Uncertainty

de Kostas Kampourakis, Kevin McCain

"Scientific knowledge is the most solid and robust kind of knowledge that humans have because of the self-correcting character inherent in its own processes. Nevertheless, anti-evolutionists, climate denialists, and anti-vaxxers, among others, question some of the best-established scientific findings, making claims that are unsupported by empirical evidence. A common aspect of these claims is the reference to the uncertainties in these domains, which leads to the conclusion that science is uncertain about evolution, climate change, vaccination, and so on. However, this is inaccurate. The truth of the matter is that whereas the broad picture is clear, there exist - and will always exist - uncertainties about the details of the respective phenomena. In this book we show that uncertainty is an inherent feature of science that does not devalue it. In contrast, uncertainty actually makes science advance because it motivates further research. This is the first book on this topic that draws on philosophy of science to explain what uncertainty in science is and how it makes science advance. It contrasts evolution, climate change, and vaccination, where the uncertainties are exaggerated, and genetic testing and forensic science where the uncertainties are usually overlooked. The goal is to discuss the scientific, psychological, and philosophical aspects of uncertainty in order to explain what it really is, what kind of problems it actually poses, and why in the end it makes science advance. Contrary to public representations of scientific findings and conclusions that produce an intuitive, but distorted, view of science as certain, people need to understand and learn to live with uncertainty in science"--