Thursday The Fragile Credibility of Science Open Thread

You May Not Be Interested in Scientism, but believe me, Scientism is very interested in you.

“Scientism is an over reliance on or overconfidence in the sciences as the only route to reliable knowledge. It is motivated by successful and effective technological outcomes that suggest scientific methods are a great, if not the best, source of knowledge for addressing any and all problems … This eclectic volume, which varies widely in style and scope, includes historical perspectives on scientism, religion, culture, and the humanities; critical assessments of cognitive neuroscience and neuroethics; and reflections on naturalism in epistemology. Two messages emerge from the variety: scientism must be distinguished from the sciences, and the practices and results of the sciences require explicit interpretation … Summing Up: Recommended. Graduate students and faculty.” –A. C. Love, University of Minnesota

and this from Dr. Shane Fudge,

A world under the spell of pseudo science

In relation to this perspective, a huge concern for writers such as Richard Williams (2014) has been the ‘over-reliance on and overconfidence in science as a source of knowledge regarding all aspects of human life and, ultimately, all human problems’. In this way, ‘scientism’ is argued by Hacker (2014) to be ‘the attempt to extend the natural sciences beyond their proper sphere of explanatory competence, and the use of the methods of the natural sciences to explain phenomena that require other forms of explanation’.

Particularly from the turn of the decade, scientific credibility, and its continued authoritative cachet, has been used both to justify and mobilise huge changes in our society. For those with their eyes open, the pandemic was orchestrated by a clear alliance between governments, billionaire technocrats and mainstream science.

RTWDT.

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