On certain issues – not all, but some – the science is clear: evolution gave rise to the diversity of life on Earth; climate change is happening, and humans are largely responsible; and vaccines do not cause autism. And yet, significant portions of the American public reject these scientific realities.
“No one looks at scientific findings, scientific results from a completely objective point of view,” said Kenneth Miller, professor of biology at Brown University and author of Finding Darwin’s God, and Only a Theory – Evolution and the Battle for America’s Soul.
Psychological research in recent years has shown that our religious, moral, political, and economic views affect how we process factual information. And when the findings of science come into conflict with deeply held beliefs, it’s the beliefs that tend to win.
“The fact of the matter is that the modern scientific and technological culture in which we live is testament, basically, to the triumph of the scientific method and the scientific enterprise,” argues Miller. “We do that sort of rejection – even though it’s understandable, psychologically – we do it at peril to ourselves, to our society, and certainly, to our economy.”
For example, denying the scientific consensus on the link between smoking tobacco and risk of lung cancer puts lives at risk, as does rejecting childhood vaccines on the fraudulent and thoroughly debunked notion that such vaccinations cause autism.
“People who take that choice have been lulled into a security by the fact that diseases that were actually pretty scary many decades ago, like whooping cough, measles, polio, are pretty much rare today because of vaccination,” said Miller.
Rejecting the nearly unanimous scientific consensus regarding human-caused climate change has long-term, global ramifications.
And climate skepticism? In many cases, that’s a misnomer.
“Skepticism is an important part of the scientific process, itself,” said Miller, who vehemently rejects the idea that there is pressure – let alone a conspiracy – to suppress dissenting views within the scientific community. “Science is the most contentious activity imaginable, and the notion that it’s a closed club where nobody dares rock the boat is completely at variance with how science really works.”
But Miller draws a line – and not a particularly fine one - between healthy skepticism and potentially dangerous science denial.
“Science denial is not so much being skeptical or inquisitive of a particular scientific conclusion or finding or piece of data,” Miller said, “but rather, rejecting wholesale the methods of science, the scientific enterprise, itself, and the consensus views of the scientific community.”
Miller says that combatting science denial is a matter of social change and education, not just about scientific facts, but about the process of science and the people who make it their life’s work.
“All scientists that I know share two things,” said Miller. “One is that there is an objective, knowable reality that we can inquire and learn about, and number two, that knowing that reality, the truth, is better than ignorance.”