Perhaps no physicist has come closer to becoming the ultimate politician as Albert Einstein, when he was asked to become the second president of Israel in 1952. He declined of course, but decades later more and more scientists are plunging into the political scene.

There have always been “celebrity scientists”, evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould and physicist Richard Feynman to name a few. But celebrity status doesn’t lead to the power to pass legislation.

A suspicious public, misleading media coverage, and lack of public debate has caused a growing number of scientists to advocate for "evidence-based decision making" in public policy, rather than the influence of popular emotion or intuitive appeal.