“Science never solves the problem” has become the go-to slogan for populists seeking to legitimize politically expedient but marginal scientific positions. In 2020, MAGA Republican Rep. Nancy Mace was asked whether she agreed that climate change is the result of human-made greenhouse gas emissions. She replied: “My opponents say this issue is scientifically settled. Well, science is never settled. Scientists will tell you that.”
“I’m a doctor. Science never solves things. That’s what makes us scientists,” Sen. Roger Marshall said in February, calling for more funding to investigate the widely debunked link between autism and vaccines.
The phrase also crossed the Atlantic. “I don’t know,” British Reform Party leader Nigel Farage said when asked if President Donald Trump was right to share widely debunked claims about a link between Tylenol use during pregnancy and autism. When asked if he “supports medical experts who say this is dangerous nonsense,” he said: “When it comes to science, I don’t take anyone’s side…because science is never settled.”
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Kit Yates is Professor of Mathematical Biology and Public Engagement at the University of Bath, UK.
The myth of consensus debunked
A favorite metaphor used by climate deniers is that scientists in the 1970s predicted that “global cooling,” or an ice age, was imminent. This is a sensible argument. Because if we could suggest that the opposite of global warming was once the dominant idea, wouldn’t it call into question the current consensus on climate science?
Despite media attention and much debate about the idea, global cooling has not been a scientific consensus. A review of contemporary literature shows that even 50 years ago, global warming dominated scientific thinking about the Earth’s short-term climate future. There is now near scientific consensus that climate change is the result of greenhouse gas emissions.
However, there are examples in science where the consensus view has been changed or updated. Gravity is a classic case. Galileo established that the acceleration due to gravity is the same for all objects near the Earth’s surface. However, it wasn’t until Newton established his theory of universal gravitation.
Newton’s theory integrated the behavior of objects falling to Earth with the motion of planets. For years, every measurement seemed to confirm it, and the theory became known as the “law” that nature is thought to follow without exception.
But as experiments expanded and equipment improved, the edges of Newton’s “laws” began to fray. Newton’s laws were not sufficient when dealing with strong gravitational fields, such as near black holes, or when calculating with high precision, or when calculating short astronomical distances. In the 20th century, Einstein’s theory of general relativity filled in many gaps, solving a series of astronomical anomalies and explaining how light bends near black holes.
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But even the relativistic interpretation of gravity is not perfect. For example, we know that it has to disintegrate inside a black hole.
First Galileo’s theory and then Newton’s theory replaced it, but we know that Einstein’s theory is not correct in all situations. Does that mean these early theories are useless and not examples of established science? Absolutely not.
In situations where these theories have been rigorously tested and proven (with some degree of accuracy) to give the correct answer, the theories remain valid. They are not wrong. They are only special cases of more general theories, valid within the particular domain of validity in which they were originally postulated and tested.
Similarly, any alternative to Einstein’s theory must be included as a special case. The example of gravity shows how scientific knowledge can evolve and yet still be considered entrenched within its bounds of validity. You can also point to other consensuses as established sciences that have expanded and generalized over time, such as the theory of evolution or germ theory.
scientific “facts”
There are also questions that most people would call finally resolved. Perhaps the most obvious fact is that the Earth is not flat, but round. However, whether we call this a “fact” or not depends on how you define the word. Science cannot provide 100% certainty. If you want certainty, you need to look to mathematics, where knowledge is constructed through deduction from axioms (a set of fundamental premises), independent of the world.
In contrast, science is built on evidence and induction, and is only ever more reliable. A key premise of the scientific method is openness to new evidence. If you think you are 100% sure, no amount of convincing new evidence will change your mind. It’s not good science.
But if we accept that science provides evidence for a hypothesis, it can provide what we might call incontrovertible evidence – so strong that challenging it is not a tenable position. Overturning a non-flat worldview requires a major rethinking of what we understand about reality, making it virtually impossible.
Therefore, “scientifically established” does not mean that we know something with absolute certainty, but rather that the weight of evidence strongly supports this interpretation. Perhaps more importantly, if someone wants to change their current beliefs, the burden of proof is on them.
All scientific knowledge involves uncertainty. That is the hallmark of good science. But uncertainty does not mean that we cannot confidently assert that entropy always increases (the second law of thermodynamics) or that the Earth orbits the sun.
Science embraces uncertainty and is open to revisions as new information emerges, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t take a position when the evidence stacks up on one side. Issues that have been rigorously tested may still be considered resolved.
Not being 100% sure is not the same as being 50/50. Admitting doubt is not the same as taking sides on a unilateral issue. The fact that scientists acknowledge uncertainty is no reason to support a false balance. But these are the false positions populists take when they say “I don’t know” or “I don’t take anyone’s side” on scientific issues.
So when you hear politicians deny scientific consensus with phrases like “science never settles,” don’t confuse what they’re saying with an argument about intellectual humility. They are blatantly trying to overturn inconvenient truths. True, truth may evolve and become more nuanced over time, but its foundations are strong enough to remain robust in the realm of legitimacy even as the structures around it grow.
Opinion on Live Science provides insight into the most important issues in science that affect you and the world around you today, written by experts in the field and leading scientists.
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