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The Mistrust of Science By Atul Gawande
All the words here and in the episode were composed of Atul Gawande.
The mistake, then, is to believe that the educational credentials you get today give you any special authority on truth. What you have gained is far more important: an understanding of what real truth-seeking looks like. It is the effort not of a single person but of a group of people—the bigger the better—pursuing ideas with curiosity, inquisitiveness, openness, and discipline. As scientists, in other words.
Even more than what you think, how you think matters. The stakes for understanding this could not be higher than they are today, because we are not just battling for what it means to be scientists. We are battling for what it means to be citizens.
You have to be able to recognize the difference between claims of science and those of pseudoscience.
Education may expose people to science, but it has a countervailing effect as well, leading people to be more individualistic and ideological.
The following was delivered as the commencement address at the California Institute of Technology, on Friday, June 10th. 2016 by Atul Gawande. https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/the-mistrust-of-science
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All the words here and in the episode were composed of Atul Gawande.
The mistake, then, is to believe that the educational credentials you get today give you any special authority on truth. What you have gained is far more important: an understanding of what real truth-seeking looks like. It is the effort not of a single person but of a group of people—the bigger the better—pursuing ideas with curiosity, inquisitiveness, openness, and discipline. As scientists, in other words.
Even more than what you think, how you think matters. The stakes for understanding this could not be higher than they are today, because we are not just battling for what it means to be scientists. We are battling for what it means to be citizens.
You have to be able to recognize the difference between claims of science and those of pseudoscience.
Education may expose people to science, but it has a countervailing effect as well, leading people to be more individualistic and ideological.
The following was delivered as the commencement address at the California Institute of Technology, on Friday, June 10th. 2016 by Atul Gawande. https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/the-mistrust-of-science