@strypey @arteteco that failure mode itself is an application of the scientific method. Thus its hard to see these kinds of losses-of-faith as anything more than a nihilistic fit.

Sure, it sucks that top nutrition counseling might not be enough to fix the top diseases in the west, but then we already knew that considering the ubiquity of literature on the topic for a long time.

Not to mention that the results of interventional studies which show a high rate of success discerning the mechanisms of serum HDL, dietary Saturated fat, and oxidative stress markers as it pertains to certain foods - when laid atop that of these less intensive methods - certainly point to a particular trend. If we're talking about science in aggregate I'd say its fair to weight results according to their rigour, which is what other replies in this thread are nodding towards when they mention institutions or other secondary bodies.

Sample size, budget, and peer review ain't everything, and its science that tells us that in any case.

@seasharp
> that failure mode itself is an application of the scientific method

This kind of apologetics is exactly what Scott is critizing. People qualified to speak for Science told us to avoid dietary fat at all costs, even if that meant replacing it with sugar and exessive carbs. People died. Science fucked up bad. People's trust in it is eroded. You can say that's how science is supposed to work, but I don't think so, and besides, claiming that won't fix the problem.
@arteteco

@strypey @arteteco what do we consider "qualified to speak for science"?

Its not apologetics to say that further scrutiny can disprove a theory. That's one of the reasons appeal to authority is such a dangerous fallacy. I have no problem holding statements to the facts and those responsible for said statements responsible. I won't, however, listen to skeptics tell me to abandon key tools of skepticism because we weren't skeptical enough or of the right things.

For those who said " avoid fat at all costs" there are still those who were adamant and steadfast in avoiding the carb scare, and they've been vocal about its effects for decades.

@seasharp I'm not sure who you're debating here. None of this addresses what Adam's piece is arguing. The fact a fringe of sceptics ignored the expert advice is irrelevant. Most people followed it and huge damage was done.
@arteteco

@strypey @arteteco it directly addresses scientific consensus as a vague term that can be manipulated for ones audience. Anyways, pointing out the obvious about signals of scientific competence and then using words like 'experts' and 'fringe skeptics' to describe people with those same exact signals does nothing to answer the begged question about consensus itself.

@seasharp
> scientific consensus as a vague term that can be manipulated for ones audience.

It's simple. Do you believe that there is a scientific consensus that human activity is driving unprecedented climate change? If so, it's because you recognize some people as experts qualified to support or block that consensus, and that the retired oil geologists etc who are the "skeptic" movement's "experts" don't count.
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@arteteco

@seasharp if we make major sacrifices to mitigate climate change and it turned out the skeptics are right (unlikely here but it seems they were about fat), it would be fair to say that climate science fucked up. Given that the rest of the scientific community are backing the climate science consensus as reliable and dismissing the "skeptics" as cranks (correctly IMHO), it would also be fair to say that science fucked up.
@arteteco

@strypey

I do believe that there is such a consensus, but I wouldn't say that it's only because of that that I think human-driven climate change is real. I read quite many researches, we surely have a margin of doubt on many things, especially on the ecological models that try to predict the effects of such a warming up (in that sense we are in high sea, IMO), but some stuff, some stuff we got it.

May be we wrong? Sure. I call back what I said before: we've been wrong in the past, it's ok. The amount of times the consensus has been right (or to better say, "right enough") is pretty strong, though, and we do not have any better option anyway. Or, do we?

I think I'm missing the point and I fear we are talking in parallel about 2 different things, because I feel confident we don't disagree in this.

I'm sorry in this case, maybe I can't catch your point or explain myself.

@seasharp

@arteteco as you are saying, as Adams says himself in the article, the whole idea of science is to become less wrong over time, often over multi-generational time scales. But this can clash with the idea of evidence-based public policy, which assumes there are answers that are *right* (not just less wrong), and can be known *now*. Both tend to assume a universalism (eg there is a healthy diet that works for all humans) that may be unjustified.
@seasharp

@arteteco
> we've been wrong in the past, it's ok.

Not if it results in people confidently giving advice based on "science", in good faith, having done their research, and getting it fatally wrong. That's not OK, and pretending it is suggests an irrational need to protect science from even justified critique. Adams' point is that when this happens, people's willingness to trust science-based advice is damaged. What's the solution? More scepticism, not less.
@seasharp

@strypey

That's kind of a problem for policy making, as I was saying. From a scientific POV, is totally ok.
Pretending that it's not ok is not understanding how this works.

And I'm not saying we should "believe" in science, skepticism is a very welcome thing, I consider myself a skeptic as well. Just let's not mistake this for a blind, emotion-based refusing of the evidence so far brought forward, as it could be with the climate change issue.

@seasharp

@strypey @arteteco I'm fairly confident the administrative bodies like FDA and USDA found it more complex.

@seasharp of course, because it's their job to sort through the fog of self-interested narratives and try to figure out what the consensus is, and how confident it is, about each thing they have to make regulatory decisions about. Your point?
@arteteco

@seasharp
> what do we consider "qualified to speak for science"?

There is some unusually clear social signage for this. People with science degrees. Particularly those with postgrad qualifications, and even more so those in senior research and teaching positions. Obviously those in disciplines relevant to the topic under discussion. Their consensus is the best indication we have of what science says about anything.
@arteteco

@seasharp @strypey @arteteco I'm qualified to speak for science, I have a degree in philosophy

@static probably more so than most scientists ;P
@arteteco @seasharp

@strypey

I hope I'm getting the point here

You that the science "fucked up".

Science didn't fucked up. It guesses wrong and corrects itself with time. That is the scientific method in action. It's not like Newton fucked up because Einstein disprove it, you need Newton to have Einstein, it's a neverending process.

And in that process, on a medical level, we got so many huge, awesome stuff that they are hard to count. And yes, many mistakes too along the way, and surely many present at the moment. So what?
Something which has a high consensus it's still your best bet.

the author says:
science has earned its lack of credibility with the public

Really? With the scientific method we know stuff like the evolution, we grow our food, we fly, we write at this very moment...

I don't even think this trust is really eroded. People take planes, take medicines, undergoes surgeries, and so on, all without too many doubts.

@seasharp

@arteteco you are making a common mistake of fudging science and technology together. These are related, obviously but they're not the same thing. The problem we're discussing is not about material tooling, like planes, it's about epistemology. What do we know, how do we know it, and what are the limits of each kind of knowledge quest. Science probably can't tell us what a healthy diet is at all, let alone for each person. The fuckup was claiming that it can and had.
@seasharp

@strypey

I'm not sure if I'm making that mistake. If you take a plane you trust the technology and by proxy the research and the knowledge (and the statistics) that confirms that it is "safe".

If you don't trust the method you don't trust the results of the method neither, so I don't see why you can't make an epistemological argument by starting from a tool.

It's like, if I do not believe in those saying homeopathy works I do not take those water-pills. If I did take them, I'd recognize that I trust the research and its methods.

@seasharp

@strypey

Probably here is the point of not understanding each other.
I don't know of any scientist claiming that we can say for sure what a healthy diet is for everyone, or that we surely understood everything about a topic.

@seasharp