Scientists are usually among the most trusted groups of people in society, alongside servicemen and teachers.
After looking at the polls about trust in the science community, one would think that the word of a scientist would be law (as it should be). It is not.
I googled “Why scientists are trusted”, and the first 5 links were all articles about why you shouldn’t trust scientists (or politicians). And the universal topic of dispute is global warming, and how the scientific establishment is completely wrong about it. To a lesser extent, they're also telling us not to trust scientists about vaccines and autism, or evolution.
A snapshot of some of the Google results
America is an interestingly dichotomous nation. And I mean that in the worst way possible. Let’s talk a bit about global warming, as a case study.
I’m not going to explain how global warming works; there’s plenty of other places you can find that information, and I am tired of the “global warming debate”, as it were. Look that up on Wikipedia or NASA. I have important opinions that haven't been expressed by the experts yet, so I'll stick to stuff you haven't heard.
Alright, I've given you time to read up on global warming, but let’s be frank. You have no idea how the climate works. At all. And to be fair, neither do I. The climate is a billion-variable problem in a constantly changing system. You can’t take a 5-minute look at the data and research of the past 30 years and come to a conclusion that’ll stand up to any scrutiny. You don’t understand the nature of cyclic solar activity, the capacity of earth’s ecosystems to produce the concoction of greenhouse gases, the thermodynamic properties of those gases vis a vis absorption and reflection of incident electromagnetic radiation, and the myriad other parameters affecting global temperatures.
Here's a bunch of climate data. Interpret it.
You know who has the best chance of understanding all those things? People that have spent their entire lives studying it--climatologists. And 97% of the most researchful researchers agree that anthropogenic global warming is a serious problem. And on top of that, every scientific organization in the world supports this consensus. The remaining 3% don’t believe it isn’t, they’re just unsure.
So that’s it, case closed, right? Wrong, apparently. There is an obstinate contingent in America that declares the debate to not yet be over. So here’s my question: When 97% of experts agree about an issue, why would 40+% of the American populace argue they are wrong?
Well, looking at sources that support global warming, there’s a lot of invoking statistics, quantum mechanical effects, and complicated math and science. You saw that data collage above, right?
When looking at the denial side, it’s usually something simple:
When looking at the denial side, it’s usually something simple:
* Climategate--Some emails between 2 or 3 scientists about using statistical techniques to cover noise in data. The media took a few quotes out of context and declared them to mean all of global warming was a sham. I don’t know why anyone bought this story.
* High school science--eg 1st law of thermodynamics, ergo global warming is false. Someone who doesn’t actually understand thermodynamics somehow misconstrues its first law, something a high school chemistry student could see through.
Whoever made this is an idiot or a liar.
* Some kind of conspiracy--scientists are agreeing with the establishment for grant money. That’s not the way science works. No one gets money to prove what’s already been proved; scientists get funding if they can find new knowledge or overturn current theories.
* Winter is really cold this year--Spouted by people who don’t know basic arithmetic, and specifically that the average temperature increasing doesn’t mean every temperature on earth will be higher all the time.
* Legitimate sounding theories-- Every now and then you get someone who’ll invoke sunspots or some advanced physics that the audience just won’t understand. As it turns out, these theories generally just turn out to be straight false, but harder to spot. It’s pretty easy to make up fancy-sounding, plausible technobabble, so you essentially have to know the theories they're talking about, or look at the person spouting it and whether they’ve gotten their theories published--in a scientific journal, not in a magazine.
"Data" that says global warming is due to sunspots. Cute, but incorrect.
That’s all certainly tied to the fact that there’s little to no published evidence refuting anthropogenic global warming in a scientific journal. Much like reports on cold fusion, when someone presents a claim counter to the established scientific consensus, it’s presented to the public rather than to the scientific community. That's often why their evidence is simple--so their audience can understand it. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing.
Then we’ve got one loose end: What if those 97% are just wrong and it’s the fringe who are right? After all, scientists all used to agree light was just a wave and the earth was flat; just because an expert says something is true, that doesn't make it right. That's the Argument to Authority fallacy. And it’s asinine. It's not even a real argument. Saying 3% of experts agree with you is not evidence that you are correct. It's evidence you're wrong. The best you can get out of it is that there's maybe a 3% chance you're correct. And that is an argument against you.
When 97% of experts agree on a statement, that’s it, you don’t have to worry about that anymore. There’s no point in wasting your time debating it, because you are in no way qualified to. That’s for the other scientists competing for their grant money. Yeah, it sounds like a parent telling their kid "because I said so"; people don't like being told to stay ignorant. But I mean for this to be an argument for pragmatism rather than ignorance--"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing." That's all you're going to get in the time it takes you to research these topics: a little knowledge. What's considered a scientific fact may change with time, but it's not going to change because the public found some simple fatal flaw in the logic; it's going to change because the scientific community found some complicated fatal flaw in the logic. And really, if you’re not going to trust scientists with science, what’s the point of having scientists?
If you know me well enough to bother reading this blog, you probably already trust my scientific opinion enough to believe me when I say anthropogenic global warming is a real and serious threat. And vaccines don’t cause autism. And that neutrino probably didn't actually go faster than light. And if you don’t believe me, well, all the evidence in the world isn’t going to change your mind anyway.
I’d like to explain the reason people’s beliefs are contrary to scientists in these regards, but there’s not much to it. People are told what to believe, and they stick to it, no matter what facts are presented to the contrary. As a matter of fact, when counter facts are presented, people tend to solidify their stance, rather than change it. It is more important to win than to be correct. And that's politics.
*Pictures were taken from their respective data sources around the Internet. I do not own them or anything.
