Science is increasingly facing problems with its ability to communicate ideas publicly, a problem that politicians, and flat-Earthers, are able to circumvent with moves towards populism.
You have people paying taxes to support research. Then you take the money and allocate it to researchers through a process that is essentially a biased lottery. And then you have researchers publish the results in journals that require you to pay to see them. Gee, I wonder why people are skeptical!
You see, a lot of scientists don’t like this system either (except maybe those that have gotten to the top of their field by exploiting it). But we need to play under its rules because otherwise we lose our jobs or, if tenured, get condemned to a lifetime of soul-crushing administrative work and/or excessive teaching. That doesn’t mean that we’re trying to deceive the public or are part of a dark conspiracy, we just do the best we can under a system driven by greed.
You have people paying taxes to support research. Then you take the money and allocate it to researchers through a process that is essentially a biased lottery. And then you have researchers publish the results in journals that require you to pay to see them. Gee, I wonder why people are skeptical!
You see, a lot of scientists don’t like this system either (except maybe those that have gotten to the top of their field by exploiting it). But we need to play under its rules because otherwise we lose our jobs or, if tenured, get condemned to a lifetime of soul-crushing administrative work and/or excessive teaching. That doesn’t mean that we’re trying to deceive the public or are part of a dark conspiracy, we just do the best we can under a system driven by greed.