Identifiant pérenne de la notice : 245204423
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Note publique d'information : "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."
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