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"How to explain the rise of Neil deGrasse Tyson? It’s hard to deny that we live in an era in which science — as both a worldview and as a practice — is under ne

by api 13y ago

"How to explain the rise of Neil deGrasse Tyson? It’s hard to deny that we live in an era in which science — as both a worldview and as a practice — is under near-constant assault. On the left, there are those who rail against the dangers of GMOs and vaccines. On the right, there are those who deny climate change and the evolution of species." I've thought about this a lot. I know a number of highly intelligent and articulate people who seem to hold a kind of animosity toward science, and in talking to them I always try to figure out exactly why this is. I've identified what I think are several reasons. (1) Science is about reality. It's about learning about reality and a commitment to reality. Unfortunately for a great many people reality just flat out sucks and there's little they feel they can do about it. You're stuck in a dead-end job with debts piling up, an underwater house, and failing health. The last thing you want to hear about is reality. You want unreality-- the more unreal the better-- because your reality is awful and then you're going to die. (2) There has been a general loss of confidence in institutions, scientific and academic ones included. I don't think this is wholly irrational. We've had multiple presidential administrations that have lied us into war. The financial industry has run what amount to pump-and-dump scams against the public (e.g. the housing bubble). These sorts of things show people that institutions aren't to be trusted. They are often either predatory or incompetent. What's that got to do with science? Well... from an ordinary person's point of view, science belongs to the same stratospheric realm as high finance and government. It's part of the world of "big" things... "big" things that stomp on the little guy. (3) (and I think this might be the big one) Science says things that are concrete and falsifiable. Since humans are not infallible, that means that some of what you say is almost certainly going to turn out to be wrong. Superstitious ideologies on the other hand seldom make concrete promises or provide answers that are actually testable or verifiable. As a result, they are never wrong. They're never wrong because they are not really saying anything. (Politicians and salesmen are also masters of this art... it's not by any means confined to religion.) Every time science makes a mistake, it counts against it in peoples' minds. "Oh, they were wrong about trans fats... that means GMO foods can't be trusted either!"

hitchhiker999 13y ago
Interesting post. I'd like to think of myself as 'intelligent' - as most of us do - I'm Mensa, I'm a programmer of 30+ years blah blah. I live and breath 'logic'. So take this for what it's worth. 2 is the big one from my perspective. I think it's extremely naive to immediately trust anything coming from mainstream science / medicine these days. GMOs, as an example, demonstrates the inability of some scientists to understand the concept of 'playing with machines they neither understand holistically, nor practically'. Even 'slightly large' software projects, where the variables are all contained in a highly controlled and observable environment, go horribly wrong. I can't imagine the arrogance you need to mess with nature confidently. Nature is a complex machine, don't f* around with it unless you a) can create it from scratch b) are absolutely sure what you're doing is not going to affect the machine's surrounding environment. We are far, far away from those necessary understandings. I would think this was obvious, but apparently it's not. I get the impression that in America I'd be shouted down for saying this.
- abstractbill 13y ago
  But we've been fucking around with nature for a long time without fully understanding it. In fact a lot of that fucking around has led to us understanding nature better!
  - api 13y ago
    You're both right IMHO. I actually think the GMO people would have more credibility if they admitted that there were possible risks and explained the risks vs. the benefits. Pretending there are no risks makes you sound like a shill, and today the instant people get a whiff of shill they blacklist you and anything you stand for. Re: #2 above: I asked a friend of mine who is very anti-GMO whether she would be more open to them if they were produced by open non-profit organizations working in the public interest. She said yes, she'd be more willing to consider their benefits in that case, but that she wasn't going to eat food "designed by corporations that are all run by sociopaths." The perception that corporations are "run by sociopaths" is not wholly unfounded or irrational. Obviously all of them aren't, but even Peter Thiel admits that the percentage of sociopaths in high-up corporate and government positions is far larger than in the general population. I have to ask then: do we really want organizations run by sociopaths programming the genome of the world's food supplies?
srl 13y ago
WRT number 3 (which I agree is the biggie): I've noticed science journalists and outreach folk often place a lot of emphasis on individual discoveries and hypotheses. Sometimes they seem to do this to make it relatable, other times perhaps just because those particular facts are "cool". Other times (usually not in physics) it's an over-eagerness to spread results that, if correct, could genuinely help people, but aren't really properly established yet. It's easy to get people excited about individual ideas, but it ultimately has the downside that the _majority_ of these ideas will end up in the infinite discard bin.
- api 13y ago
  A lot of people don't understand this. Science produces reams of output in the form of publications and data sets, and quite a bit of that will turn out to be insignificant or even wrong. It's like anything else... the stuff that stands the test of time (and repeatability!) is the good stuff.
Double_Cast 13y ago
Here's what I've always suspected the primary reason for animosity towards science is: from the perspective of a non-scientist, science doesn't actually look any different from a religion, or the latest fashion, or the snakeoil salesman. A professional scientist can examine a peer's paper and determine its quality. E.g. the signal to noise ratio, whether the math checks out, scope, etc. But the Average Joe doesn't know how to properly evaluate a scientific paper. So he has to take it on faith that what the high priest in the lab coat says is true. Approaching the unknown with apprehension is a perfectly natural reaction. This can be overcome through education. But learning takes time and energy. It's hard work. And as excited as I am about things like "Cosmos", I think a lot of people don't find it worth the trouble, because it's not immediately relevant. "Leave that science stuff to the scientists, I'm perfectly satisfied being able to drive my car without knowing how the Otto Cycle works."
neumann 13y ago
I think there is another element. I admit, that as a scientific researcher, I am exhausted with 'science' in the mainstream. We are bombarded by rubbish 'science' reporting, which when criticized, hides behind the banner of science. God forbid any of the articles in the Science section of most major newspapers actually scale the reporting to the actual significance of the finding/article. Often it is usually cheap journalism that goes with a crazy headline (eg. AIDS cure found in mice) reporting on some preliminary study that is suggestive at best, and often a PR stunt for a researcher/lab (supported and indeed recommended by the named institution). There are also a ton of opinion pieces and blogs that use data analysis or 'science' to push an agenda. That's great when it adheres to the scientific method, but often they don't or the argument it is justifying isn't in the field of science. Just because you crunched numbers does not mean you are doing science. I have very well educated friends who assume that if an opinion is backed by statistics, then you are backed by facts, and conflate science with fact (as per @api's point 3). Critical thinking doesn't come into play. A lot of them do well in policy jobs! We need more education on the scientific method, better criticism of poor science reporting in the media, and a desperate need for scientists to regain the public's trust. I believe this last step is very hard currently. The education bubble is just growing and growing and academia is eaten up be the tertiary education industry and a destructive motivator model (publish or perish).
- api 13y ago
  "better criticism of poor science reporting in the media," This makes me think of another pet peeve of mine: where are the skeptics? The Skeptic movement almost exclusively goes after marginal outsiders: fringe archaeologists, ancient aliens people, UFO cultists, extreme new agers, creationists, faith healers, etc. Yet for every person who has spent a $10 on a bogus homeopathic cure there are a few dozen people who have spent hundreds of dollars on a bogus pharmaceutical promoted by a multi-billion-dollar ad campaign. The vast majority of Skeptics (capital S) strike me as basically just establishmentarians. They're not really skeptics in the philosophical sense-- their skepticism is strictly reserved for certain fashionable-to-criticize outsider positions. I don't see them as real advocates for science, more like a cult of people who like to shoot fish in barrels to prove what great marksmen they are. On top of that, many Skeptics are dicks about it. This further puts people off science, making them think that science consists of a bunch of arrogant eggheads constantly congratulating themselves on how superior they are. It makes science look like another fundie cult.
mamcx 13y ago
Also: Science is what produce the worst of the worst possible things, and make the worst, better. Is what build the weapons, the pollution, the asphalt-jungle, the climate-change, the dictators in steroids, the NSA. Is what will lead humanity to distopia (or worse). And will not build a better world. Everything wrong, is stronger with science. Science is the slave of tyrants, military, politicians. Science could be sell to the higher bidder. A peasant rarely can benefit, directly, from a scientist. From preacher? yes. For somebody selling a dream? yes. Bastard ask for a way to torture and kill with efficiency, and scientist say "I could do it better than you tough". P.D: This is about what could inspire fear in people, so take that in account about this...

by api 13y ago

hitchhiker999 13y ago

Interesting post. I'd like to think of myself as 'intelligent' - as most of us do - I'm Mensa, I'm a programmer of 30+ years blah blah. I live and breath 'logic'. So take this for what it's worth. 2 is the big one from my perspective. I think it's extremely naive to immediately trust anything coming from mainstream science / medicine these days. GMOs, as an example, demonstrates the inability of some scientists to understand the concept of 'playing with machines they neither understand holistically, nor practically'. Even 'slightly large' software projects, where the variables are all contained in a highly controlled and observable environment, go horribly wrong. I can't imagine the arrogance you need to mess with nature confidently. Nature is a complex machine, don't f* around with it unless you a) can create it from scratch b) are absolutely sure what you're doing is not going to affect the machine's surrounding environment. We are far, far away from those necessary understandings. I would think this was obvious, but apparently it's not. I get the impression that in America I'd be shouted down for saying this.

abstractbill 13y ago
But we've been fucking around with nature for a long time without fully understanding it. In fact a lot of that fucking around has led to us understanding nature better!
- api 13y ago
  You're both right IMHO. I actually think the GMO people would have more credibility if they admitted that there were possible risks and explained the risks vs. the benefits. Pretending there are no risks makes you sound like a shill, and today the instant people get a whiff of shill they blacklist you and anything you stand for. Re: #2 above: I asked a friend of mine who is very anti-GMO whether she would be more open to them if they were produced by open non-profit organizations working in the public interest. She said yes, she'd be more willing to consider their benefits in that case, but that she wasn't going to eat food "designed by corporations that are all run by sociopaths." The perception that corporations are "run by sociopaths" is not wholly unfounded or irrational. Obviously all of them aren't, but even Peter Thiel admits that the percentage of sociopaths in high-up corporate and government positions is far larger than in the general population. I have to ask then: do we really want organizations run by sociopaths programming the genome of the world's food supplies?

srl 13y ago

WRT number 3 (which I agree is the biggie): I've noticed science journalists and outreach folk often place a lot of emphasis on individual discoveries and hypotheses. Sometimes they seem to do this to make it relatable, other times perhaps just because those particular facts are "cool". Other times (usually not in physics) it's an over-eagerness to spread results that, if correct, could genuinely help people, but aren't really properly established yet. It's easy to get people excited about individual ideas, but it ultimately has the downside that the _majority_ of these ideas will end up in the infinite discard bin.

api 13y ago
A lot of people don't understand this. Science produces reams of output in the form of publications and data sets, and quite a bit of that will turn out to be insignificant or even wrong. It's like anything else... the stuff that stands the test of time (and repeatability!) is the good stuff.

Double_Cast 13y ago

Here's what I've always suspected the primary reason for animosity towards science is: from the perspective of a non-scientist, science doesn't actually look any different from a religion, or the latest fashion, or the snakeoil salesman. A professional scientist can examine a peer's paper and determine its quality. E.g. the signal to noise ratio, whether the math checks out, scope, etc. But the Average Joe doesn't know how to properly evaluate a scientific paper. So he has to take it on faith that what the high priest in the lab coat says is true. Approaching the unknown with apprehension is a perfectly natural reaction. This can be overcome through education. But learning takes time and energy. It's hard work. And as excited as I am about things like "Cosmos", I think a lot of people don't find it worth the trouble, because it's not immediately relevant. "Leave that science stuff to the scientists, I'm perfectly satisfied being able to drive my car without knowing how the Otto Cycle works."

neumann 13y ago

I think there is another element. I admit, that as a scientific researcher, I am exhausted with 'science' in the mainstream. We are bombarded by rubbish 'science' reporting, which when criticized, hides behind the banner of science. God forbid any of the articles in the Science section of most major newspapers actually scale the reporting to the actual significance of the finding/article. Often it is usually cheap journalism that goes with a crazy headline (eg. AIDS cure found in mice) reporting on some preliminary study that is suggestive at best, and often a PR stunt for a researcher/lab (supported and indeed recommended by the named institution). There are also a ton of opinion pieces and blogs that use data analysis or 'science' to push an agenda. That's great when it adheres to the scientific method, but often they don't or the argument it is justifying isn't in the field of science. Just because you crunched numbers does not mean you are doing science. I have very well educated friends who assume that if an opinion is backed by statistics, then you are backed by facts, and conflate science with fact (as per @api's point 3). Critical thinking doesn't come into play. A lot of them do well in policy jobs! We need more education on the scientific method, better criticism of poor science reporting in the media, and a desperate need for scientists to regain the public's trust. I believe this last step is very hard currently. The education bubble is just growing and growing and academia is eaten up be the tertiary education industry and a destructive motivator model (publish or perish).

api 13y ago
"better criticism of poor science reporting in the media," This makes me think of another pet peeve of mine: where are the skeptics? The Skeptic movement almost exclusively goes after marginal outsiders: fringe archaeologists, ancient aliens people, UFO cultists, extreme new agers, creationists, faith healers, etc. Yet for every person who has spent a $10 on a bogus homeopathic cure there are a few dozen people who have spent hundreds of dollars on a bogus pharmaceutical promoted by a multi-billion-dollar ad campaign. The vast majority of Skeptics (capital S) strike me as basically just establishmentarians. They're not really skeptics in the philosophical sense-- their skepticism is strictly reserved for certain fashionable-to-criticize outsider positions. I don't see them as real advocates for science, more like a cult of people who like to shoot fish in barrels to prove what great marksmen they are. On top of that, many Skeptics are dicks about it. This further puts people off science, making them think that science consists of a bunch of arrogant eggheads constantly congratulating themselves on how superior they are. It makes science look like another fundie cult.

mamcx 13y ago

Also: Science is what produce the worst of the worst possible things, and make the worst, better. Is what build the weapons, the pollution, the asphalt-jungle, the climate-change, the dictators in steroids, the NSA. Is what will lead humanity to distopia (or worse). And will not build a better world. Everything wrong, is stronger with science. Science is the slave of tyrants, military, politicians. Science could be sell to the higher bidder. A peasant rarely can benefit, directly, from a scientist. From preacher? yes. For somebody selling a dream? yes. Bastard ask for a way to torture and kill with efficiency, and scientist say "I could do it better than you tough". P.D: This is about what could inspire fear in people, so take that in account about this...