The Scientific Attitude, Lee McIntyre
The Scientific Attitude, Lee McIntyre
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The Scientific Attitude
Defending Science from Denial, Fraud, and Pseudoscience

Author: Lee McIntyre

Narrator: Mike Chamberlain

Unabridged: 9 hr 58 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 05/17/2019


Synopsis

Attacks on science have become commonplace. Claims that climate change isn't settled science, that evolution is “only a theory,” and that scientists are conspiring to keep the truth about vaccines from the public are staples of some politicians' rhetorical repertoire. Defenders of science often point to its discoveries (penicillin! relativity!) without explaining exactly why scientific claims are superior. In this book, Lee McIntyre argues that what distinguishes science from its rivals is what he calls "the scientific attitude"—caring about evidence and being willing to change theories on the basis of new evidence. The history of science is littered with theories that were scientific but turned out to be wrong; the scientific attitude reveals why even a failed theory can help us to understand what is special about science.

McIntyre offers examples that illustrate both scientific success and failure. He describes the transformation of medicine from a practice based largely on hunches into a science based on evidence; considers scientific fraud; examines the positions of ideology-driven denialists, pseudoscientists, and "skeptics" who reject scientific findings; and argues that social science, no less than natural science, should embrace the scientific attitude.

About Lee McIntyre

Lee McIntyre is a Research Fellow at the Center for Philosophy and History of Science at Boston University and an Instructor in Ethics at Harvard Extension School. He is the author of Post-Truth and Dark Ages: The Case for a Science of Human Behavior.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Brian on April 24, 2019

Like many with a science background, I generally struggle to take philosophy of science seriously - it can too inward-looking and generally more fond of using impenetrably big words than having any true meaning. However, Lee McIntyre manages to make his take on the scientific method and the demarcat......more

Goodreads review by Mark on October 10, 2019

I thought this book would be more "pop philosophy", but it's a serious philosophical treatise on science. It would be great to take a class with the author, because I still have so many questions.......more

Goodreads review by Pauline on November 19, 2019

A good book explaining that the essence of science is using evidence to come to an understanding of things, and willing to change one's mind based on new evidence, with some interesting examples of when it has worked to correct misunderstandings and where people have sometimes gone wrong, though he......more