Hansson Sven Ove
Department of Philosophy and History, Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Brinellvägen 32, 100 44 Stockholm, Sweden.
Stud Hist Philos Sci. 2017 Jun;63:39-47. doi: 10.1016/j.shpsa.2017.05.002. Epub 2017 May 31.
Science denialism poses a serious threat to human health and the long-term sustainability of human civilization. Although it has recently been rather extensively discussed, this discussion has rarely been connected to the extensive literature on pseudoscience and the science-pseudoscience demarcation. This contribution argues that science denialism should be seen as one of the two major forms of pseudoscience, alongside of pseudotheory promotion. A detailed comparison is made between three prominent forms of science denialism, namely relativity theory denialism, evolution denialism, and climate science denialism. Several characteristics are identified that distinguish science denialism from other forms of pseudoscience, in particular its persistent fabrication of fake controversies, the extraordinary male dominance among its activists, and its strong connection with various forms of right-wing politics. It is argued that the scientific response to science denialism has to be conceived with these characteristics in mind. In particular, it is important to expose the fabricated fake controversies for what they are and to reveal how science denialists consistently use deviant criteria of assent to distort the scientific process.
科学否认主义对人类健康以及人类文明的长期可持续性构成了严重威胁。尽管最近对此进行了较为广泛的讨论，但这种讨论很少与关于伪科学及科学与伪科学划界的大量文献联系起来。本文认为，科学否认主义应被视为伪科学的两种主要形式之一，与伪理论宣扬并列。文章对科学否认主义的三种突出形式，即相对论否认主义、进化论否认主义和气候科学否认主义进行了详细比较。确定了一些将科学否认主义与其他形式的伪科学区分开来的特征，特别是其持续制造虚假争议、其活跃分子中男性占绝对主导以及它与各种形式的右翼政治的紧密联系。文章认为，对科学否认主义的科学回应必须考虑到这些特征。尤其重要的是，要揭露虚假争议的本来面目，并揭示科学否认者如何一贯使用异常的认同标准来扭曲科学过程。
