Values matter in science, so do facts: Response to Gingras

Abstract

Following my letter to QSS (Siler, 2021), Yves Gingras (2022) responded with a variety of bad faith arguments, ad hominem attacks, and hyperbole. Gingras repeatedly distorted what I actually wrote, then attacked the distortion. Straw men might be convenient interlocutors, and can provide ballast for hot takes, but seldom yield intellectual progress. In his letter, Gingras broadly posited a false dichotomy, with “rational,” apolitical stalwarts (including himself ) protecting the integrity of modern science against an incursion of hysterical, moralizing social justice warriors hostile to unpopular truths. Not only does this perspective betray a facile understanding of modern scientific communication, it also entails the fallacious notion that scientific empirics and underlying values are mutually exclusive.