THE ECONOMIC PAMPHLETEER: Rethinking Science: The Highest Research Priority for the Next 5 Years

Abstract

First paragraphs:

At the risk being labeled an uneducated Luddite or a right-wing political conservative, I believe the highest research priority for the next five years should be to rethink science, in concept and in practice. Nowhere is this priority more urgent or important than in research related to food systems, including agriculture. Recent research seems to indicate that overall public confidence in science has remained relatively strong and stable since the 1970s, at least among most Americans (Gauchat, 2012). However, the research indicates that public trust has declined significantly among those who think science should mesh with common sense, who question industrialization, and who are skeptical of the "intellectual establishment."

I am an unabashed advocate of common sense, an open opponent of the industrial paradigm, and a frequent critic of an increasingly arrogant intellectual establishment. I have not lost confidence in science, at least not science defined as a systemic means of acquiring knowledge. I have lost confidence in scientists who insist that "good science" includes only those propositions that have been proven using the "scientific method."...