Consensus Doesn't Equal Science

“Whenever you hear the consensus of scientists agrees on something or other, reach for your wallet, because you’re being had.”

So said the late Michael Crichton during a guest lecture at CalTech. Crichton, a medical doctor, is best known for his brilliant science fiction including Jurassic Park, Westworld, and The Andromeda Strain.

There is claimed to be consensus about climate change among learned scientists. One headline from the Cornell Chronicle reads: “More than 99.9% of studies agree: Humans caused climate change.”

The article’s lead author claims “[Man-made climate change] is really case closed. There is nobody of significance in the scientific community who doubts human-caused climate change,” This headline has been parroted by NASA, the European Commission and the Guardian. (Those who dispute consensus include Prager U and Forbes.)

Consensus was used as a reason to stifle debate during the COVID crisis. Facebook and YouTube saw opposition to the government narrative as disinformation. Posts against consensus were censored and users were banned.

Pre-Musk Twitter had a policy concerning tweets about climate change: “Misleading advertisements on #Twitter that contradict the scientific consensus on #climatechange are prohibited, in line with its inappropriate content policy.”

The word pairing “scientific consensus” is a destructive science-stifling oxymoron.

Here’s some more wisdom from Michael Crichton’s guest lecture at CalTech.

“Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled …  “Let’s be clear: the work of science has nothing whatever to do with consensus. Consensus is the business of politics. Science, on the contrary, requires only one investigator who happens to be right, which means that he or she has results that are verifiable by reference to the real world. In science, consensus is irrelevant. … The greatest scientists in history are great precisely because they broke with the consensus. There is no such thing as consensus science. If it’s consensus, it isn’t science. If it’s science, it isn’t consensus. Period.”

Albert Einstein agrees. In 1931 the Nazi movement promoted the book One Hundred Authors Against Einstein. Einstein’s theories were labeled “Jewish physics” in Hitler’s Germany. Einstein’s response, paraphrased, was "If I were wrong, it would only take one." Einstein’s was right and the consensus of the 100 scientists was wrong. Indeed, Einstein’s famous equation being questioned, E = mc², led to invention of the atomic bomb that ended WWII.

Claims of scientific consensus often lead to ultimate embarrassment. Take, for example, Professor Peter Gunter who, in 1970, defended an alarming claim with an appeal to consensus:

“Demographers agree almost unanimously on the following grim timetable…. By the year 2000, or conceivably sooner, South and Central America will exist under famine conditions…. By the year 2000, thirty years from now, the entire world, with the exception of Western Europe, North America, and Australia, will be in famine.”

There have been famines since Gunter’s 1970 prophesy. But they sporadically occur locally due to droughts, war and politics. Gunter’s appeal to global famine was wrong and he will be primary remembered in history for wrongness of his consensus-based claim.

Some who bucked scientific consensus have made world-changing discoveries. Here’s one:

For a long time the medical consensus was that peptic ulcers were caused by stress and lifestyle factors. Two Australian researchers, however, came to believe ulcers were caused by bacteria.

Barry J. Marshall and Robin Warren’s claim was so far outside of consensus that no scientist believed them. Besides, they were both from the University of Western Australia. Everyone knows that great medical breakthroughs come from Harvard, Johns Hopkins and Stanford — not a small insignificant institution isolated in the city of Perth on the western shore of Australia.

Sure of their theory, Marshall underwent a gastric biopsy to demonstrate that he had no ulcer. Then he infected himself with bacteria and formed an ulcer. When he cured himself with antibiotics and bismuth salt regimens his theory was proved.

Marshall’s dedication to disproving consensus was, as they say, beyond the call. Marshall and Warren were awarded a Nobel Prize for ignoring scientific consensus and thinking and acting creatively outside the box.

Here’s another example from Albert Einstein: At the tender age of 26 he challenged consensus in his development of relativity.

For one thing, the speed of light was widely viewed to be relative to the speed of the observer with respect to the light source. Einstein abandoned this consensus. He theorized the speed of light was a constant independent of the relative speeds of the light source and the observer.

Further, it was known that sound waves need air or some other media to propagate. Scientists during the time of Einstein believed electromagnetic waves like light need some similar media in outer space and assumed something called aether was the propagation media.

Motivated by the Michelson-Morley experiment, Einstein correctly hypothesized there was no aether. Einstein bucked consensus and the theory of relativity was born.

I don’t pretend to know the right answer to many of today’s scientific debates. I do know that “if it’s consensus, it isn’t science.” Be it global warming or COVID, let the debate continue until the evidence is overwhelming.