A few days ago the Wall Street Journal asked a bunch of college students to write about why we don't trust science anymore. Why? Beats me, but apparently they poll the youth of America every week on some subject or another. In any case, pretty much everyone agreed that the answer was COVID. But they disagreed about exactly why. Aidan Olcott of the University of Colorado said scientists have no one but themselves to blame:
Suddenly, in March 2020, science was thrust onto the national stage. Science, they said, is why healthy children and young adults must stay locked in their homes. Science, they said, is why you must mask and double-mask. Science is why a person must quarantine for two weeks following a Covid diagnosis. Or maybe it’s 10 days....While the public lived in desperation, scientists and bureaucrats felt no need to explain and no need to apologize. For the public to forgive them now, they must first offer a public apology.
Scientists must apologize! But Elizabeth Ghartey of the University of Arizona put the blame elsewhere:
Political grandstanding has only intensified public distrust in scientists, and it doesn’t seem to be fading. During the Covid pandemic, Donald Trump ignored early mitigation guidelines, vilified scientists such as Anthony Fauci, promoted discredited treatments and undermined the reputation of vaccines. Mr. Trump’s administration trivialized the severity of climate change too, despite resounding calls for action from the scientific community.
What none of the kids did, however, was look at some actual data. Here, for example, is the difference between Democrats and Republicans when it comes to confidence in the scientific community:
Up through 2000 there was little partisan difference. In fact, Republicans were a little more confident in science. That flattened out by the early aughts and the gap began to grow steadily. Then, in 2021, when COVID hit, it exploded. There is now a 30-point difference between Democrats and Republicans.
In other words, it's not true that "we" have lost confidence in science. Republicans have. Democrats actually have more confidence in science these days.
As for the reason, I don't think that's hard to suss out. Science is inconvenient for Republicans, so they go after the scientists. That's all there is to it.
While its clear that the Republicans dispute/deny significant science, such as global warming or lots of environmental regulation, this is not exclusively a GOP challenge.
For example, the broad Democratic opposition to nuclear energy or GMO crops, if one is realistic about the numbers, is not really based on an honest analysis of the risk/reward. Further, the Democratic support for extreme Covid measures (masks on little kids, keep schools closed until Covid was 'over') but BLM protests were okay, are examples of the non science based reasoning.
My point, at times, both parties use science or deny science if it suits broader goals.
https://newrepublic.com/article/139700/democrats-party-science-not-really
"For example, the broad Democratic opposition to nuclear energy"
The Democratic opposition is so broad, it includes economics itself!
From the AP, w/r/t Plant Vogtle, the only new nuke in the US in decades:
"The overall project is seven years late and $17 billion over budget. Vogtle’s costs and delays could deter other utilities from building nuclear plants, even though they generate electricity without releasing climate-changing carbon emissions."
https://apnews.com/article/georgia-power-vogtle-nuclear-plant-oglethorpe-lawsuit-899e34f518cb137a5d57542b51d1244b
aldoushickman - unlike the US the French build, basically, the same reactor design over and over. The French safely, and cost effectively operation nuclear reactors across the nation.
Actual studies of transmission from Asia showed pretty early on that outdoors was very safe, while indoor transmission was common.
BLM protests - outside with quite a bit of space between protesters - were actually very safe. The real risks associated with the protests were the jailing of protesters (crowded police vans and cells) and carpooling to the protests. The protests themselves were very safe in terms of covid transmission. Few people were arrested, and nearly everyone went home after their outdoor protesting. In Minnesota you could actually see that covid rates continued to drop after the protests.
Sturgis was the opposite. Actually getting to Sturgis was safe - riding a motorcycle, even with a passenger, is very low risk for transmission. But once at Sturgis the risk rose quite high. People were close together in crowds, restaurants, and hotels. After Sturgis covid rates in neighboring Minnesota went up.
Schools were an interesting problem, because early on it was prudent to be very cautious. Schools are indoors, after all, and many schools have few options for ventilation. Given the very low death rate among kids and the growing availability of KN95 masks, I would have preferred to open schools earlier to masked kids, perhaps even switching the school year to being open in summer in the North, when windows can be left open. But Americans dont value school. They value school sports. So there were big outbreaks at sports practices and games, which resumed before classroom activities, even though masked geometry was much safer than volleyball.
The only restrictions that actually seemed stupid to me were restrictions on recreational boating, tennis, and drive-in church. Those were actually quite safe (either entirely outdoors or greatly restricting interaction between people).
The science was all about air flow and proximity. But humans are concerned about type of activity, the visibility of activity, and the scariness of strangers. If tennis was safe, then people would want all sports to be labled safe, even though hockey was aleays going to be far riskier (and, indeed, caused quite a few outbreaks). People hated seeing others outside, ignoring the real risks of indoor gatherings they couldnt see. And people always see strangers as risky, when their own friends and family are much, much more likely to be the one who infects them.
cephalopod - we live in a very liberal part of California.
During the BLM protest time, on zoom, several of us asked our local school board to allow in person, outdoor, public school. We were told that was 'a Trump like idea that would kill teachers and students.'
i would assume a lot of kids take a bus to school, which is a confined space, and in pre-vaccine 2020 that was a legitimate concern (just anecdata, but a friend of mine died from covid in 2020)
also... liberals eventually came around to accept in-person attendance while a lot of conservatives are still anti-vax
which cuts against the 'both sides' conclusion: once good data was available re in-person classes, liberals changed their positions
otoh, republican ant-vaxxers still refuse to accept the data on vaccine safety
liberal support for nukes has risen as of late
https://www.pewresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/SR_23.08.18_nuclear-energy_1.png
while conservative support for evolution actually fell from 2009 to 2013
https://www.pewresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/FT_Belief_Trends1.png
and of course the whole notion that the election was stolen is alive and well with conservatives in spite of having absolutely no evidence at all
seems to me that one party is much more amenable to basing their positions on data and it isn't republicans
A significant fraction of "the broad Democratic opposition to nuclear energy" is because nuclear energy is far too expensive for today's marketplace. It's a lot cheaper to build renewable wind and solar projects with battery backup than it is to build new nuclear plants.
And fusion power, aside from the gravitationally-confined reactor, is the power of a decade or two from now, and always will be.
I'm guessing the WSJ only interviewed Biz School students. Or one of the other Lib (heh!) Arts. Those objections that Mr D cited sounded pretty ignorant, non-quantitative, and just plain stupid.
Also, if you had viewed the "trust in science gap" in the 1960s-1970s, it may very well gone the other way. "Better Living Through Chemistry!" became tarnished with the accumulating effects of pollution, wildlife die-out, cancer, etc.
Oh, and nuclear power ends up being unthinkably "dirty" -- and much harder to clean up. Plus, it's a great target for terrorists!
"In other words, it's not true that "we" have lost confidence in science. Republicans have. Democrats actually have more confidence in science these days."
This is 1000% not what the chart says. The chart is the difference between the two.
https://apnorc.org/projects/major-declines-in-the-publics-confidence-in-science-in-the-wake-of-the-pandemic/
Yes, it's mostly about Republicans saying they don't trust science as much as Democrats, but there's been a decline for both.
It's also worth noting that this question is highly sensitive to contemporaneous political climate.
Interestingly, the chart in the link I pasted above illustrates something about "independents" - namely, that they're both rather constant (which makes sense, they're generally lower-information voters) but also that they've always had less trust that either set of self-identified partisans. That also implies something about how Democrats and Republicans are probably not thinking of the same thing with regards to what "trusting science" means.
The NORC data indicate a peak in approval of science among Democrats in 2021, probably for partisan reasons as the Republican anti-vax campaign was heating up. Then approval fell in 2022, but to a level which was above any level before 2018. So there is no long-term drop-off in Democrats' approval, rather there is a rise. Republican approval was falling since 2000, but really tanked in 2020-2021.
Sure, but it depends on the starting point.
It also depends on what's been in the news lately. The question was worded thusly:
"I am going to name some institutions in this country. As far as the people running these institutions are concerned, would you say you have a great deal of confidence, only some confidence, or hardly any confidence at all in them?"
In addition to the institution-naming being a potential source of timeline bias, there's the wording of the 3 options themselves. There are essentially two negative responses vs. one very positive response. I hate to say it given that it's an official source, but that's poor survey design if you want to say anything meaningful about the data you get from it.
I continue to be amazed at Kevin's ability to sleuth out these things and then quickly formulate data analytics to make crystal-clear points. I want Kevin to be in charge of our nation's Ministry of Messaging! We will be so much smarter!
It's not just science that's inconvenient for the people who vote for Republicans, it's basically everything. They've lost every argument they've ever had about society and public policy and they no longer care to try to put on the show that they have any interest in anything but in how much it lets them create an injury for someone or something.
And it isn't just in the US, it's worldwide.
This plague rat can go fuck himself.
"The way to prevent deadly infectious diseases from spreading is to not go near people, or if you must, take proven measures to not spread viruses" has been settled science for literally centuries.
This guy is speaking in code, as well. "Healthy children and young adults" is code for "I believe the young can't get or spread COVID and so should have been allowed to run wild and free." And of course shitting all over masking, the most basic request that someone behave like a decent human being.
There is no other way to read that quoted section other than "the person who wrote it thinks COVID never really posed a public health threat and reasons from there that people who treated it like one are automatically wrong or contemptible." That's disgusting, and he should feel bad.
This guy is speaking in code, as well. "Healthy children and young adults" is code for "I believe the young can't get or spread COVID and so should have been allowed to run wild and free."
Or, more likely, that the only people who get really sick and die from Covid -- and thus bear the sole responsibility of protecting themselves -- are the olds and, really, who gives a shit about them, amirite?
Remember early on in covid when conservatives were going on about how old people had one last duty, to die for the rest of us, so we wouldn't have to be inconvenienced by any kind of pandemic mitigation?
Wherever Mr. Olcott got his idea of how science is supposed to work, he needs to go back and demand a refund. "Knowing immediately what the nature of a novel disease is and how to stop it 100% effectively right from the start" is not how anything works, least of all in science.
What Republicans did was take the fact that, as more data and information about the virus and its spread became available, recommendations about mitigating risk changed sometimes, and then claim that that shows you can't believe anything anymore. Except what they tell you, of course, which is to be doubtful, afraid, and angry and buy guns and take ivermectin and donate to their campaigns to pwn the libs.
This, absolutely.
Faced with a dangerous virus that you know next to nothing about, the prudent choice is to start with a wide range of risk reduction protocols, and then as you learn more about the specific virus -- which takes time! -- you pare down to those protocols that are expected to be effective against its specific features. And yes, maybe early on you will get some of it wrong, and need to recalibrate later. None of that proves that science doesn't work.
Republicans don’t trust “science” but they are more than happy to trot out contrarian scientists who say locking down and masking doesn’t help, global warming isn’t real, smoking doesn’t cause cancer, vaccines cause autism, etc. Then they get to say that they “have done the research” and happily cite some rogue opinion that agrees with their thinking. They think all the other scientists are part of a global conspiracy with only a few scientists heroically countering those “false” claims.
If these are interviews, WSJ found the two undergraduates in the US who think in entire paragraphs. So are these comments essays, of which at least the first one has been polished to a gleaming shine (trite ideas, but polished surface)? Or, noting the "Mr" in the second quotation, the reporter's paraphrases of some (long) conversations? Presumably the pay-walled article explains all this-- presumably-- but pending clarification, these views look completely cherry-picked to lead to a pre-ordained conclusion.
Do they mistrust Medical science or physics? Don’t use the internet. Don’t drive a car. And for gods sake don’t fly in a plane! And never, never ever go to the doctor. Bleed to death. Let that infection fester and pray it will go away on its own. Dumb question.
I guess they believe in magic now. Good to know.
It's a little more complex than R vs D. Pew has a recent survey out that indicates there are some significant differences in trusting scientists across race/ethnicity lines: https://www.pewresearch.org/science/wp-content/uploads/sites/16/2023/11/PS_2023.11.14_trust-in-scientists_REPORT.pdf
I trust the process of science. I don't trust scientists like that room temp super conducter guy who is now outed as a fraud.
"As for the reason, I don't think that's hard to suss out. Science is inconvenient for Republicans, so they go after the scientists. That's all there is to it."
The actual reason is that scientists are almost all liberals these days. Conservatives don't trust liberals.
I write on another site recently, in the course of a longer comment trashing contemporary public opinion surveys, that
This poll is a classic illustration.
STEM comedy,
https://twitter.com/engineers_feed/status/1729049384321720584
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