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buybuydandavis comments on Publication: the "anti-science" trope is culturally polarizing and makes people distrust scientists - Less Wrong Discussion
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Comments (76)
And in this case, the layman is much closer to the truth. While the scientist in question likely isn't an idiot, he is basically a liar.
For the scenario indicated, “there’s no scientific evidence for X” - is almost always false. The "scientist" in question is arguing from authority with a lie. He doesn't have fantastical standards for evidence, he just pretends to himself that such standards are appropriate for things he disagrees with.
If the scientist actually says
possibly starting with "Maybe, but I have heard too many enthusiastic claims that failed later so I'm skeptical.", then it is no lie and both don't need to depart angrily.
But a condescending "science says no" surely sounds like ivory tower arrogance.
If you're actually pushing rationality in general rather than scientific results in particular, you could talk with the person about doing experiments.
Yes, whenever you hear “there’s no scientific evidence for X” you should keep in mind that there are published meta-reviews in support of homeopathy and telepathy.
Yes, there might be good reasons to assume that a lot of the studies that find that homeopathy and telepathy works are flawed but saying there no evidence often just ignores the research.
If there really no evidence in favor it usually just means that nobody studied the question at all. In that case if I hear from someone who lost weight with method X and nobody did run a study on it, there's nothing wrong with trying method X yourself provided the method doesn't seem dangerous.