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ChristianKl comments on Publication: the "anti-science" trope is culturally polarizing and makes people distrust scientists - Less Wrong
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Misunderstood your comment; my criticism didn't make sense with the correct interpretation. Sorry I didn't get to the post before you did.
Now that I've got it right, though, it seems to me that the behavior you're talking about might indeed be made sense of in terms of treating scientific integrity as a less sacred value than whatever you're trying to defend. "Screw inconclusive evidence; people are hurting" is exactly what I'd expect to see from an activist who'd absorbed a meme somewhere about the scientific process being just another frame for looking at the world, and that's unfortunately not an uncommon one in activist circles. I don't think there are all that many activists who would explicitly endorse this way of looking at the problem, but you don't need explicit endorsement to decide some scientific body is untrustworthy for ideological reasons.
More charitably, in the context of social science and medicine, there's quite a lot of stuff that's still under dispute or has only weak evidence pointing one way or another (including the linked post) and choosing to favor the interpretation you find more convenient for political reasons doesn't quite seem to qualify as lying. Particularly since everyone's got their halo effects coloring everything. JulianMorrison's comment is the first time I've ever seen someone coming out and saying it in public, though.
Not the optimal move, certainly, but I wouldn't call it extremely stupid.
Changing your frame of looking at the world is like changing clothing.
You don't go slopply dressed in an environment where everyone wears suits to convince them to follow your political ideology.
I don't follow hardcore feminism but if I would move in an environment where everyone operates from that frame I wouldn't wear the scientific method frame. I rather speak about how they are pretty judgemental about people who disagree with them and that there are better methods of dealing with people than being judgemental.
If you think that your scientific frame is the only one there is, then that means that no sign of stupidity when you try to convince hardcore feminists with evidence. For someone on the other hand who comes from a background where they should be aware that there are different frames of looking at the world it's sloppy.
The problem is that not all frames are created equal. Some are actually useful for discovering the truth and/or improving the world, others are mostly only useful for signalling.
If your goal is to improve the world and the people with whom you are talking are a bunch of feminists getting them on the issue of them judging people is more likely to reach them then getting them on the issue of them not being in line with scientific evidence.
Also if you really believe that the frame of science is more useful for either of those goals where are your numbers. Where are the people that you studied who hold that belief that are more effective at discovering the truth and/or improving the world?
If you don't have those numbers because nobody really cares about using the scientific method to validate that belief, you have to choices:
You can't really argue that science is the best frame for improving the world and than hold that belief based on nonscientific reasoning that's backed up by zero data.
It should be possible to find a metric for whether someone uses science as his primary frame and possible to find a way to measure whether an individual improves the world. At least if you do believe in the scientific project than it should be possible to measure such things. If you don't think they are measurable, there goes your scientific method for finding out the truth.
And some clothes are actually useful for keeping you warm and dry and comfortable while others are mostly only useful for signalling, so what's your point? ;-)
Some fashionable frames are the equivalent of tight-lacing and foot binding.
Signalling is useful.