Science in the realm of opinion

Abstract

The chapter considers highly emotive topics where the science, or ideas are contentious, and frequently it is difficult to separate facts from opinion, bias, deliberate mis-information or political and nationalistic ideas. We are humans so this is inevitable, and currently there are many subjects with a wealth of partial information, strong emotive opinion, models and computer simulations, or entrenched political and economic factors. In many cases there can be deliberate mis-information in circulation. With such minefields one must tread carefully. Currently this includes many topics in medical areas, models of astronomy, evolution, viruses and pandemics, and items linked to religion or nationalism. The only consolation is that science has a degree of pragmatism and erroneous concepts are invariably eventually displaced and replaced by better models.