How do you deal with anti-science?

Discussion in 'Free Thoughts' started by Jeeves, Jan 19, 2020.

  1. Jeeves Valued Senior Member

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    You know what I mean.
    Very predictably on every 'science' forum, we get posters on some kind of crusade against science.
    Their most popular targets are evolution and climate change, but almost anything, even elementary physics, may come under their blunderbuss.
    Do you ignore them?
    Try to educate them?
    Deride their crazy ideas?
     
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  3. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    Feeding weeds makes them grow.
     
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  5. parmalee peripatetic artisan Valued Senior Member

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    Funny. I was just about to post a remarkably similar query in another thread, though mine would have read thusly: How do you deal with irrational prejudice/hate speech? I think this -
    - is an appropriate response when dealing with garden variety trolling or relatively innocuous stupidity, but not so much when confronted with the kind of idiocy that can and does have very real world consequences.
     
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  7. C C Consular Corps - "the backbone of diplomacy" Valued Senior Member

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    There aren't real anti-science people in 'science' forums, anyway. Similar to Eric in the California Institution for Women or Erica in the California Institution for Men, but different context.

    [X] Do you ignore them?
    [_] Try to educate them?
    [_] Deride their crazy ideas?
     
  8. James R Just this guy, you know? Staff Member

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    I'd add that a lot of these people focus on personalities rather than the science, probably because (a) they typically lack the proficiency in the science to be able to defend their position with any competency and (b) they think, for some reason, that cutting other people down builds them up. Thus, the usual targets are the big ones. If it's evolution, then Darwin is the usual target; if it's physics, it's almost always Einstein; if it's climate change, then it's the IPCC.

    There's an interesting psychology of the anti-science crusader. Features can include (these are not necessarily mutually exclusive):
    • science envy: the crusader wishes he (it's usually a "he") had more education and was in a position to understand the science he is criticising, but instead of working towards understanding the science he is consumed by a kind of jealousy, which makes him angry.
    • conspiracist mindset: the crusader distrusts authorities of all types, with the possible exception of certain fringe voices or groups that he follows blindly. His assumption is therefore that most established science is a conspiracy made up of lies.
    • in-group identification: the crusader, with his limited grasp of the science, instead identifies strongly with an "alternative" culture, such as a "new-age" community, a religion or a fringe group (Truthers, UFO nuts, anti-vaxers, etc.) The crusader views his in-group's propaganda as unquestionable truth, and Science as an enemy of the group that must be fought.
    • vested interest: the crusader has a vested interest in promoting invalid science. For example, the crusader might hold shares in fossil fuel companies, whose ongoing profitability is threatened if climate change is real.
    • troll: the crusader is not really concerned with the truths of science at all. Instead, his goal is to anger people and to disrupt normal discussion by making himself and his concerns the focus of attention. For trolls, the science is often just an excuse. Very soon the discussion becomes personal, with the troll insulting other people who are in the discussion.
    • delusional and inflated self-image: the crusader vastly overestimates his own capacities and comes to believe that he has a revolutionary idea that will overturn accepted science. In such cases, it almost inevitably turns out that the crusader is practically clueless about the relevant science; he might not even have a grasp of the basics of the science he is claiming to revolutionise.
    • anti-social: the crusader finds it difficult to establish and maintain productive relationships with other people. The anti-science stance, combined with the anonymity of the internet gives the crusader an excuse (in his own eyes) for anti-social behaviour. Typically, this type of crusader posts angrily and bears a large chip on his shoulder. The target of his anger is often scientists as an establishment, but it can be narrower, concentrating on a particular scientist. In discussions, the target of the anger can turn towards the crusader's opponents in the debate he started.
    • delusional: the crusader has either a full-blown or mild mental illness, such that his perception of reality is skewed. Usually, this type of crusader posts erratically and nonsensically. His arguments do not connect to one another in a logical way. He constantly drifts off topic, or else he is so set in his ways that he simply ignores all correction and contradiction.
    My own approach is usually to give people the benefit of the doubt in the first instance. Some people are honest seekers after knowledge but they can have misconceptions. Sooner or later it becomes clear that we're dealing with a person who has one or more of the issues outlined above. At that point, I often post not in the hope that I will change the mind of the crusader, but rather with an understanding that other readers of the exchange might gain something from reviewing the interaction.

    There comes a point of diminishing returns when dealing with any crusader. Sometimes that can happen within a couple of posts of the crusader's first appearance. Sometimes it can take years. Once that point is reached, there's little point in engaging directly with the crusader. However, sometimes the crusader can still say something that can be used as a springboard to discuss something else that it interesting. The crusader himself becomes largely irrelevant.

    When crusaders turn into trolls, such that they start to disrupt all useful discussion, or when they require constant moderator attention, the only solution is to exclude them completely from the forum. Again, this can happen very early after the first appearance of a crusader, or it can happen years later.
     
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  9. Jeeves Valued Senior Member

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    Thank you, James R, that was very thorough.
    I have a similar - though not exactly identical - catalogue of anti-science posters.
    I don't always identify the types immediately.
    One type that's hard to spot and harder to deal with is the earnest truth-seeker who's got hold of one valid item in a huge accumulation of evidence (either in evolution or climate) and has become convinced that that the disproportionate importance of that one factor is being inadvertently or deliberately ignored/devalued by the discipline; that, if they realized the true significance of cloud-formation or whatever, they would revise the whole body of knowledge.
    Some are simply young and confused: they've been subjected a particular school of skepticism, or have trouble with a particular aspect of some issue. That type can sometimes be directed to accessible sources of sound information.
    Modern science can be daunting, intimidating - quite intelligent people can easily go astray in the labyrinth of material available on the internet. Some bad sources present a plausible front.
    And it's so difficult to admit how little we ourselves actually know -
    - quite impossible, apparently, to admit that as a species, we may never be able to know everything.
     
  10. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    And voting for them makes them grow even faster. There are a lot more people now who really believe that vaccines cause autism, that wind turbines cause cancer, and that climate change is all a Chinese plot. We're entering something of an American age of unreason, where believing something strongly enough - and surrounding oneself with media sources that echo those beliefs - makes it true to some people.
     
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  11. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    Good list. I would add one:

    The self-validator. There are people out there who honestly believe they are very intelligent, and that the lack of real-world evidence of said intelligence is caused by X. (People who aren't ready for their futuristic ideas, a conspiracy to quash their ideas etc.) Often these people are not even mentally ill; they simply construct a version of events where they are the brilliant hero in their own story, and everyone else who disagrees simply does not understand their brilliance. Such people are often drawn to forums, because even today you can find forums where someone will believe any sort of woo there is. Then they show up on a real science forum and they don't get the validation they have gotten elsewhere, which makes them angry and bitter. At that point they are unable to learn from their mistakes, since any alteration of their ideas is "admitting defeat" and removing the only validation they have of their intelligence.
     
  12. sideshowbob Sorry, wrong number. Valued Senior Member

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    Near where I live there's a storm drainage ditch. Some of the people with property abutting it mow the weeds right down to the water line; some don't. Where the weeds are mowed there's a nice, even carpet of dandelions; where they're not mowed, there's a few dandelions mixed in with a variety of other weeds.

    So... if you want just dandelions you can have just dandelions but if you don't want any weeds at all, you're out of luck, whether you feed them or not.
     
  13. paddoboy Valued Senior Member

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    I'll sum it up far more simply and adequately James....The anti science crusader will near always have an agenda...sometimes that agenda is hidden and closeted...mostly its religious or not being able to accept the fact that the universe as far as we are concerned doesn't give a fuck about us and simply exists.
    They cannot bare that lack of dependence and emotion by the universe and need to create a reason.
    That is often coupled of course with delusions of grandeur.
     
  14. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    Of course, there's always those who will deride, even when no anti-science claims have been made. They'll just spuriously lump someone in with any group that makes such claims. But that's how partisan hacks operate.
     
  15. James R Just this guy, you know? Staff Member

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    I'm so glad I have you to do the job better than I can.

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  16. paddoboy Valued Senior Member

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    No probs...I'm here to help when I can.
     
  17. paddoboy Valued Senior Member

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    You certainly don't ignore them as has happened here on many occasions...The monster and their delusions just grow bigger and more arrogant.
    As I have previously mentioned....
    Most do have an agenda, religious or ID most likely, and simply argue against those pillars of science you mentioned in the hope of finding a crack and so supposedly discredit science. Some are closeted and have fooled the moderators of this forum for quite a while now.
     
  18. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    Indeed there will be. There will be others who simply pretend those anti-science claims don't exist, lest they experience cognitive dissonance.
     
  19. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    Agreed. Of course, most PRO-science people who post have an agenda, too.
     
  20. Jeeves Valued Senior Member

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    So far as I've experienced, the attack on science, or some aspect of a branch of science, usually takes place in the opening post. The pro-science types then come to explain or set the OP straight.
    What ulterior purpose is served by defending science?
    Rarely have I seen provocative pro-science threads - only invitations, on the appropriately designated board, to discuss a particular proposition. The provocation comes, usually, from a crackpot pseudo-scientist with an ultra clever idea based somewhere north-west of physical reality.
    What agenda is served by correcting such an one?
     
  21. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    None. I don't think anyone mentioned "ulterior purposes."
    The science agenda - a desire to have people understand science.
     
  22. Jeeves Valued Senior Member

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    agenda: a list, plan, outline, or the like, of things to be done, matters to be acted or voted upon, etc.:
    I don't see how a desire for people to understand fits that definition.
    I do realize now, and admit, that my first negative reaction to the word was a reflex one: of late "agenda" has become, in the public consciousness, synonymous with political scheming.
     
  23. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    Agreed; that's an attempt to make it into a pejorative, which is important in today's attack-based news. But we all have agendas, good and bad.
     

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