Science is a process and Bias is unavoidable

Mac Coon (and I agree)

"I certainly am not anti-science by any stretch, but i definitely do not worship at the 'shrine of holy science' (or any other shrine) either. there are often (understatement) times when science overreaches the limits of the scientific method and substitutes purely emotional conjecture for hypothesis then assumes a theory has been constructed out of re-defined variables which were so altered to fit the conclusion."

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And to point out what might not be obvious to folks: Science is performed by scientists who are themselves raised in a culture  with its values, its limitations, its ignorance, its social pressures, and so on.

Objectivity is a kind of useful goal that is not possible in reality - one cannot step outside of this universe in order to study it - all attempts to understand invariably alter in myriad ways the thing you're studying.  The questions you pose reflect your ignorance, your biases, your cultural and/or religious indoctrination, your Human limitations and myopia, and so on.  This is inescapable - yet it is laudable - and required for Science to be Science - to make every possible attempt to know your own biases and remove them from your experiments as much as possible.

That said, Objectivity can be a sort of trap as well, with tons of wankers believing that they're truly objective and everyone else is fools.  That's just more bias (and a particularly male and juvenile one at that).

Science is an attempt to see what is true, record what is true, pass on what is true and go beyond our biases towards facts as much as Humanly possible.

...it just turns out that Humanly possibly isn't all that, and must be constantly reexamined and broadened and deepened.

I'm a firm believer in seeking truth, facts, reality.  Science is our formalized attempt to learn from our mistakes and build on each successive generations attempts to do just that.

But fools and politicians (wait, redundant?) will try to manipulate the public through claiming authority everywhere that they can - including co opting "Science" as if it were a religion or a cloak of authority and then making absurd and false claims that appeal to people's ignorance and emotional biases.

That doesn't mean Science itself is wrong - or that all Science cannot be trusted.

But like *EVERYTHING* in life - you - yes YOU - actually have to have a brain, study, learn, learn to think, and think about what folks are saying to understand what is likely to be true, and likely to be false.

Putting your "faith" in anything - Science or your pastor or your politicians - is a step away from thinking, knowing, understanding - and step towards being a fool.

Do not be a fool.  Think.  Learn.  Strive for understanding of what is really, actually, factually true.  And help everyone else figure this all out along with you.

Only through being smart are we able to avoid the traps laid out for us by those who wish to dominate and exploit us.

In Love and Reason,

Steve Wolf
2018-08-16