Denial
Photo: Anthony Bradshaw
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People who outright deny some aspect of science for the sake of preserving an ideological agenda commonly cast themselves as skeptics and thus the "real" promoters of "genuine" science. There is a difference between skepticism and denial -- between legitimate skepticism of evolution and denial of evolution, between skepticism of vaccines and denial of vaccines, etc. Understanding how and why they are different helps us understand how and why people engaged in denial have gone wrong.
Unfortunately, it doesn't quite help us understand how to get them back on the right track again.
Michael Shermer writes in the May 15, 2010 issue of New Scientist:
When I call myself a sceptic, I mean that I take a scientific approach to the evaluation of claims. A climate sceptic, for example, examines specific claims one by one, carefully considers the evidence for each, and is willing to follow the facts wherever they lead.
A climate denier has a position staked out in advance, and sorts through the data employing "confirmation bias" - the tendency to look for and find confirmatory evidence for pre-existing beliefs and ignore or dismiss the rest.
Scepticism is integral to the scientific process, because most claims turn out to be false. Weeding out the few kernels of wheat from the large pile of chaff requires extensive observation, careful experimentation and cautious inference. Science is scepticism and good scientists are sceptical.
So it seems that the critical issue is: what do you do with the evidence? Do you follow the evidence where it leads, adjusting your position in different ways based on new data as it comes, or do you steadfastly stick to your original position and reinterpret whatever data you see in order to make it fit your preconceived notions?
As to the question of how a person gets going down the wrong path, it seems as though they are making a basic error in treating scientific questions as if they were ideological ones.
Yet casting questions like these as a matter of belief is nonsensical. Either the Earth is getting warmer or it is not, regardless of how many believe it is or is not. When I say "I believe in evolution" or "I believe in the big bang", this is something different from when I say, "I believe in a flat tax" or "I believe in liberal democracy".
What sometimes happens is that people confuse these two types of questions - scientific and ideological. Sometimes the confusion is deliberate. Denial is one outcome. Thus, one practical way to distinguish between a sceptic and a denier is the extent to which they arc willing to update their positions in response to new information. Sceptics change their minds. Deniers just keep on denying.
I can't begin to count how many times I see creationists use "believe in" with respect to evolution -- they insist that they don't "believe in evolution" and wonder why I "believe in evolution." I try to make clear to them that I don't "believe in" evolution any more than I "believe in" plate tectonics or the germ theory of disease.
I do this in order to help them understand that scientific issues like this are not an appropriate context for "belief in." It is my hope that if they can "get" that, then they might start to develop a better understanding of the distinction between scientific and ideological questions. I'm not sure it has worked yet, but I need to start somewhere and this seems like a good place. I don't want to have a conversation where such an incorrect characterization of my position keeps being reinforced.
Have you ever tried this and gotten it to work? Have you tried a different tactic and been successful?
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