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A comment on The rise and fall of scientific authority, and how to bring it back. Parent comment

Re:The rise and fall of scientific authority, and how to bri... by scotty79 on Monday March 18, 2019 @01:34PM (#19423135)
> The one thing you learn in high level science is that nobody really knows what they're talking about, paradigms shift, and further study is required.

High level science is on the borders of vast body of scientific knowledge. It's only to be expected that people who work there don't know much about the things they try to figure out. What they know a whole lot about is the foundation of that vast body of scientific knowledge they try to build new understanding upon.

Nobody expects reverence at high levels of science. But a little bit of reverence for scientfic method and for what vast knowledge science was able to establish without a dubt so far would be nice.

Established science is not what's in the news. It's mostly what's in the textbooks. News pretty much broke the public relationship towards science.

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Re:The rise and fall of scientific authority, and how to bri... by spraak on Monday March 18, 2019 @03:34PM (#19424365)
Pluto as a planet was established science for a long time. Textbooks are probably the biggest examples of "settled science" that is out of date.
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Re:The rise and fall of scientific authority, and how to bri... by dragonwriter on Monday March 18, 2019 @05:27PM (#19425501)
> Pluto as a planet was established science for a long time

The discovery of more objects in the solar system led to defining additional categories of objects, most relevant the category of “dwarf planets”.

That's evolving terminology not a change in the science.

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Re:The rise and fall of scientific authority, and how to bri... by WalterBright on Monday March 18, 2019 @04:47PM (#19425117)
The definition of a planet is not science, it's just an arbitrary rule.
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Re:The rise and fall of scientific authority, and how to bri... by umvi on Monday March 18, 2019 @05:21PM (#19425442)
> it's just an arbitrary rule.

Same with the definition of mental conditions. Yet people wield the DSM as science and use it to bludgeon people who are not politically in line with their worldview on mental health

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Re:The rise and fall of scientific authority, and how to bri... by XorNot on Monday March 18, 2019 @08:59PM (#19427065)
What in the heck are you even referring to here? Seems like there's a lot of context missing from this comment.
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Re:The rise and fall of scientific authority, and how to bri... by umvi on Monday March 18, 2019 @11:21PM (#19427816)
I purposefully kept the comment vague to avoid a dumpster fire. Basically, there are certain mental health conditions whose classification/categorization/etc. seem especially vulnerable to politicking, and if you take a dissenting stance on those particular conditions, you'll be attacked by opponents who believe the DSM grants them scientific high ground.

You would know if it's happened to you.

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Re:The rise and fall of scientific authority, and how to bri... by tlear on Tuesday March 19, 2019 @09:25AM (#19430535)
Try mentioning any of that and you summon a lynch mob. That area of science makes cargo culting in software development seem like math. Utter joke. That anyone takes it seriously or actually does anything based on it.. surgeons during Napoleonic wars had more clue as to what they were doing.
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Re:The rise and fall of scientific authority, and how to bri... by esyir on Tuesday March 19, 2019 @02:26AM (#19428533)
I suspect he's referring to Gender Dysphoria, which was previously known as Gender Identity Disorder. This, if I recall correctly, happened in the transition to DSM 5.0.
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