Thread by @PnictogenHorses

hm. I had some thoughts about the *provisional nature* of scientific truth. let's see if I can get those into a thread.

right-wing propagandists like to pretend that #science (or Science™, rather, "science" as a buzzword and slogan) is a source of _absolute truth_.

(cont'd)

this is a fallacy: all scientific findings are *provisional*. scientific models are built on empirical observations about the world; they're generalizations based on a body of knowledge that is _always_ accumulating fresh data. scientific observation has never stopped.

(cont'd)

as as result, there is *always* a possibility that currently accepted scientific models will be rendered obsolete by fresh information. NO scientific model is immune from the possibility of upset.

there's two general sorts of person who don't grasp this about science.

(cont'd)

first, there's the scientifically illiterate computer nerds—the @sama / @ID_AA_Carmack people, who think of science as a list of equations in a computer.

second, there's Christian fanatics like @MattWalshBlog who pretend that "science" proves their various bigotries.

(cont'd)

the computer nerds and the Christian fanatics are in fact often the same people—a truly astonishing number of #STEM-lords are also #Christian extremists.

the Christians, in particular, want to pretend that Science™ is equivalent to God's commandments on a tablet.

(cont'd)

they don't like that #science keeps growing and changing and revising itself. that's not how Christian dead-enders like @MattWalshBlog and @RepMTG see the world: they think of the world as running by a set of rules that's fixed, unchanging, and set in stone long ago.

(cont'd)

"there's only two 'biological sexes', that's SCIENCE," is in fact a *religious* statement—and, to the surprise of nobody (outside mainstream Western #journalism) almost everyone who asserts that "science" says there's only two sexes is, in fact, a Christian extremist.

(cont'd)

or they're one of the *small* number of right-wing pseudointellectual cranks—@Docstockk, @bindelj, @HJoyceGender, &c.—who make their money by cooking up fallacious but superficially plausible rationales for the bigotry of a mostly *Christian* audience of reactionaries.

(cont'd)

the "gender criticism" of @bindelj &c. is fallacious to the core. it's based on the fallacy of *scientism*, i.e. endowing scientific entities with metaphysical significance. GC ideologues in fact must *ignore* scientific evidence, e.g. the existence of intersex persons.

(cont'd)

but @bindelj, @AbigailShrier, and the other GC pseudoacademics are in a sense *irrelevant*. that is to say, they're only relevant at all because they've been selectively amplified by extremist right-wing politics—driven almost wholly by extremist Christian ideology.

(cont'd)

@bindelj &c. furnish Christian fanatics like @MattWalshBlog and @RonDeSantisFL with the thinnest possible tissue of secularized rationalizations for an irrational commitment to the premise that human beings come in exactly two rigidly defined types, and no others.

(cont'd)

@MattWalshBlog and all those @GOP politicians (whom @mtaibbi works for) only believe "science" insofar as it's the kind of perverted, fallacious "science" offered up by propagandists such as @AbigailShrier. in _general_, the Christian fanatics have no use for science.

(cont'd)

for that matter, neither do the avaricious #STEM nerds like @sama and @elonmusk—to them, "science" is something that makes cool toys for them to play with. they don't know how science works; they simply know that it's "smart" and "cool" and full of math and equations.

(cont'd)

and for their various reasons, both the Christian dingbats and the right-wing programming nerds want to pretend that #science is a set of unchangeable rules, easily codified.

it's not. it never was. it *can't* be, because science is required to adapt and change.

(cont'd)

science can *never* be finalized. its findings can always be overturned with fresh knowledge. that's been called a "paradigm shift", although to be honestly I've never had much patience with the term—nevertheless I acknowledge that it has some value.

(cont'd)

I prefer to think of #science as a product of evolution, just as biological populations and human cultures are products of evolution. Stephen Jay Gould found that the pace of evolutionary change was not constant, but instead had lulls and peaks—"punctuated equilibrium".

(cont'd)

a "paradigm shift" might be thought of as a period of "punctuated equilibrium". old ways of modelling the world are upset, and eventually a new equilibrium coalesces. quantum mechanics was once shocking; now it's a routine element of our technology. that's #science.

(cont'd)

I am on the side of science, and therefore I repudiate the dishonest *scientism* of the GC propagandists. @bindelj and @Docstockk aren't scientists any more than racists like @charlesmurray and @EPoe187 are scientists. all of these people are mere ideological frauds.

(cont'd)

Western #journalism has failed us, utterly. the scientific illiteracy of Western society and especially of Western politics has failed us. for *decades* now, both the media and our political leaders have let _Christian extremists_ drive discourse on scientific matters!

(cont'd)

this problem has been snowballing for decades—the drive to erase "New Math" from grade-school #education (i.e. forbidding the teaching of principles of abstract algebra) was perhaps the first big right-wing victory of conservative ideology over organized knowledge.

(cont'd)

roughly the same irrational arguments were used against "New Math" that right-wing propagandists like @realchrisrufo and @jordanbpeterson now use against a huge swath of academic disciplines. "it's too confusing". "nobody needs to know this for their jobs." and so on.

(cont'd)

they've gone after climatology and atmospheric science because they want to pretend "global warming" is a communist plot or something. they've assaulted public health and vaccination because...well, @NateSilver538 &c. want to pretend viruses are a communist plot.

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the list goes on. right-wing political ideology has been allowed to *pervert* science and academia, unrestrained. @charlesmurray hasn't been hounded into obscurity for peddling racist rubbish—why? because the @GOP and "conservative" money wants Charles Murray around.

(cont'd)

@charlesmurray is subsidized by right-wing money—most of it right-wing #Christian money. @mtaibbi and @bariweiss and @ShellenbergerMD are kept on life support by right-wing money. right-wing money flows into @bindelj and @Docstockk and the other British GC charlatans.

(cont'd)

a little clump of very rich, bigoted, and very evil people have Western media and Western intellectual discourse in their power. they *create* issues to be amplified by useful dunces of the @mtaibbi / @jessesingal / @NateSilver538 sort—for these people are easy to fool.

(cont'd)

throw a few *numbers* in @NateSilver538's face and he'll copy and memetically repeat just about any right-wing lie.

this is our #journalism now. this is why #science is threatened. this is why frauds like @elonmusk and @bindelj are still, somehow, taken seriously.

(cont'd)

Christianity has done this to us. money and capitalism has done this to us.

a Western world in which a depraved fanatic like @MattWalshBlog is permitted to posture and strut as though he were a defender of *science* is a world that needs to _end_.

~Mona Drafter of Pnictogen

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