Let's unpack what I mean by that:
• Ideas that benefit those who propagate them will be motivated to create narratives, data, and a scientific-sounding framework to justify those ideas. This allows the ideas to spread more effectively.
• With enough resources, incentives, and effort, these ideas can manufacture selective or misleading statistics, studies, expert opinions, journals, conferences, and more to create the illusion of scientific validity.
• Over multiple iterations, as the ideas spread more widely, there is a kind of "selection pressure" to continually strengthen the scientific credibility and authority of the ideas. Contradicting evidence and opinions get weeded out.
• The spread of such ideas is difficult to stop once they gain enough momentum. They become accepted based more on ideology, populism, and emotional appeal rather than scientific merit. Legitimate science progressing on its own is a slow process.
• This process of generating pseudoscience to justify an idea often begins with a kernel of truth or misleading insight. The idea is then dressed up in scientific jargon, studies, statistics, experts, journals, etc. to make it seem far more credible and evidence-based than it really is.
• The incentives driving this process are often ideological, political, or financial. There are motivations to promote the idea for its own sake, not because of any genuine scientific merit. The "science" is secondary to the incentives.
• Over multiple iterations of spreading the idea, there is continuous adaptation to counter criticisms and strengthen the scientific credentialing. Contradicting information is dismissed; confirming anecdotes and studies are highlighted. Confirmation bias takes over.
• There is no single or simple solution. Improving scientific literacy, evaluating evidence rigorously, reducing biases, avoiding tribalism - these are all difficult with large groups and complex ideas. And there will always be some degree of pseudoscience.
Solutions:
• We must remain vigilant, continue advancing legitimate science, promote independent and critical thinking, avoid politicizing science, prevent commercial interests from manipulating research, and be wary of "motivated reasoning" that confirms what we already believe.
• Science culture and institutions must work to prevent prestigious journals, conferences, teams, studies, data, professors, think tanks, etc. from being "bought" and used to rubber-stamp preconceived notions rather than follow evidence wherever it leads.
• There will be no escape from an open system where ideas can spread unpredictably. But we must make the system as resistant as possible to the spread of "fiat science" and make authentic science as robust as possible. It is an ongoing effort.
• In a complex, evolving system like society, some degree of "fiat science" or pseudoscience gaining ground is unavoidable, as there are always incentives to promote self-serving ideas, not all of which can be evaluated for scientific validity. Legitimate science acts as a check, but cannot eliminate this completely.
• The only real solutions are promoting scientific critical thinking, evaluating evidence over appeals to authority or emotion, and avoiding biases that can lead people to prefer ideologically convenient "alternative facts." But these are difficult solutions to implement at scale.
This captures how the spread of non-scientific or even "anti-scientific" ideas is enabled through motivated distortions of the scientific process itself. Legitimate science is an ongoing effort, not an end point. And "fiat science" aims to undermine that effort by masquerading as science.
Constant vigilance and skepticism are required to defend the scientific approach. Science must always remain evidence-based and avoid being bought or politicized. And we must work to build systems resistant to the spread of unjustified ideas. It is a continual struggle.
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Credit: @saifedean for coining the term “Fiat Science”.
