zlacker

“Science” is just the process of continuously evaluating and re-evaluating what you know using data and experiments, and changing what you “know” (or your mental model) to align with the new data.

What people deify is certain conclusions, for myriad reasons.

>>lotsof+(OP)
Enough of this no true scottsmanship.

"Scientific consensus" is taken as gospel by many people. Most on this very board. They don't care to learn how the consensus was reached (usually happens by just ignoring detractors). They just care to feel superior to people outside the consensus because "duh, science".

>>guraf+S9
Under the assumption that no one has the capacity to perform all the science experiments and analyze all the data themselves to model the world, individuals would have to rely on a proxy such as other people telling them the results of science experiments.

Given how complicated nature or whatever around and within us is, there will be many shades of gray. What is looked down upon is (usually) conclusions reached from methods outside of the scientific method, such as predictions of one’s personal life based on a deck of cards or medical interventions with no explanation of cause of action or experimental numbers to rule out random-ness.

>>guraf+S9
You want to think it's "taken as gospel", maybe because you have an ax to grind, but the reality is the scientific consensus on most topics is taken as "better than anything else I have access to, or any bullshit I'll make up in my own head". And when it comes time to make a personal decision - do I take the pill or not take the pill - we all have to use the best information we have, which almost all of the time will be the scientific consensus.

Though I'll agree there is a phenomenon that occurs when a vocal group starts criticizing a scientific consensus, usually for obvious political reasons, that causes many people to double-down and express too much rigid faith in that consensus. I don't like that either.

>>guraf+S9
The scientific method is limited by the historical method, unless you perform the experiment yourself.

Determining the correctness of somebody’s experiment is pointless if the underlying observations are intentionally incorrect.

Just as you should be cautious trusting Josephus to be critical of the Romans, you should be cautious trusting a researcher report observations contrary to the interests of their social institutions.