> As a scientist, I've seen lots of people who are overconfident in both themselves and overconfident in science.
I feel that I've never had the first problem, but have definitely had the second.
On one hand, there is the natural limitation of Science itself in terms of the type of questions (that are amenable to the scientific method) it can answer. On the other hand, it is still the best way of generating knowledge that we have.
My overconfidence was that scientists, as individuals and as a community, would always do the right thing, driven by, and honestly following, the scientific method. But in the past few years I've had to revisit this assumption several times and be reminded to always retain some healthy skepticism.
Most recent example is this climate scientist who just published in Nature, and then went ahead afterwards and penned an op-ed [0] saying he actually misrepresented the actual factors in order to get published.
> My overconfidence was that scientists, as individuals and as a community, would always do the right thing...
This is a great point. I'm shocked by how often I end up working on a project with a colleague who is taking the path of least resistance. In my field, this usually results in using decades old statistical methods than have been proven time and time again to be unsatisfactory. They just don't want to learn new methods or their technical expertise aren't good enough to learn how to implement the new approaches. So they just coast. I'm not sure what to do in these situations other than just try and set a positive example.
I feel that I've never had the first problem, but have definitely had the second.
On one hand, there is the natural limitation of Science itself in terms of the type of questions (that are amenable to the scientific method) it can answer. On the other hand, it is still the best way of generating knowledge that we have.
My overconfidence was that scientists, as individuals and as a community, would always do the right thing, driven by, and honestly following, the scientific method. But in the past few years I've had to revisit this assumption several times and be reminded to always retain some healthy skepticism.
Most recent example is this climate scientist who just published in Nature, and then went ahead afterwards and penned an op-ed [0] saying he actually misrepresented the actual factors in order to get published.
[0] https://www.thefp.com/p/i-overhyped-climate-change-to-get-pu...