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| center for truth in science: How to Talk to a Science Denier Lee McIntyre, 2021-08-17 Can we change the minds of science deniers? Encounters with flat earthers, anti-vaxxers, coronavirus truthers, and others. Climate change is a hoax--and so is coronavirus. Vaccines are bad for you. These days, many of our fellow citizens reject scientific expertise and prefer ideology to facts. They are not merely uninformed--they are misinformed. They cite cherry-picked evidence, rely on fake experts, and believe conspiracy theories. How can we convince such people otherwise? How can we get them to change their minds and accept the facts when they don't believe in facts? In this book, Lee McIntyre shows that anyone can fight back against science deniers, and argues that it's important to do so. Science denial can kill. Drawing on his own experience--including a visit to a Flat Earth convention--as well as academic research, McIntyre outlines the common themes of science denialism, present in misinformation campaigns ranging from tobacco companies' denial in the 1950s that smoking causes lung cancer to today's anti-vaxxers. He describes attempts to use his persuasive powers as a philosopher to convert Flat Earthers; surprising discussions with coal miners; and conversations with a scientist friend about genetically modified organisms in food. McIntyre offers tools and techniques for communicating the truth and values of science, emphasizing that the most important way to reach science deniers is to talk to them calmly and respectfully--to put ourselves out there, and meet them face to face. |
| center for truth in science: The Way of Science Dennis R. Trumble, 2013-07-16 How science can convey a profound sense of wonder, connectedness, and optimism about the human condition. This book makes a compelling case that now more than ever the public at large needs to appreciate the critical-thinking tools that science has to offer and be educated in basic science literacy. The author emphasizes that the methods and facts of science are accessible to everyone, and that, contrary to popular belief, understanding science does not require extraordinary intelligence. He also notes that scientific rationality and critical thinking are not only good for our physical well-being but also are fully in sync with our highest moral codes. He illustrates the many ways in which the scientific worldview offers a profound sense of wonder, connectedness, and optimism about the human condition, an inspiring perspective that satisfies age-old spiritual aspirations. At a time of daunting environmental challenges and rampant misinformation, this book provides a welcome corrective and reason to hope for the future. |
| center for truth in science: A Social History of Truth Steven Shapin, 2011-11-18 How do we come to trust our knowledge of the world? What are the means by which we distinguish true from false accounts? Why do we credit one observational statement over another? In A Social History of Truth, Shapin engages these universal questions through an elegant recreation of a crucial period in the history of early modern science: the social world of gentlemen-philosophers in seventeenth-century England. Steven Shapin paints a vivid picture of the relations between gentlemanly culture and scientific practice. He argues that problems of credibility in science were practically solved through the codes and conventions of genteel conduct: trust, civility, honor, and integrity. These codes formed, and arguably still form, an important basis for securing reliable knowledge about the natural world. Shapin uses detailed historical narrative to argue about the establishment of factual knowledge both in science and in everyday practice. Accounts of the mores and manners of gentlemen-philosophers are used to illustrate Shapin's broad claim that trust is imperative for constituting every kind of knowledge. Knowledge-making is always a collective enterprise: people have to know whom to trust in order to know something about the natural world. |
| center for truth in science: The Scientific Attitude Lee McIntyre, 2019-05-07 An argument that what makes science distinctive is its emphasis on evidence and scientists' willingness to change theories on the basis of new evidence. Attacks on science have become commonplace. Claims that climate change isn't settled science, that evolution is “only a theory,” and that scientists are conspiring to keep the truth about vaccines from the public are staples of some politicians' rhetorical repertoire. Defenders of science often point to its discoveries (penicillin! relativity!) without explaining exactly why scientific claims are superior. In this book, Lee McIntyre argues that what distinguishes science from its rivals is what he calls “the scientific attitude”—caring about evidence and being willing to change theories on the basis of new evidence. The history of science is littered with theories that were scientific but turned out to be wrong; the scientific attitude reveals why even a failed theory can help us to understand what is special about science. McIntyre offers examples that illustrate both scientific success (a reduction in childbed fever in the nineteenth century) and failure (the flawed “discovery” of cold fusion in the twentieth century). He describes the transformation of medicine from a practice based largely on hunches into a science based on evidence; considers scientific fraud; examines the positions of ideology-driven denialists, pseudoscientists, and “skeptics” who reject scientific findings; and argues that social science, no less than natural science, should embrace the scientific attitude. McIntyre argues that the scientific attitude—the grounding of science in evidence—offers a uniquely powerful tool in the defense of science. |
| center for truth in science: Tower of Babel Robert T. Pennock, 2000-02-28 Creationists have acquired a more sophisticated intellectual arsenal. This book reveals the insubstantiality of their arguments. Creationism is no longer the simple notion it once was taken to be. Its new advocates have become more sophisticated in how they present their views, speaking of intelligent design rather than creation science and aiming their arguments against the naturalistic philosophical method that underlies science, proposing to replace it with a theistic science. The creationism controversy is not just about the status of Darwinian evolution—it is a clash of religious and philosophical worldviews, for a common underlying fear among Creationists is that evolution undermines both the basis of morality as they understand it and the possibility of purpose in life. In Tower of Babel, philosopher Robert T. Pennock compares the views of the new creationists with those of the old and reveals the insubstantiality of their arguments. One of Pennock's major innovations is to turn from biological evolution to the less charged subject of linguistic evolution, which has strong theoretical parallels with biological evolution, both in content and in the sort of evidence scientists use to draw conclusions about origins. Of course, an evolutionary view of language does conflict with the Bible, which says that God created the variety of languages at one time as punishment for the Tower of Babel. Several chapters deal with the work of Phillip Johnson, a highly influential leader of the new Creationists. Against his and other views, Pennock explains how science uses naturalism and discusses the relationship between factual and moral issues in the creationism-evolution controversy. The book also includes a discussion of Darwin's own shift from creationist to evolutionist and an extended argument for keeping private religious beliefs separate from public scientific knowledge. |
| center for truth in science: Why Trust Science? Naomi Oreskes, 2021-04-06 Why the social character of scientific knowledge makes it trustworthy Are doctors right when they tell us vaccines are safe? Should we take climate experts at their word when they warn us about the perils of global warming? Why should we trust science when so many of our political leaders don't? Naomi Oreskes offers a bold and compelling defense of science, revealing why the social character of scientific knowledge is its greatest strength—and the greatest reason we can trust it. Tracing the history and philosophy of science from the late nineteenth century to today, this timely and provocative book features a new preface by Oreskes and critical responses by climate experts Ottmar Edenhofer and Martin Kowarsch, political scientist Jon Krosnick, philosopher of science Marc Lange, and science historian Susan Lindee, as well as a foreword by political theorist Stephen Macedo. |
| center for truth in science: An Instinct for Truth Robert T. Pennock, 2019-08-13 An exploration of the scientific mindset—such character virtues as curiosity, veracity, attentiveness, and humility to evidence—and its importance for science, democracy, and human flourishing. Exemplary scientists have a characteristic way of viewing the world and their work: their mindset and methods all aim at discovering truths about nature. In An Instinct for Truth, Robert Pennock explores this scientific mindset and argues that what Charles Darwin called “an instinct for truth, knowledge, and discovery” has a tacit moral structure—that it is important not only for scientific excellence and integrity but also for democracy and human flourishing. In an era of “post-truth,” the scientific drive to discover empirical truths has a special value. Taking a virtue-theoretic perspective, Pennock explores curiosity, veracity, skepticism, humility to evidence, and other scientific virtues and vices. He explains that curiosity is the most distinctive element of the scientific character, by which other norms are shaped; discusses the passionate nature of scientific attentiveness; and calls for science education not only to teach scientific findings and methods but also to nurture the scientific mindset and its core values. Drawing on historical sources as well as a sociological study of more than a thousand scientists, Pennock's philosophical account is grounded in values that scientists themselves recognize they should aspire to. Pennock argues that epistemic and ethical values are normatively interconnected, and that for science and society to flourish, we need not just a philosophy of science, but a philosophy of the scientist. |
| center for truth in science: The Language of God Francis Collins, 2008-09-04 Dr Francis S. Collins, head of the Human Genome Project, is one of the world's leading scientists, working at the cutting edge of the study of DNA, the code of life. Yet he is also a man of unshakable faith in God. How does he reconcile the seemingly unreconcilable? In THE LANGUAGE OF GOD he explains his own journey from atheism to faith, and then takes the reader on a stunning tour of modern science to show that physics, chemistry and biology -- indeed, reason itself -- are not incompatible with belief. His book is essential reading for anyone who wonders about the deepest questions of all: why are we here? How did we get here? And what does life mean? |
| center for truth in science: Post-Truth Lee McIntyre, 2018-02-16 How we arrived in a post-truth era, when “alternative facts” replace actual facts, and feelings have more weight than evidence. Are we living in a post-truth world, where “alternative facts” replace actual facts and feelings have more weight than evidence? How did we get here? In this volume in the MIT Press Essential Knowledge series, Lee McIntyre traces the development of the post-truth phenomenon from science denial through the rise of “fake news,” from our psychological blind spots to the public's retreat into “information silos.” What, exactly, is post-truth? Is it wishful thinking, political spin, mass delusion, bold-faced lying? McIntyre analyzes recent examples—claims about inauguration crowd size, crime statistics, and the popular vote—and finds that post-truth is an assertion of ideological supremacy by which its practitioners try to compel someone to believe something regardless of the evidence. Yet post-truth didn't begin with the 2016 election; the denial of scientific facts about smoking, evolution, vaccines, and climate change offers a road map for more widespread fact denial. Add to this the wired-in cognitive biases that make us feel that our conclusions are based on good reasoning even when they are not, the decline of traditional media and the rise of social media, and the emergence of fake news as a political tool, and we have the ideal conditions for post-truth. McIntyre also argues provocatively that the right wing borrowed from postmodernism—specifically, the idea that there is no such thing as objective truth—in its attacks on science and facts. McIntyre argues that we can fight post-truth, and that the first step in fighting post-truth is to understand it. |
| center for truth in science: Science and Partial Truth Newton C. A. da Costa, Steven French, 2003 Explores the consequences of adopting a 'pragmatic' notion of truth in the philosophy of science. This framework describes issues to do with belief, theory acceptance, and the realism-antirealism debate, as well as the nature of scientific models and their heuristic development. |
| center for truth in science: Society's Choices Institute of Medicine, Committee on the Social and Ethical Impacts of Developments in Biomedicine, 1995-03-27 Breakthroughs in biomedicine often lead to new life-giving treatments but may also raise troubling, even life-and-death, quandaries. Society's Choices discusses ways for people to handle today's bioethics issues in the context of America's unique history and cultureâ€and from the perspectives of various interest groups. The book explores how Americans have grappled with specific aspects of bioethics through commission deliberations, programs by organizations, and other mechanisms and identifies criteria for evaluating the outcomes of these efforts. The committee offers recommendations on the role of government and professional societies, the function of commissions and institutional review boards, and bioethics in health professional education and research. The volume includes a series of 12 superb background papers on public moral discourse, mechanisms for handling social and ethical dilemmas, and other specific areas of controversy by well-known experts Ronald Bayer, Martin Benjamin, Dan W. Brock, Baruch A. Brody, H. Alta Charo, Lawrence Gostin, Bradford H. Gray, Kathi E. Hanna, Elizabeth Heitman, Thomas Nagel, Steven Shapin, and Charles M. Swezey. |
| center for truth in science: Truth Or Beauty David Orrell, 2012-11-27 Questions the promises and pitfalls of associating beauty with truth, showing how ideas of mathematical elegance have inspired, and have sometimes misled, scientists attempting to understand nature. The author also shows how the ancient Greeks constructed a concept of the world based on musical harmony. |
| center for truth in science: Science in Democracy Mark B. Brown, 2009 An argument that draws on canonical and contemporary thinkers in political theory and science studies--from Machiavelli to Latour--for insights on bringing scientific expertise into representative democracy. |
| center for truth in science: Quest for Truth Mano Singham, 2000 |
| center for truth in science: Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Brigham Young The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, The prophet Brigham Young taught the restored gospel of Jesus Christ in a basic, practical way that gave inspiration and hope to the Saints struggling to build a home in the wilderness. Though more than a century has now passed, his words are still fresh and appropriate for us today as we continue the work of building the kingdom of God. President Young declared that as members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints we possess the “doctrine of life and salvation for all the honest-in-heart” (DBY, 7). He promised that those who receive the gospel in their hearts will have awakened “within them a desire to know and understand the things of God more than they ever did before in their lives” and will begin to “inquire, read and search and when they go to their Father in the name of Jesus he will not leave them without a witness” (DBY, 450). This book reflects the desire of the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles to deepen the doctrinal understanding of Church members and to awaken within them a greater desire to know the things of God. It will inspire and motivate individuals, priesthood quorums, and Relief Society classes to inquire, read, search, and then go to their Father in Heaven for a witness of the truth of these teachings. Each chapter contains two sections—“Teachings of Brigham Young” and “Suggestions for Study.” The first section consists of extracts from Brigham Young’s sermons to the early Saints. Each statement has been referenced, and the original spelling and punctuation have been preserved; however, the sources cited will not be readily available to most members. These original sources are not necessary to have in order to effectively study or teach from this book. Members need not purchase additional references and commentaries to study or teach these chapters. The text provided in this book, accompanied by the scriptures, is sufficient for instruction. Members should prayerfully read and study President Young’s teachings in order to gain new insights into gospel principles and discover how those principles apply to their everyday lives. By faithfully and prayerfully studying these selections, Latter-day Saints will have a greater understanding of gospel principles and will more fully appreciate the profound and inspired teachings of this great prophet. The second section of each chapter offers a series of questions that will encourage thoughtful contemplation, personal application, and discussion of President Young’s teachings. Members should refer to and carefully reread his words on the principle being discussed. Deep and prayerful study of these teachings will inspire members to greater personal commitment and will help them resolve to follow the teachings of the Savior, Jesus Christ. If individuals and families prayerfully follow the principles in this book, they will be blessed and inspired to greater dedication and spirituality, as were the early Saints who heard these words directly from the lips of the “Lion of the Lord” (HC, 7:434)—the prophet, seer, and revelator, President Brigham Young. |
| center for truth in science: Merchants of Doubt Naomi Oreskes, Erik M. Conway, 2011-10-03 The U.S. scientific community has long led the world in research on such areas as public health, environmental science, and issues affecting quality of life. These scientists have produced landmark studies on the dangers of DDT, tobacco smoke, acid rain, and global warming. But at the same time, a small yet potent subset of this community leads the world in vehement denial of these dangers. Merchants of Doubt tells the story of how a loose-knit group of high-level scientists and scientific advisers, with deep connections in politics and industry, ran effective campaigns to mislead the public and deny well-established scientific knowledge over four decades. Remarkably, the same individuals surface repeatedly-some of the same figures who have claimed that the science of global warming is not settled denied the truth of studies linking smoking to lung cancer, coal smoke to acid rain, and CFCs to the ozone hole. Doubt is our product, wrote one tobacco executive. These experts supplied it. Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway, historians of science, roll back the rug on this dark corner of the American scientific community, showing how ideology and corporate interests, aided by a too-compliant media, have skewed public understanding of some of the most pressing issues of our era. |
| center for truth in science: Science Fictions Stuart Ritchie, 2021-09-16 |
| center for truth in science: Scandalous Knowledge Barbara Herrnstein Smith, 2006 Throughout the recent culture and science wars, the radically new conceptions of knowledge and science emerging from such fields as the history and sociology of science have been denounced by various journalists, scientists, and academics as irresponsible attacks on science, absurd denials of objective reality, or a cynical abandonment of truth itself. In Scandalous Knowledge, Barbara Herrnstein Smith explores and illuminates the intellectual contexts of these crude denunciations. A preeminent scholar, theorist, and analyst of intellectual history, Smith begins by looking closely at the epistemological developments at issue. She presents a clear, historically informed, and philosophically sophisticated overview of important twentieth-century critiques of traditional--rationalist, realist, positivist--accounts of human knowledge and scientific truth, and discusses in detail the alternative accounts produced by Ludwik Fleck, Thomas Kuhn, Michel Foucault, Bruno Latour, and others. With keen wit, Smith demonstrates that the familiar charges involved in these scandals--including the recurrent invocation of postmodern relativism--protect intellectual orthodoxy by falsely associating important intellectual developments with logically absurd and morally or politically disabling positions. She goes on to offer bold, original, and insightful perspectives on the currently strained relations between the natural sciences and the humanities; on the grandiose but dubious claims of evolutionary psychology to explain human behavior, cognition, and culture; and on contemporary controversies over the psychology, biology, and ethics of animal-human relations. Scandalous Knowledge is a provocative and compelling intervention into controversies that continue to roil through journalism, pulpits, laboratories, and classrooms throughout the United States and Europe. |
| center for truth in science: Genesis and Development of a Scientific Fact Ludwik Fleck, Thaddeus J. Trenn, 2012-09-05 Originally published in German in 1935, this monograph anticipated solutions to problems of scientific progress, the truth of scientific fact and the role of error in science now associated with the work of Thomas Kuhn and others. Arguing that every scientific concept and theory—including his own—is culturally conditioned, Fleck was appreciably ahead of his time. And as Kuhn observes in his foreword, Though much has occurred since its publication, it remains a brilliant and largely unexploited resource. To many scientists just as to many historians and philosophers of science facts are things that simply are the case: they are discovered through properly passive observation of natural reality. To such views Fleck replies that facts are invented, not discovered. Moreover, the appearance of scientific facts as discovered things is itself a social construction, a made thing. A work of transparent brilliance, one of the most significant contributions toward a thoroughly sociological account of scientific knowledge.—Steven Shapin, Science |
| center for truth in science: Truth Decay Kavanagh, Michael D. Rich, 2018-01-16 Political and civil discourse in the United States is characterized by “Truth Decay,” defined as increasing disagreement about facts, a blurring of the line between opinion and fact, an increase in the relative volume of opinion compared with fact, and lowered trust in formerly respected sources of factual information. This report explores the causes and wide-ranging consequences of Truth Decay and proposes strategies for further action. |
| center for truth in science: The Physiology of Truth Jean-Pierre Changeux, 2009-06-30 In this wide-ranging book, one of the boldest thinkers in modern neuroscience confronts an ancient philosophical problem: can we know the world as it really is? Drawing on provocative new findings about the psychophysiology of perception and judgment in both human and nonhuman primates, and also on the cultural history of science, Jean-Pierre Changeux makes a powerful case for the reality of scientific progress and argues that it forms the basis for a coherent and universal theory of human rights. On this view, belief in objective knowledge is not a mere ideological slogan or a naive confusion; it is a characteristic feature of human cognition throughout evolution, and the scientific method its most sophisticated embodiment. Seeking to reconcile science and humanism, Changeux holds that the capacity to recognize truths that are independent of subjective personal experience constitutes the foundation of a human civil society. |
| center for truth in science: Idealization and the Aims of Science Angela Potochnik, 2020-09-23 Science is the study of our world, as it is in its messy reality. Nonetheless, science requires idealization to function—if we are to attempt to understand the world, we have to find ways to reduce its complexity. Idealization and the Aims of Science shows just how crucial idealization is to science and why it matters. Beginning with the acknowledgment of our status as limited human agents trying to make sense of an exceedingly complex world, Angela Potochnik moves on to explain how science aims to depict and make use of causal patterns—a project that makes essential use of idealization. She offers case studies from a number of branches of science to demonstrate the ubiquity of idealization, shows how causal patterns are used to develop scientific explanations, and describes how the necessarily imperfect connection between science and truth leads to researchers’ values influencing their findings. The resulting book is a tour de force, a synthesis of the study of idealization that also offers countless new insights and avenues for future exploration. |
| center for truth in science: The Half-Life of Facts Samuel Arbesman, 2013-08-27 New insights from the science of science Facts change all the time. Smoking has gone from doctor recommended to deadly. We used to think the Earth was the center of the universe and that the brontosaurus was a real dinosaur. In short, what we know about the world is constantly changing. Samuel Arbesman shows us how knowledge in most fields evolves systematically and predictably, and how this evolution unfolds in a fascinating way that can have a powerful impact on our lives. He takes us through a wide variety of fields, including those that change quickly, over the course of a few years, or over the span of centuries. |
| center for truth in science: Reproducibility and Replicability in Science National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, Policy and Global Affairs, Committee on Science, Engineering, Medicine, and Public Policy, Board on Research Data and Information, Division on Engineering and Physical Sciences, Committee on Applied and Theoretical Statistics, Board on Mathematical Sciences and Analytics, Division on Earth and Life Studies, Nuclear and Radiation Studies Board, Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education, Committee on National Statistics, Board on Behavioral, Cognitive, and Sensory Sciences, Committee on Reproducibility and Replicability in Science, 2019-10-20 One of the pathways by which the scientific community confirms the validity of a new scientific discovery is by repeating the research that produced it. When a scientific effort fails to independently confirm the computations or results of a previous study, some fear that it may be a symptom of a lack of rigor in science, while others argue that such an observed inconsistency can be an important precursor to new discovery. Concerns about reproducibility and replicability have been expressed in both scientific and popular media. As these concerns came to light, Congress requested that the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine conduct a study to assess the extent of issues related to reproducibility and replicability and to offer recommendations for improving rigor and transparency in scientific research. Reproducibility and Replicability in Science defines reproducibility and replicability and examines the factors that may lead to non-reproducibility and non-replicability in research. Unlike the typical expectation of reproducibility between two computations, expectations about replicability are more nuanced, and in some cases a lack of replicability can aid the process of scientific discovery. This report provides recommendations to researchers, academic institutions, journals, and funders on steps they can take to improve reproducibility and replicability in science. |
| center for truth in science: Tracking Truth Sherrilyn Roush, 2005-11-10 Tracking Truth presents a unified treatment of knowledge, evidence, and epistemological realism and anti-realism about scientific theories. A wide range of knowledge-related phenomena, especially but not only in science, strongly favour the idea of tracking as the key to what makes something knowledge. A subject who tracks the truth - an idea first formulated by Robert Nozick - has the ability to follow the truth through time and changing circumstances. Epistemologistsrightly concluded that Nozick's theory was not viable, but a simple revision of that view is not only viable but superior to other current views. In this new tracking account of knowledge, in contrast to the old view, knowledge has the property of closure under known implication, and troublesome counterfactualsare replaced with well-defined conditional probability statements. Of particular interest are the new view's treatment of skepticism, reflective knowledge, lottery propositions, knowledge of logical truth, and the question why knowledge is power in the Baconian sense.Ideally, evidence indicates a hypothesis and discriminates it from other possible hypotheses. This is the idea behind a tracking view of evidence, and Sherrilyn Roush provides a defence of a confirmation theory based on the Likelihood Ratio. The accounts of knowledge and evidence she offers provide a deep and seamless explanation of why having better evidence makes one more likely to have knowledge. Roush approaches the question of epistemological realism about scientific theories through thequestion what is required for evidence, and rejects both traditional realist and traditional anti-realist positions in favour of a new position which evaluates realist claims in a piecemeal fashion according to a general standard of evidence. The results show that while anti-realists were immodest indeclaring a priori what science could not do, realists were excessively sanguine about how far our actual evidence has so far taken us. |
| center for truth in science: Body of Truth Harriet Brown, 2015-03-24 A science journalist's provocative exploration of how biology, psychology, media, and culture come together to shape our ongoing obsession with our bodies, while also tackling the myths and realities of the obesity epidemic. |
| center for truth in science: The Good Life in the Scientific Revolution Matthew L. Jones, 2008-09-15 Amid the unrest, dislocation, and uncertainty of seventeenth-century Europe, readers seeking consolation and assurance turned to philosophical and scientific books that offered ways of conquering fears and training the mind—guidance for living a good life. The Good Life in the Scientific Revolution presents a triptych showing how three key early modern scientists, René Descartes, Blaise Pascal, and Gottfried Leibniz, envisioned their new work as useful for cultivating virtue and for pursuing a good life. Their scientific and philosophical innovations stemmed in part from their understanding of mathematics and science as cognitive and spiritual exercises that could create a truer mental and spiritual nobility. In portraying the rich contexts surrounding Descartes’ geometry, Pascal’s arithmetical triangle, and Leibniz’s calculus, Matthew L. Jones argues that this drive for moral therapeutics guided important developments of early modern philosophy and the Scientific Revolution. |
| center for truth in science: Science at the Bar Sheila Jasanoff, 1997-09-30 Issues spawned by the headlong pace of developments in science and technology fill the courts. The realm of the law is sometimes at a loss—constrained by its own assumptions and practices, Jasanoff suggests. This book exposes American law’s long-standing involvement in constructing, propagating, and perpetuating myths about science and technology. |
| center for truth in science: Shaping Science with Rhetoric Leah Ceccarelli, 2010-11-15 How do scientists persuade colleagues from diverse fields to cross the disciplinary divide, risking their careers in new interdisciplinary research programs? Why do some attempts to inspire such research win widespread acclaim and support, while others do not? In Shaping Science with Rhetoric, Leah Ceccarelli addresses such questions through close readings of three scientific monographs in their historical contexts—Theodosius Dobzhansky's Genetics and the Origin of Species (1937), which inspired the modern synthesis of evolutionary biology; Erwin Schrödinger's What Is Life? (1944), which catalyzed the field of molecular biology; and Edward O. Wilson's Consilience (1998), a so far not entirely successful attempt to unite the social and biological sciences. She examines the rhetorical strategies used in each book and evaluates which worked best, based on the reviews and scientific papers that followed in their wake. Ceccarelli's work will be important for anyone interested in how interdisciplinary fields are formed, from historians and rhetoricians of science to scientists themselves. |
| center for truth in science: Science on a Mission Naomi Oreskes, 2021-04-19 A vivid portrait of how Naval oversight shaped American oceanography, revealing what difference it makes who pays for science. What difference does it make who pays for science? Some might say none. If scientists seek to discover fundamental truths about the world, and they do so in an objective manner using well-established methods, then how could it matter who’s footing the bill? History, however, suggests otherwise. In science, as elsewhere, money is power. Tracing the recent history of oceanography, Naomi Oreskes discloses dramatic changes in American ocean science since the Cold War, uncovering how and why it changed. Much of it has to do with who pays. After World War II, the US military turned to a new, uncharted theater of warfare: the deep sea. The earth sciences—particularly physical oceanography and marine geophysics—became essential to the US Navy, which poured unprecedented money and logistical support into their study. Science on a Mission brings to light how this influx of military funding was both enabling and constricting: it resulted in the creation of important domains of knowledge but also significant, lasting, and consequential domains of ignorance. As Oreskes delves into the role of patronage in the history of science, what emerges is a vivid portrait of how naval oversight transformed what we know about the sea. It is a detailed, sweeping history that illuminates the ways funding shapes the subject, scope, and tenor of scientific work, and it raises profound questions about the purpose and character of American science. What difference does it make who pays? The short answer is: a lot. |
| center for truth in science: Karl Popper, Science and Enlightenment Nicholas Maxwell, 2017-09-26 Here is an idea that just might save the world. It is that science, properly understood, provides us with the methodological key to the salvation of humanity. A version of this idea can be found in the works of Karl Popper. Famously, Popper argued that science cannot verify theories but can only refute them, and this is how science makes progress. Scientists are forced to think up something better, and it is this, according to Popper, that drives science forward.But Nicholas Maxwell finds a flaw in this line of argument. Physicists only ever accept theories that are unified – theories that depict the same laws applying to the range of phenomena to which the theory applies – even though many other empirically more successful disunified theories are always available. This means that science makes a questionable assumption about the universe, namely that all disunified theories are false. Without some such presupposition as this, the whole empirical method of science breaks down.By proposing a new conception of scientific methodology, which can be applied to all worthwhile human endeavours with problematic aims, Maxwell argues for a revolution in academic inquiry to help humanity make progress towards a better, more civilized and enlightened world. |
| center for truth in science: The New Atlantis , 2008 |
| center for truth in science: The Idea of a Christian College Arthur Frank Holmes, 1987 More than ten years after its publication in 1975, The Idea of a Christian College has become, in the prophetic words of Nicholas Wolterstorff, a classic, a standard. Widely used by students, lay readers, teachers, and administrators, it provides a concise case for the Christian college and defines its distinctive mission and contribution. This revised edition is Holmes' response to the many professors and students who have read the work enthusiastically and urged the author to clarify certain ideas and to address further aspects of the overall subject. The author has extensively revised several chapters, has eliminated one-gender language, and has included two new chapters: Liberal Arts as Career Preparation and The Marks of an Educated Person.--Back cover. |
| center for truth in science: The Dawkins Delusion? Alister McGrath, Joanna Collicutt McGrath, 2011-05-18 Alister McGrath and Joanna Collicutt McGrath present a reliable assessment of The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins, famed atheist and scientist, and the many questions this book raises--including, above all, the relevance of faith and the quest for meaning. |
| center for truth in science: Childbed Fever K. Codell Carter, Barbara R. Carter, 1994-05-30 In the nineteenth century, tens of thousands of women died each year from childbed fever. The Carters describe birthing conditions and medical practices in Vienna during the time when young Semmelweis began to work in a maternity clinic there. He discovered that childbed fever arose because medical personnel did not wash adequately after dissecting corpses before doing vaginal examinations of women in labor. After he required students to disinfect themselves, the mortality rate immediately dropped. However, Semmelweis's views were not accepted by the senior physicians who believed the disease was due to a variety of causes. After strident attempts to persuade skeptics, Semmelweis was committed to a Viennese insane asylum where he died at age 42, possibly from beatings by asylum guards. Childbed fever, now called puerperal infection, continues to be a leading cause of maternal mortality, in spite of the best efforts of modern physicians. |
| center for truth in science: Defenders of the Truth Ullica Christina Olofsdotter Segerstråle, 2000 For the last twenty-five years, sociobiologists have come under continuous attack by a group of left-wing academics, who have accused the former of dubious and politically dangerous science. Many have taken the critics' charges at face value. But have the critics been right? And what are their own motivations? This book strives to set the record straight. It shows that the criticism has typically been unfair. Still, it cannot be dismissed as 'purely politically motivated'. It turnsout that the critics and the sociobiologists live in different worlds of taken-for-granted scientific and moral convictions. The conflict over sociobiology is best interpreted as a drawn-out battle about the nature of 'good science' and the social responsibility of the scientist, while it touches on such grand themes as the unity of knowledge, the nature of man, and free will and determinism. The author has stepped right into the hornet's nest of claims and counterclaims, moral concerns, metaphysical beliefs, political convictions, strawmen, red herrings, and gossip, gossip, gossip. She listens to the protagonists - but also to their colleagues. She checks with 'arbiters'. She plays the devil's advocate. And everyone is eager to tell her the truth - as they see it. The picture that emerges is a different one from the standard view of the sociobiology debate as a politically motivated nature-nurture conflict. Instead, we are confronted with a world of scientific and moral long-term agendas, for which the sociobiology debate became a useful vehicle. Behind the often nasty attacks, however, were shared Enlightenment concerns for universal truth, morality and justice. The protagonists were all defenders of the truth - it was just that everyone's truth was different. Defenders of the Truth provides a fascinating insight into the world of science. It follows the sociobiology controversy as it erupted at Harvard in 1975 until today, both in the US and the UK. But the story goes more deeply, for instance in its account of the circumstances surrounding W.D. Hamilton's famous 1964 paper on inclusive fitness, and on the connections of the sociobiology debate to the Human Genome project and the Science Wars. General readers and academics alike will find much to savour in this book. |
| center for truth in science: The Comprehensive Guide to Science and Faith William A. Dembski, Casey Luskin, Joseph M. Holden, 2021-10-05 Science and Faith Can—and Do—Support Each Other Science and Christianity are often presented as opposites, when in fact the order of the universe and the complexity of life powerfully testify to intelligent design. With this comprehensive resource that includes the latest research, you’ll witness how the findings of scientists provide compelling reasons to acknowledge the mind and presence of a creator. Featuring more than 45 entries by top-caliber experts, you’ll better understand… how scientific concepts like intelligent design are supported by evidence the scientific findings that support the history and accounts found in the Bible the biases that lead to scientific information being presented as a challenge—rather than a complement—to Christianity Whether you’re looking for answers to your own questions or seeking to explain the case for intelligent design to others, The Comprehensive Guide to Science and Faith is an invaluable apologetic tool that will help you explore and analyze the relevant facts, research, and theories in light of biblical truth. |
| center for truth in science: The Truth-Seeker's Handbook Gleb Tsipursky, 2017-11-22 Why do so many people prefer comfortable lies over inconvenient truths? After all, holding such false beliefs can cause bad decisions with tragic consequences for one¿s personal life, relationships, careers, and our society as a whole.Recent research provides the answer: the human mind make mistakes in predictable and systematic ways. These mental errors ¿ called cognitive biases by scholars ¿ cause people to form misconceptions about the world and thus make poor decisions that may lead to catastrophe. Fortunately, cognitive and behavioral scientists have recently uncovered many useful strategies for overcoming these mental flaws. This book relates those strategies in a clear, straightforward and engaging manner. It uses everyday life examples to show you how to train yourself and guide others in avoiding these mental flaws, preventing disasters and facilitating success and happiness for yourself and those you care about. |
| center for truth in science: Is Nature Enough? John F. Haught, 2006-05-04 Is nature all there is? John Haught examines this question and in doing so addresses a fundamental issue in the dialogue of science with religion. The belief that nature is all there is and that no overall purpose exists in the universe is known broadly as 'naturalism'. Naturalism, in this context, denies the existence of any realities distinct from the natural world and human culture. Since the rise of science in the modern world has had so much influence on naturalism's intellectual acceptance, the author focuses on 'scientific' naturalism and the way in which its defenders are now attempting to put a distance between contemporary thought and humanity's religious traditions. Haught seeks to provide a reasonable, scientifically informed alternative to naturalism. His approach will provide the basis for lively discussion among students, scholars, scientists, theologians and intellectually curious people in general. |
| center for truth in science: A Christian Student’S Guide to Truth in Science Stanley J. O’Briant, 2015-03-13 This book exposes the attempt to teach atheistic evolution to students, often ridiculing their faith in God. The classrooms in our schools have become the battlegrounds for the minds of our children. Since the introduction of evolution by Charles Darwin there has been a growing list of atheist professors who vigorously fight any religion. The classrooms of America should not be the battlegrounds of any religion, but evolution is a religion. It has no place in the classroom since it does not offer any information that improves the teaching of any science class, except evolution itself. There is no proof of evolution, only assertions, innuendos, credulity (belief without proof), and suppositions. Fully one-third of all geology textbooks deal with evolution, which is founded only opinion and undocumented assertions. Therefore, it should be removed from all textbooks. Dr. David Menton, who taught medicine at the Washington School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri, for twenty-five years, stated that he never once needed to reference evolution in any medical class. A coalition of organizations such as the National Academy of Sciences, whose members are 93% atheist or agnostic, and the National Center for Science and Education control most of the government grants intended for schools use, fully support the atheism of evolution, and they attack any criticism of evolution. |
Truth in Science: Proof, Persuasion, and the Galileo Affair
What passes today for truth in science is a comprehensive system of coherencies supported more by persuasion than “proofs.” What kind of evidence convinced Galileo and Kepler that the …
Making Truth. Metaphor In Science, Theodore L. Brown
In outlining the role of scientific metaphor, Brown points out that theories involve a mapping between a more abstract target domain (experimental observations) and a source domain …
Finding the truth in science - Nature
In a ‘publish or perish’ culture, some scientists may resort to questionable research practices or even fraud. Scientific paper mills and artificial intelligence increasingly threaten the pursuit...
Women in science: myth, harsh reality, or advantage - Ruth …
Becoming a scientist requires education, resources, encouragement, training, role models, time, and funding, and the lack of such provisions banned women from the gates of Truth. The …
The Notion of Truth in Sciences and Medicine, Why it Matters …
The notion of Truth has different meanings, including factual truth (affirmation according to fact) and prescriptive truth (ethics, morals, etc.). It is important for gaining knowledge, in particular in …
Science Education in the Post-Truth Era
We argue there is an urgent need for science education to respond to the societal phenomenon of "post-truth," to do much more in supporting students to understand how science constructs and …
the history of truth: serres, canguilhem, foucault
The paradox contained in the history of science, namely the task of writing the history of an essentially axiological activity, was the cardinal theme of the French epistemological tradition …
A Question of Truth - JSTOR
exhibits in the sciencecentre are based on. Somecommentssuggestedexplana-tionsfor discrimination: Prejudice is partoflife becausepeopleare afraid ofwhatthey don't know. …
THE PURSUIT OF SCIENTIFIC TRUTH IN THE INTELLECTUAL …
Furthermore, it seeks to underscore the role of science as the primary means for the pursuit of truth and knowledge, as well as the dynamic exhibited by humanity, emancipated from …
Truth Politics between Science and Society . Political …
‘return to truth’ (Cain et al. 2019), understanding the relationship between science and a democratic public, the delineation of appropriate scientific practices, and how to reconcile …
The Truth About Science (journal article) - University of …
The present state of the philosophyof science is illustrated by recent work on the ‘truth hypothesis’, according to which, science is generating increasingly accurate representations of …
BEYOND MISINFORMATION - Architects & Engineers for 9/11 …
What Does Science Say? The purpose of this booklet is to provide a careful examination of these competing explanations — which we will refer to as “hypotheses” from this point forward — and …
SCIENCE, PHILOSOPHY, AND RELIGION - apps.dtic.mil
science, philosophy and religion, I believe It would be knowledge and truth. All three have as their basic objective the search for knowledge and truth. Science Is a search for the general laws …
The War Between Faith and Fact - Taylor & Francis Online
Is there a war going on between science and religion or not? The Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences and many other bridge-building advocates deny that a war must be fought …
Where is the Webinar Recording? - American Chemical Society
Feb 27, 2025 · •“To refuse to accept the existence, truth, or validity of” •Overall, 57% of Americans say science has had a mostly positive effect on society (down 8 percentage points since …
Call for Papers: Masterclass Truth Politics between Science …
‘return to truth’ (Cain et al. Q O P X), understanding the relationship between science and a democratic public, the delineation of appropriate scientific practices, and how to reconcile …
Nietzsche: Science and Truth - Universidade de Lisboa
Nietzsche’s conception of truth, first asking the related question: how does Nietzsche conceptualise the truth of scientific statements? The most interesting text, for our purposes, is …
Chapter 14 Science Education in the Post-Truth Era - Tufts …
We argue there is an urgent need for science education to respond to the societal phenomenon of "post-truth," to do much more in supporting students to understand how science constructs and …
Reach, Effectiveness, and Treatment Engagement with Digital …
Mar 23, 2021 · Truth Initiative is a non-profit public health foundation which provides free services to the public and sells enterprise digital tobacco cessation programs to support its mission …
Undisputed Facts Point to the Controlled Demolition of WTC
for 9/11 Truth, 1 a fast-growing body of more than 230 architects and engineers dedicated solely to bringing out the truth about all three high-rise building collapses on 9/11. We believe that we …
Formaldehyde and Lymphopoietic Cancers - truthinscience.org
• The Center for Truth in Science put out a call for proposals in 2023 to conduct a State-of –the Science Systematic Review of the literature on the relationship between inhaled formaldehyde …
David Randall, Ph.D. - truthinscience.org
He has co-authored The Irreproducibility Crisis of Modern Science: Causes, Consequences, and the Road to Reform (2018), as well as articles on the irreproducibility crisis for The Wall Street …
CTS Top Takeaways: Talc (lung cancer) - Truth in Science
comprehensive review should ensure that future discussions on talc will be based on validated science, and produce regulatory and judicial decisions that foster innovation, benefit …
Per-and Polyfl uoroalkyl Substances Issue Primer - Truth in …
Overview Per-and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are a group of man-made chemicals that includes the two most well-known compounds—PFOA and PFOS—and several thousand …
Science vs. Settle: A Johnson & Johnson Case Study - Truth …
Science versus settle J&J’s May 2020 decision to discontinue the sale of talc-based baby powder in North America is represen-tative of the “science vs. settle” mentality that is prevalent within …
