I Trust Science!
There has been an explosion in the recent frequency of signs, memes, and social media posts about trusting science. I find this exceptionally troubling given that they are being used to silence evidence-based research that undermines their belief about a particular topic—in this case, primarily COVID-19 information. More to the point, most of the time “I trust science!” is being expressed it is being used in a way that is hardly separable from the logical fallacy called Appeal to Authority, where because someone possesses a credential, their words/writings are considered “truthful”, even if they can be shown to be based on biases, falsehoods, or unfounded beliefs. Credentials do not, in and of themselves, make statements truthful. It is the evidence upon which the statements are based that builds a solid explanation of a particular phenomenon. But, nothing is ever conclusive (i.e., science does not build indisputable facts), and if you believe so, you are practicing a religion. Further, there are other ways of explaining events than solely through the lens of the scientific method, but that is another topic for another time.
In case it is not known, scientific investigations often begin with a null hypothesis (frequently abbreviated as H0), which is a proposed explanation that is often framed as stating there is no difference between the observed phenomenon and random chance. The study then attempts to reject the null hypothesis (in favor of a stated alternative hypothesis, abbreviated as HA) and will often use various statistical tests to determine a value of how strongly the null hypothesis is rejected. If that statistical value is low, the study is considered to have “failed to reject the null hypothesis”, which, for example, would be the case for a novel drug that had no appreciable effect on reducing the severity of symptoms in a particular disease. But, important to the reader is that all of these are probabilities not equal to 1. In other words, science suggests a strength of an explanation, but does not ever state “this is how it is and that is the end of it.” Science constantly evolves by having people propose alternative explanations and challenge long-held ideas. In fact, it is imperative that freedom of speech is allowed and celebrated (so long as there is some basis for the ideas) in order that novel concepts can be expressed and studied. The history of scientific research is filled with long-held beliefs that were later upended by those who saw things differently and were willing to challenge the status quo. Science is not static (again, it is not a religion).
So, let’s now bring this around to current events. You cannot state that “I trust science!” when you are trying to shame people to wear masks or social distance or accuse them of risking other people’s lives for not following lock-down procedures. Why? Because these things are not known with any certainty to prevent infection under certain conditions (such as a healthy person who is expressing no symptoms). If you have simply followed what the TV commentators state, you are getting a fear-based message that does not represent the entirety of science on the topic. You have not been told that many studies contradict the current recommendations, and even Dr. Anthony Fauci presented a different message at the beginning of the pandemic (a message that changed in response to public perception, not science). Most people simply believe what they are told and follow all the rules, even when such information is not well supported or even “cherry picked” (i.e., there are multiple contradictory studies, and the one that suits the authority’s purpose is chosen as the “correct one”). How many of the social shaming people have read the actual published studies upon which the United States’ recommendations are based? How many have read studies that contradict their beliefs? Most have done neither—they just follow the industrial message. In case you didn’t know, most of the masks that are worn cannot stop the virus particles because the pore size needed for breathability (330 nm) is much larger than the virus itself (60–125 nm) (read here). In fact, the cloth masks that are worn by many people are quite inadequate (read here). Even more, masks worn by surgeons don’t have the prevention efficacy that most people believe they do, and a significant number of surgeons wear them only because of tradition or public perception (read here). One study even showed that masks actually increase the amount of virus outside of the mask than within (which may be explained by loose-fitting masks and resulting air passages above and below the mouth where air velocity would be increased due to constriction around the mouth—read here). We could go on. There are literally tens of evidence-based, peer-reviewed studies published in well-known journals that contradict what we are told concerning COVID-19. None of this is to state these studies are the ones we should follow. It means that they are part of the sum-total knowledge about COVID-19 and prevention measures, studies that also need to be considered when creating public policy, vaccination demands, and cultural practices around shaming.
Also, in case you didn’t know, one study with a very large sample size (nearly 10,000,0000 people) suggests that asymptomatic persons are not spreading COVID-19 to anyone (read here). An important quote from the research:
“…there was no evidence that the identified asymptomatic positive cases were infectious.”
Of course, this study does not prove anything, but it does suggest that our current paradigm of thought concerning COVID-19 may not be entirely accurate (i.e., we may be overly reactive and fearful). At the very least, the “I trust science!” slogans are not incorporating all the scientific studies into their body of thought. Most people touting this phrase are simply unaware of how much bias (both kinds of bias and amount of bias) are present in science. This except from A New Path (Haines 2017) will hopefully illustrate this.
“At this point, you might be thinking that is all sounding a bit too alarmist. After all, the US government would never allow a substance that is potentially harmful to come into contact with something so important as our drinking water (or our food, our children’s mouths, etc.). One of the major problems is that the respective regulatory agencies utilize studies with obvious conflicts of interest to guide their policies. For example, in a study by Saal and Welshons (published in 2006), they found that 100% of industry-funded studies (11 of 11) demonstrated that BPA (for example) was safe, yet 92% of studies without industry funding (109 out of 119) demonstrated measurable health effects due to exposure to BPA. The problem here goes even deeper, given the massive amount of lobbying performed by the American Chemistry Council (11,000,000 dollars in expenses in 2013) and the fact that some governmental reports on BPA safety have largely been written by the plastic industry and those with a financial stake in this chemical (as uncovered by Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and published in 2008).”
None of this writing is intended to be an anti-mask message or suggest people should not comply with public health requests. Nor is it intended to downplay the severity of COVID-19. It was written and presented to readers with a single purpose: to expose the public’s lack of understanding of what science is (which includes the abysmal comprehension of the myriad of biases incorporated into public health policies). If people knew what science was and how it operated, they would never use science to silence ideas (that practice is, in fact, quite anti-science). And science can never be used as justification to silence other statements based on scientific study that don’t agree with a person’s beliefs. If you are one of the people yelling “I trust science!” at the top of your lungs, you are likely as much a part of the problem as those who are rejecting scientific study as one valid way of understanding the creation we find ourselves enmeshed within. Science is more a way (or method) of studying the world around us than it is a set of truths. It’s time to let go of what you think you know and come to an understanding that the world is complex. Homogeneous solutions for a heterogenous world often don’t make sense.