipulation*, where adults are treated as children and freedom of choice is brushed aside.
Following the planning conference in Holland of May 2008 that produced the Aldebaran  (Aldebaran is the boat where they signed the treaty) Treaty, we now have the vehicle with which to cooperate, nation with nation, group with group, and people to people, united and yet different, against a philosophy that sees the state as the dispenser of rights and social discrimination and the citizen as merely an obedient production unit.
Such a conception of state and citizens diminishes us all, and TICAP will fight for a free and just society where individually established quality of life -­ not collectively established quantity of life -­ is the paramount value of that society. Where the individual - ­ not the bureaucrat -­ establishes the rules of personal behaviour and where the parent -­ not the state or the school - has the power to teach our children the ideals and values that will shape their dreams and futures.

(The signatories to the The Aldebaran Treaty. The only people I can recognise, because I’ve met them, are, left to right: John Gray (standing) Bill Gibson (sitting and waving) behind him Nick Hogan,  and wearing the glasses is the Chairman of Freedom2Choose, Andy Davis)

TICAP held their first world conference in May 2008 which was due to be held in the European Parliament Building but the Anti Tobacco thugs, who did not want to hear from dissenting scientific voices (where have I heard this recently?), and banned the conference from going ahead a few days before it was due to start. That did not stop freedom of speech, a nearby hotel was only too willing to have us there. So much so that [the conference] was a roaring success!  TICAP cannot be stopped, it would appear, as they have just announced there second world conference on the 15th of March 2o10, all are welcome.

* Talking about “scientific fraud and political manipulation” here is something that I, as an ordinary person on the street, who took scientists at their word, say… no more, especially after the Climategate fiasco, where the scientific community have come into disrepute!  And they are in  disrepute, there is no argument about that.
Even that bastion of political integrity, the BBC? in their news programs, they, have belatedly decided to listen to the public about Climategate, first reported on the blogosphere, and had to listen to the public in the end.  But they [the BBC]  still cow towed to their paymasters…no, not us, the licence payers, the goberment! What’s new then?
Well there’s TICAP, who not only moved on to the next World Conference but have made The Brussels Declaration !

THE BRUSSELS DECLARATION
ON SCIENTIFIC INTEGRITY

In the global crusade against alcohol, tobacco, and “unhealthy” foods, health politicians have drawn on alleged scientific evidence that does not adequately meet minimal scientific standards. The following Declaration reminds us of these
standards. The Declaration also calls upon politicians to avoid abusing questionable statements by selected and sometimes quite biased “experts” in order to deprive people of their free lifestyle choices. A prohibitionist society cannot be a free society!

Whereas science and the scientific method have been responsible for the unprecedented progress of knowledge about the physical world during the last few centuries, and for the consequent unabated progress in the material, intellectual, and
social conditions of humankind.

Whereas objective evidence is the key for the success of science and the scientific method, and whereas this paramount feature of science imposes a new ethical standard of objective evidence in the assessment and presentation of material evidence in social human affairs.

Whereas in free societies the policies and regulations pertaining to physical realities must be objectively validated according to the requirements of the scientific method.

Whereas conjectural statements wrongly claimed to be based on objective and validated scientific evidence are increasingly made to encroach on public opinion, government policies and regulations, legal proceedings, educational curricula, and
individual choices and behaviors.

Whereas this trend gravely compromises the integrity of science, and is the harbinger of dire consequences for the intellectual progress, the material welfare, and ultimately for the individual freedom and the physical and mental health of people on this planet.

It is thus resolved that we, the signatories of this declaration, pledge ourselves to defend and promote the objective scientific integrity of public statements presented as being scientific representations of events in the physical world, and that affect
government policies and actions, the media and public opinion, legal proceedings, educational curricula, and other activities of individual and social significance.

To this end we, the signatories of this declaration, highlight here certain fundamental concepts that characterize the nature and the integrity of science and of the scientific method, which we hold to be true and self-evident principles for the identification of authentic, objective, testable, and valid scientific statements.

Principles of scientific integrity

1. 
   Science and the scientific method move from observations to the formulation of cause-and-effect hypotheses, leading to study designs that objectively and honestly test the validity of those hypotheses.
2. 
   Science and the scientific method rely on the language of numbers and mathematics in order to attain the needed quantitative precision.
3. 
   Science and the scientific method do not claim to obtain absolute truths, but rather best estimates within the probability limits of explicit margins of error.
   
4. The quantitative precision of science and the scientific method depends on measurements that are accurate and precise with margins of error small enough to be inconsequential.
5. 
   Science and the scientific method depend on measurements that are relevant to the task at hand, and that warrant to be authentic representations of what it is said to have been measured.
6. Scientific observations and experiments must ensure that observations and effects are specific and internal to the matters at hand, and are not confounded, corrupted, or biased by spurious externalities or by financial and political interests.
7. 
   Valid observations and cause-and-effect conclusions must be reproducible by independent investigators.
   
8. Studies should be properly published and open to peer and public scrutiny before their results are released to the press for political purposes.

We, the signatories of this declaration and its annexes pledge ourselves to publicize detailed examination of the scientific validity of public policies and statements, to suggest remedies compatible with valid science where possible and appropriate, and to act politically to ensure that only scientifically validated
statements and policies are promulgated by governments and other public institutions.
Your rights, your constitutions, your very lives are being played around with and taken off you without you realising it and what for?…The better good???  Think again, think TICAP!
Intel: http://brusselsdeclaration.org/pages/press/ http://brusselsdeclaration.org/pages/home/ and http://brusselsdeclaration.org/pages/home/
Declare yourselves here: http://brusselsdeclaration.org/declaration/sign/