Hi, my name is not convexer and this is my garbage site. I created this site
because I wanted a place where I could be my full & terrible self without
worrying too hard about making a positive impression.
Topics of interest include personal shit, gender politics, regular politics,
and the modern workplace. I don’t really proofread my posts, so let me know if
I say anything that’s just wrong.
“If I have peed farther, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.”
:
Science is fake
What does “science is real” (on those “in this house we believe …” signs) mean, anyway?
Is the claim that science is real in the way jujutsu is real—as in, this is a thing that
people do? Surely the claim is stronger than that.
Maybe the idea is that this thing,
science, that scientists do has a “real” impact on the world. Science as a set
of epistemic practices that inform public policy. You know, like eugenics.
But most likely, the intended meaning isn’t about the existence or impact,
but rather that the claims scientists make about the world are true (notice
how the word “real” doesn’t appear in this sentence). Unfortunately, I have
trouble with this reading too:
Sometimes scientists are mistaken, as they were when they claimed that AIDS only affected gay men.
Sometimes scientists are not merely mistaken, but also fail to take advantage
of well-known methodological improvements that would make it harder to get published.
The real meaning of “in this house we believe science is real” is, I believe,
“in this house, we believe that something must be done to stop anthropogenic climate change.”
Why not just say that, so I can agree with you instead of getting pissed off?
