Scientific American January 1997 [antikvár]

From the Editors Defending Reason Reasonably Alarmed by the public's continuing enthusiasm for the paranormal, the illogical and the unreasonable, many scientists and skeptics have gone on the defensive. They warn that this wave of irrationalism threatens to engulf society and, in the process, impede science by robbing it of support and brains suitably equipped for the rigors of future research. Mindful of these consequences, Gary Stix, Sasha Nemecek and Philip Yam of Scientific American's editorial board therefore took a closer look at the ominous phenomenon that has come to be known as antiscience. Their report appears on page 80. They quickly discovered that defining antiscience, let alone assessing its danger, is no easy task. Antiscience has become like "political correctness," an all-purpose slur that defines the position of the person using the phrase better than it does the thing AmiSCIENCE UNDER SCRUTINY ^emg described, ^e astrology Philip Yam, Sasha Nemecek f a„d Gary Stix. television programs about angels and traas on feminist physics all antiscience? Are they all antiscientific in the same way? Does calling them antiscience do much to explain or refute them? For that reason, it seemed most sensible and informative to get past the broad heading and instead examine a few of the movements labeled antiscientific in their particulars. Few of the phenomena called antiscience are unique to our era. Belief in the supernatural predates the written word; conversely, more people may know at least some of the rudiments of science today than ever before. The root causes of modern antiscience probably have less to do with premillennial irrationality than they do with long-standing failures of education (and not merely within the schools). Even if a discrete antiscience trend does not exist, it is still important to treat the individual problems (if that's what they are) seriously and thoughtfully. Antievolution movements damage the public's understanding of all biology and of the incremental nature of scientific progress. That is why we must be prepared to pursue the maddening fight, over and over again, to make sure that evolution is taught in schools. Ridiculous assertions about UFOs and the supernamral need to be answered. In our zeal to defend science, however, let's not make the mistake of overgeneralizing or falling into conspiracy-minded thinking. Our greatest misfortune as rationalists is that it usually takes less work to spout nonsense than to debunk it—but that extra effort is the unavoidable price for being on the side of the angels. So to speak. JOHN RENNIE, Editor in Chief editors@>;ciam.com