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Is America the most brainwashed country on Earth?/least scientific belief

Estonia, Poland, Switzerland, Hungary, Norway, Denmark all ranked higher science scoring and higher % of Christians.
 
Swiss Christians and U.S. Christians are ... not the same. There's more at play than a shared belief in Christ. Townie knows this, though.
 
bigdoublezero said:
Swiss Christians and U.S. Christians are ... not the same. There's more at play than a shared belief in Christ. Townie knows this, though.
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I think it's probably telling towards their rationalist epistemology, too.
 
PhDeac said:
Both reasons why those of us in academia need to write up our own press releases and do a better job of teaching students in our intro courses how to interpret research and engage in the appropriate critical thinking. They may end up writing about or reading about our findings someday.
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Agreed. Crazy thing is I wrote that press release but it didn't matter once it got sent to the copy editor. Needless to say I now make it clear that I will have final say on the edits of the press release. My boss and I actually had radio and newspaper interviews about the work and it was really awkward for me because she stood behind the changes and went with it. I was stuck as a 5th year graduate student sitting next to her feeling like I was falsifying my own findings.

And you are absolutely right about needing to focus more on how to properly critique and analyze papers rather than just reading them. The most beneficial course I ever took as a graduate student was solely focused on us doing mock reviews of papers (some published, some actually out for review). Over the course of a semester, it was amazing how much my perspective changed on how I approached analyzing the literature. Knowledge based courses are absolutely required but, at least in the biomedical sciences, a lot of the curriculum has seemed to ignore the philosophy portion of the doctor of philosophy. It has become so research focused that many students get through will minimal training on how to actually think like a scientist. That is great for making a bunch of competent researchers but it is very bad at preparing independent scientists. I just got the responses to my reviewer comments for a paper back and the difference between myself and the other two reviewers illustrates how bad critical analysis of papers has become in some cases. I highlighted almost 10 major errors, including inconsistency among data sets and conclusions that didn't match the data presented, that required addition of 5 experiments and numerous editorial changes to the paper. The other two reviewers? They suggested it be accepted with no revision. Good scientists can disagree but there is simply no way for 3 scientists to critically read a paper for review and the outcome be what it was in this case (for those not involved in peer review, I would say less than 10%, probably even lower actually, of papers are accepted without revision). Too many faculty and post-docs (especially post-docs) seem to mail it on on these reviews. That of course leads to more articles needing correction, or even retraction, post publication which further damages the reputation of science.
 
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I think we had this conversation before on the pit, maybe the Bill Nye thread where he calls out people? I think the conclusion with that was Christian doesn't equal Christian because no other country has the Southern Baptists and the like, who are probably the biggest science opponents.
 
BigTreeDeac said:
Agreed. Crazy thing is I wrote that press release but it didn't matter once it got sent to the copy editor. Needless to say I now make it clear that I will have final say on the edits of the press release. My boss and I actually had radio and newspaper interviews about the work and it was really awkward for me because she stood behind the changes and went with it. I was stuck as a 5th year graduate student sitting next to her feeling like I was falsifying my own findings.

And you are absolutely right about needing to focus more on how to properly critique and analyze papers rather than just reading them. The most beneficial course I ever took as a graduate student was solely focused on us doing mock reviews of papers (some published, some actually out for review). Over the course of a semester, it was amazing how much my perspective changed on how I approached analyzing the literature. Knowledge based courses are absolutely required but, at least in the biomedical sciences, a lot of the curriculum has seemed to ignore the philosophy portion of the doctor of philosophy. It has become so research focused that many students get through will minimal training on how to actually think like a scientist. That is great for making a bunch of competent experimenters but it is very bad at preparing independent researchers. I just got the responses to my reviewer comments for a paper back and the difference between myself and the other two reviewers illustrates how bad critical analysis of papers has become in some cases. I highlighted almost 10 major errors, including inconsistency among data sets and conclusions that didn't match the data presented, that required addition of 5 experiments and numerous editorial changes to the paper. The other two reviewers? They suggested it be accepted with no revision. Good scientists can disagree but there is simply no way for 3 scientists to critically read a paper for review and the outcome be what it was in this case (for those not involved in peer review, I would say less than 10% of papers are accepted without revision). Too many faculty and post-docs (especially post-docs) seem to mail it on on these reviews. That of course leads to more articles needing correction, or even retraction, post publication which further damages the reputation of science.
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This is huge. Great post. Ever read Ferric Fang? He's a good follow.
 
The peer review process is a joke. Good post, BigTree. I'll rant about peer review another time.
 
TownieDeac said:
This is huge. Great post. Ever read Ferric Fang? He's a good follow.
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I am very familiar with his work and have met him a few times. As an Immunologist, I try to know the main editors of the big journals I submit to. I'll take any advantage I can get. I also know Arturo Casadevall who co-wrote the PLoS One article with him about why retractions have increased.
 
TownieDeac said:
Estonia, Poland, Switzerland, Hungary, Norway, Denmark all ranked higher science scoring and higher % of Christians.
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bigdoublezero said:
Swiss Christians and U.S. Christians are ... not the same. There's more at play than a shared belief in Christ. Townie knows this, though.
Click to expand...

I think % of evangelicals is probably a more revealing statistic.
 
Lets not forget the leader in Pentecostal snake healers.

hunterbarnes3-thumb-468x317-27470.jpg
 
bigdoublezero said:
Yeah, things have really sucked since 1985. Fuck science.
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Well, it has sucked on many counts smartass...If I wake tomorrow to find eggs are on the outs again it won't surprise.

Just 2 weeks ago researchers at the NIH came out and said that there is positively no discernible link between Trans fats and heart disease. None. They said go eat fried chicken till your heart is content.

And don't be your usual jackass...I'm anticipating here. If you need more examples then the ignorant junk man is more than happy to bury your ass in them.
 
TownieDeac said:
I think it's probably telling towards their rationalist epistemology, too.
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Also a very homogenous society. We give a wide berth for the freedom of cultural identity to a very broad spectrum of nationalities.
 
Bigtreedeac wrote:

"I once had the statement in a press release about the ultimate conclusion of my graduate work changed from "identified a pathway critical for controlling oral fungal infections" to "team of researchers have identified cure for deadly fungal infections". I neither found a cure nor was the actual infection in question particularly fatal (really not fatal at all) but hey, it sounds better for the University. I didn't find out about the edits until after it was published."

Sounds like they graduated to climate science.

And thanks, Ph, for clarifying that the peer review process is bullshit. That's precisely what Lovelock and a multitude of world class scientists have said about the review process surrounding climate change.
 
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Lectro proves the thread title's point a thousand times over on the Tunnels.
 
TownieDeac said:
Lectro proves the thread title's point a thousand times over on the Tunnels.
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You and your brethren here are easily the most ignorant reps of just about any website I visit.

I mean you guys are just gulls...and your lazy on top of that.
 
"Science is the belief in the ignorance of the experts" – Richard Feynman
 
"your lazy on top of it"

I work in science lec. Not a junkyard.
 
Lectro said:
Well, it has sucked on many counts smartass...If I wake tomorrow to find eggs are on the outs again it won't surprise.

Just 2 weeks ago researchers at the NIH came out and said that there is positively no discernible link between Trans fats and heart disease. None. They said go eat fried chicken till your heart is content.

And don't be your usual jackass...I'm anticipating here. If you need more examples then the ignorant junk man is more than happy to bury your ass in them.
Click to expand...

So you're not just a climate skeptic but fully anti-science? Call me crazy, but science has made life better in the past 30 years, confusion about the healthfulness of eggs notwithstanding. Either that or we have pretty different thresholds for the suckiness of life.
 
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