1. A created controversy is an issue on which the overwhelming majority of experts are in agreement, but the wider public supposes that the issue is contested and the relevant scientific community evenly divided.

2. Insofar as the appearance of controversy might lead people to suppose that no-one really has a good grasp on certain issues, we are in danger of ignoring important information.

3. Ignoring important information threatens the reliability of individual choice and sound social policy.

4. There is no controversy surrounding the core tenets of anthropogenic climate change.

5. There is no controversy concerning the age of the Earth, the core assumptions of biological evolution, nor the acute weaknesses of ID.

6. It is uncontroversial that HIV causes AIDS, and vaccines don't cause autism.

7. Any impression that any of these issues represent genuine scientific controversies speaks principally to the success of those groups that have created the appearance of controversy.

8. There is no evidence to suggest that GMOs present a special threat to human health. There are, however, legitimate worries concerning who benefits from the technology and whether it is being judiciously utilized and regulated.

9. The idea that scientific communities are involved in global conspiracies is implausible.

10. Our own uncertainty about certain issues is very likely a poor guide to the current state of many scientific issues, and hence a poor reason to reject scientific consensus. The layperson typically has an extremely meagre sense for the sophistication, rigour, scale and variety of modern scientific research programs, the range of methods utilized to gather data, the extraordinary number of very narrow questions being posed, the degree of coherence between distinct methods and analyses, and the depth of understanding that scientists have achieved.

11. There remain many interesting important questions involving the changing climate and our responses, the relationship between science and religion, biological evolution and related disciplines, issues of public health, the costs and benefits associated with new technologies, and so on. These unresolved and important questions shouldn't detract from what scientific disciplines have achieved.

12. Scientific methods, conclusions and goals are always legitimate objects of criticism and analysis. However, if we don't work hard to distinguish legitimate objections from weak and politically or ideologically motivated objections then we risk a great deal.

The empiricist attitude towards the sciences can appear so very familiar and so obviously correct that it is hard to imagine what an alternative theory of science would even look like. What could be more mundane than the observation that scientists gather data and then reason, or argue, on the basis of those data for certain theories and hypotheses. Surely this is exactly what scientists do, and by doing this they achieve, we suppose, an ever more accurate and complete understanding of the world we inhabit. Admittedly, as we've now seen, even the most basic empiricist ideas face challenges. A naïve empiricist might suppose that our observations are always reliable. They aren't, but the problem of distinguishing reliable from unreliable data admits of no general solution, in part because learning to make the distinction is itself an ongoing process. The problem of induction provides further reminders of both the fallibility of scientific theories and the existence of hidden complexities when it comes to describing and evaluating methods, hypotheses and theories. Nevertheless, these problems don't obviously require the abandonment of empiricism ' a little refining might seem more appropriate.

In the first half of the twentieth century, the most influential philosophies of the sciences were empiricist philosophies. Although there were important differences in the details, these accounts shared a commitment to articulate and justify the scientific method, and somehow vanquish the problem of induction. Such articulation, it was assumed, would elucidate what scientists do and explain why sciences make progress. These empiricist philosophers relied on ideas from the philosophy of language, as well as developments in logic, and generally assumed that scientific evidence can be derived unambiguously from observation. They assumed that understanding the scientific method required no serious engagement with the history of science. These were ambitious, extensive and influential theories about how sciences work, but in 1962 Thomas Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions appeared, and things weren't the same after that.

Kuhn's book revolutionized the ways in which scholars came to think about the sciences. It contained profound challenges to conventional wisdom on the nature of scientific rationality, scientific methods and scientific progress. Kuhn argued that we cannot responsibly ignore the history and sociology of science if our hope is to understand the nature of the sciences. Prevailing empiricist descriptions, Kuhn opined, fail to describe both what scientists now do and what past generations did.

In 1999 the Kansas Board of Education was involved in what became a very public review of its standards of science education. Up for discussion, and piquing public interest, was what those standards would say about the teaching of biological evolution. Commenting on the case Phillip Johnson would later suggest: ‘What educators in Kansas and elsewhere should be doing is to “teach the controversy”’. Johnson was a law professor at U.C. Berkeley, author of Darwin on Trial, and co-founder of the Discovery Institute, a Seattle-based think tank that has worked tirelessly to promote what's known as Intelligent Design (ID) theory. The nature of the controversy that Johnson thought worth teaching is not entirely clear, but the idea that we should ‘teach the controversy’ became an important campaign for the Discovery Institute, a campaign that would soon gain significant momentum. By August 2005, President George W. Bush was convinced, proclaiming that ‘Both sides ought to be properly taught’ and that ‘Part of education is to expose people to different schools of thought’.

The Design Institute's teach-the-controversy campaign is just one chapter in the much bigger story of how evolutionary biology and Creation science have been regarded within U.S. public school systems, a story that traces back to at least the 1920s. And the story of evolution's place in the classrooms is a small part of an even bigger set of issues concerning the relationship between the sciences and religions. Here we can barely hope to scratch even the surface of many subtle, interesting and worthwhile topics. We will consider whether the controversy we were being urged to include in sciences classrooms is a created one, and what attitudes towards evolution and ID are reasonable. We'll start, however, by considering the more general issue of how the sciences and religions are related.

Sciences and religions

It appears to be quite widely supposed that the sciences are straightforwardly in conflict with religion, but what does this actually mean? Many religions appear concerned principally with worshiping a god, or gods; with moral codes; with describing the best way to lead a good life; with the significance of certain historical events, parables and teachings; with questions about the meaning of life; what happens to us when we die; our responsibilities to other members of our community and so on.

One of Kuhn's greatest influences on the philosophy of science – an influence quite independent of the merits of his own theory of science – was his use of historical and sociological considerations for purposes of addressing traditional, philosophical questions. Kuhn wasn't the first to think about either the history or sociology of science, but these were nascent disciplines, and their relevance to philosophy was largely ignored. Over the last few decades, the history and sociology of the sciences have each flourished as academic subjects. Simultaneously, philosophy of science has become far more sensitive to the possibility that understanding the sciences requires paying attention to their histories, social contexts, the psychology of working scientists and the social organization of scientific communities. To a significant degree the sciences are now recognized as responses to changing human and social interests, pursued by people of varying personality, celebrity, socio-economic upbringing, race and gender, who work within scientific communities that compete for funding and influence, which generate conclusions that may be unpalatable or inconvenient to certain groups in society. A theory of the sciences that regards them as simply an abstract set of methods and assumptions can produce, at best, an impoverished account.

There is undoubtedly much we can all learn from historical, sociological and psychological perspectives on the sciences, but such perspectives are also often associated with radical and profound challenges to our understanding of what the sciences can achieve. These sceptical arguments threaten scientific authority and the idea that sciences represent our most reliable methods for understanding the world. In this chapter, we'll introduce the arguments. We'll see that their significance for evaluating created controversies is not straightforward. Those who create controversies are typically more concerned with securing for themselves a degree of scientific legitimacy, an objective which isn't well served by arguments that challenge the possibility of scientific authority. Nevertheless, certain critics of mainstream sciences continue to advance versions of these sceptical arguments, and thus it is beneficial to spend some time reviewing them. Towards the end of the chapter, we will survey several further projects that take very seriously the idea that sciences are historically situated, social activities. In some cases, these accounts recognize ways in which sciences can be improved, but they maintain a generally optimistic view of scientific success and the possibility of achieving scientific progress.

1. A satisfying solution to the problem of demarcation remains elusive, but, regardless, we shouldn't be content with dismissing any theory, study or method simply because it doesn't fulfil a particular definition.

2. Empiricist attitudes towards the sciences emphasize both observations and certain forms of reasoning, but the basic empiricist picture could easily lead to confusion about how sciences work.

3. Our experiences are not always reliable indicators of how things are. We should be wary of placing too much emphasis on how things appear.

4. Biases in subjective experience can be overcome through improved experimental design.

5. There might be very good reasons for ignoring certain data, but those reasons may not always be immediately apparent to those who lack relevant training and education.

6. Certainty is not something sciences achieve, but absence of certainty is consistent with having lots of compelling evidence for given conclusions.

7. We continue to learn about how past experiences can better predict future events.

8. Scientific methods are themselves appropriate objects of criticism and refinement, and the introduction of new methods may be entirely justifiable.

9. All theories confront anomalies, so anomalies alone can't be adequate reasons to dismiss a theory. Theories are pursued, in part, because they offer the most promise for purposes of furthering our understanding.

10. Kuhn's suggestion that scientists work within something like a paradigm has historical plausibility, but this need not imply strong incommensurability between paradigms.

11. Scientific progress is contingent, shaped in part by what problems scientists choose to engage, what technology becomes available, as well as broader socio-economic and political factors. Nevertheless, such contingencies are quite consistent with scientists achieving substantive results relative to the objectives they set.

12. The arguments from underdetermination and discontinuity within the sciences are each reminders of scientific fallibility. Neither provides compelling reasons to deny particular scientific theories or conclusions that some people may find inconvenient or objectionable.

13. Scientific communities may be a more appropriate object for explaining scientific authority.

14. Sciences are not value free, but the role of values in sciences need not compromise scientific authority.

15. It is appropriate to criticize scientific conclusions, methods and theories, but we should remember that some criticisms may be entirely misguided. Worthwhile criticisms are precise and well-supported.

When Ola Svenson surveyed American students about their driving skills, 46 per cent estimated that they were among the most skilled 20 per cent, and 93 per cent of those surveyed placed themselves in the top 50 per cent. Doctors who observe several patients that all have the same illness are more likely to diagnosis the same illness in subsequent patients who don't have it, even in the case of noncontagious diseases. Subjects in a study who had been manipulating words like Florida, wrinkle, grey and bald, walked away from the testing room more slowly than those subjects who had been manipulating sets of words that don't induce thoughts of old age. These represent just a few of many studies that demonstrate how our decisions, behaviour, memories and beliefs can be influenced in ways that we're wholly unconscious of. Not only are we unaware of these subconscious influences, but in some cases our beliefs are being shaped in demonstrably irrational ways.

In Chapter 2 we discovered that our perceptions of the world can be influenced by expectation, among other things. We were reminded that what we perceive doesn't always reflect how things are. In this chapter, we observe that how we reason from available evidence to conclusions and beliefs is also subject to systematic and often predictable error. These errors have enormous significance for our appraisal of those scientific issues where scientific opinion might appear divided. In some instances we're inappropriately influenced by prior commitments in our assessment of new data, or overly influenced by considerations that come more readily to mind, or overconfident in our abilities to understand, predict and adjudicate. One purpose of this foray into cognitive psychology is to forearm ourselves against the possibility that each of us is placing more trust in our individual abilities than is appropriate. A little humility and greater awareness for the ways in which we're vulnerable to error represent key steps towards improving our reasoning abilities.

Confirmation bias

Confirmation bias is a well-known, widespread and well-studied cognitive bias. It describes our tendency to prefer, or actively seek out, evidence that supports rather than challenges our pre-existing beliefs or desires. Consider Jones, for purposes of illustration, who has a poor opinion of women drivers and who occasionally witnesses instances of reckless driving. If the gender of the driver is unknown, Jones confidently predicts that the driver is female.

The word science can conjure up for us a variety of ideas and images. It can whisk us back to cluttered classrooms, furnished with tall stools and long benches, Bunsen burners, and glass-doored cupboards stocked with assorted paraphernalia. The word might bring to mind the names and faces of famous scientists: Newton, Faraday, Hawking, Curie, Galileo and Mendel all jostle for attention, but ultimately are crowded out by a mental image of Freud and his cigar, Einstein and his untamed hair, or Darwin and an almost equally untamed beard. Maybe it rouses important scientific concepts, activities or instruments, the atom, star gazing, the test tube or the microscope. Perhaps we imagine a pristine laboratory, a young technician dressed in an immaculate white coat, scrutinizing a vial of blue translucent fluid for reasons unknown.

Science is ubiquitous. Its boundaries are fuzzy, its range bewildering. Distinctions have been drawn between different types of science, natural versus social, hard versus soft, historical versus experimental, and so on. Disagreement reigns over whether economics is science, whether anthropology is science, whether history is science. Creation science calls itself science, but many call foul. Politicians have suggested – what sounds thoroughly reasonable – that policy should utilize sound science and eschew junk science. Scientific discoveries are reported in the media; scientific concepts are utilized in novels, film and television. Science is popularized and demonized. It offers explanations of our most commonplace observations, but in terms that are peculiar and hard to comprehend. Scientific developments are integral to some of society's most remarkable achievements, but also some of our most horrifying tragedies. Science is both utterly familiar and an immediate source of controversy and debate.

The fact that science occupies an extraordinarily important place within modern society makes it important to think more carefully about what science is. A great deal of scientific research is conducted in service to issues of public safety and perceived public need, is funded by taxpayers, and is overseen at least to some extent by political systems. It is sensible to consider whether the research being pursued is of genuine value, of greater value than research that doesn't get funded, and whether the degree of political oversight is appropriate. The technological fruits of scientific labours often give rise to hard questions about the ethics of warfare, human reproduction, food production, energy development and more.

Central to any scientific endeavour are efforts to advance evidence and reasons in support of particular conclusions. Some conclusions are broad, ranging over all space and time; others are far narrower and may concern the attributes of a particular biological species, chemical element or geological feature. Some conclusions may depart from previous work, requiring some degree of revision to existing attitudes; other conclusions extend our understanding into new terrain. Attempts to understand scientific methods can be understood in terms of a desire to better articulate the kinds of arguments that scientists develop, the kinds of evidence that they appeal to and the reasons those methods and evidences are valued.

Very often the ability to comprehend and evaluate scientific arguments requires significant training in the relevant discipline. Gathering data and evidence in ways that are reliable is not always straightforward. Evaluating someone's analysis of the evidence and the plausibility of the conclusions she draws may require familiarity with sophisticated mathematics and statistics, computer modelling or the intricacies of technical apparatus that laypersons typically don't possess. Nevertheless, if we understand science very broadly as the collection of our best methods for investigating the world and reaching reliable beliefs about it, then we would all think more scientifically if we spent time developing basic critical thinking skills.

The need for more responsible argument evaluation can also be motivated by reflecting on the cognitive biases that we considered in Chapter 5. Given our natural tendencies to prefer evidence that fits with prior beliefs, for example, it becomes all the more important that we cultivate a habit of pausing to reflect on the reasons we have for holding certain opinions. Do we have good reasons for doubting anthropogenic climate change, or have we merely heard sceptical attitudes repeated sufficiently often that they have attained an inflated and false level of plausibility? An important step towards improving our critical thinking involves asking ourselves what reasons are being advanced in support of some claim, whether those reasons are themselves plausible and whether there are better ways of accounting for the conclusions being presented. Many arguments are advanced in opposition to mainstream sciences which are so patently unconvincing that basic critical thinking should be sufficient to expose their flaws. In this chapter, we'll review a variety of ideas that can help us all improve the way we assess arguments and debates.

There are many who regard anthropogenic, global climate change as the most urgent problem facing humankind. There are also critics who dismiss the whole idea as a hoax, who remain deeply sceptical of even the basic scientific conclusions and who therefore feel no motivation to even consider policies that would reduce carbon emissions. Polls indicate that public attitudes are decidedly mixed. A 2010 study revealed that 61 per cent of Americans believed that the planet is getting warmer, but 45 per cent agreed that ‘[t]here is a lot of disagreement among scientists about whether or not global warming is happening’. With almost half the population supposing that there exists a genuine scientific controversy, it is worth exploring the accuracy of that judgement. Is the appearance of controversy a reflection of genuine scientific disagreement, or is this appearance better explained in terms of public ignorance of the relevant evidence, cognitive biases, poor argument evaluation and the agenda of groups that feel threatened by a scientific consensus? The chapter is not designed as an authoritative overview of the state of the science nor as an attempt to answer the many particular criticisms that have been levelled against the sciences surrounding climate change. We might nevertheless each hope to become better informed on the issue. Our framing concept of a created controversy will also prove instructive.

The first two sections of the chapter will survey the history of our understanding of the climate, then offer a greatly condensed argument for why scientists accept that human activity is responsible for recent unusual climate change. Providing even a brief overview will help us recognize that many of the objections raised against climate change are simply beside the point. For example, once we grasp even a shred of the science we'll realize that it is entirely irrelevant, for purposes of understanding anthropogenic climate change, that carbon dioxide is a natural gas, just as it's irrelevant that CO2 comprises only a tiny fraction of Earth's atmosphere. Unfortunately, despite their utter irrelevance, prominent individuals have offered both these observations as apparent challenges to climate science.

In the third section, we'll consider influences on public attitudes towards climate science, including what appear the most common given reasons for remaining agnostic.

When significant scientific consensus is concealed and the impression is created that particular claims are controversial within the relevant scientific community, dangerous and regrettable consequences follow. First, we produce a population that is less well informed that it should be. For all our cognitive failings and limitations, we are capable of grasping and understanding remarkable and astonishing features of our world, ourselves, our past, our co-inhabitants on this plant, living cells and the molecular machinery that drives them, distant galaxies and stars, and the forces that move, shape, alter and maintain everything from the smallest constituents of matter to the fabric of the cosmos. Not everyone cares to invest significant time and energies tracking the moving frontiers of modern scientific investigation, but general scientific acumen would no doubt be improved if we were better at distinguishing worthwhile criticisms of modern scientific conclusions from frivolous ones, if we learned to place a more appropriate level of confidence in our own abilities to evaluate complex issues and if we better appreciated both the unavoidable fallibility of scientific conclusions and yet also the complete and unambiguous compatibility between scientific fallibility and the existence of overwhelming evidence that, concerning particular scientific claims, we almost certainly are not wrong.

Levels of scientific literacy lower than they otherwise would be is one regrettable consequence of creating controversy. More practical consequences are also apparent. When we ignore expert opinion, we risk our health, our well-being and the quality of life of future generations. We should be vigilant and alert to the possibility that something might appear controversial and uncertain only because that appearance benefits a select few at the expense of a great many. Once we are suspicious that the appearance of controversy has been created, we should be extremely cautious about rejecting the conclusions of scientific consensus. We should be wary that our emotions, desires, overconfidence and personal experiences are playing an irrational and central role in our reasoning and judgement. We should seek the most reliable evidence, rather than settle for what's easiest to recall. We should evaluate arguments critically and consider the possibility that better explanations for cited evidence might be available but are unknown to us personally.

For several years I have enjoyed teaching an introductory college course that explored many of the issues discussed in this book. My thanks go out to all those students who have helped me think through these issues, who have challenged me to find better ways of explaining the material, and who have helped me see which aspects were of greater or lesser relevance. Several friends and colleagues were extremely generous with their time and talents, reading through large sections of the book, and providing wonderful feedback that greatly improved the book. Thanks in particular to Bob Schroer, Justin Sytsma, Matt Lund, Dave Hilbert, Nick Huggett and Bob Fischer. Parts of the book were presented to audiences in Durham, Leeds and Bristol. I am very grateful to those who made these events possible, and to those who attended and offered helpful questions and discussion. An anonymous referee from Cambridge University Press made several excellent suggestions that I'm sure have made the book better. My editors, Hilary Gaskin and Rosemary Crawley, were incredibly helpful with the book's preparation, for which I am very grateful. My thanks are also owed to the College of Arts and Science at East Tennessee State University, for awarding me a Summer Research Fellowship in 2014, which helped in the final stages of writing. My sister and parents have always provided enormous encouragement and support. There are many reasons why this book wouldn't have been written if it wasn't for them. Finally, my wife is a perennial source of inspiration and optimism. With respect to this project she was always willing to offer support, advice and reassurance. For the many ways she enriches my life I am indebted.