 Hi, welcome back to history and philosophy of science and medicine. I'm Matt Brown. Today we're going to talk a little bit about trust in science so Let's let's think about what it what it means for To use science and decision-making Public policy or just personal medical decision-making for example It requires number one that you know what the science says, right? You have to have the scientific information Available to you and you have to understand it, right? Okay number two You have to see that that You have to you have to trust That scientific information you have to see that the that there are good reasons to believe The information that you have and the advice that it's based on and number three you have to accept some connection between the information and Some some form of action, right? So it's not enough for example for scientists to tell us that That that our release of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is causing global warming We also need to know that that's a bad thing and that there's we should do something to stop that, right? If that information is true, which it is So we we we need to we need to be able to connect those things together, right? So when the scientists recommend for example that we we get vaccinated For measles mumps and rubella or for COVID-19 Number one we need to know What they're telling us right when they tell us that it's safe and effective and the the risks are this and that and They're minimal in this in that way, right? and we need to to trust that they're they're telling us the truth and that the they're Sort of they're giving us the right advice and then we need to Accept the value judgments and other factors that might connect the advice to action, right? now When when we have controversies like vaccine hesitancy or climate change denial Where there seems to be a disconnect between the science and the prescribed actions This there's all these are these are all these different ways that Things could be falling apart. We could not understand what the scientists are saying, right? We could be misinformed in some way We could believe that the that really scientists don't know what's going on with global warming or with vaccine safety We could Have full knowledge of what the scientific consensus is and just not trust it, right? Or we could not believe that we could not believe that The recommended action coheres with our with our values, right? So we might for example, believe that the climate is changing due to our actions and we might say well, you know five degrees warmer and massive biodiversity loss and ocean rising that sounds nice, right? I mean, hopefully we don't think that but but it's not logically incoherent, right? Now in terms of these disconnects by and large when the scientific community and and those who advocate for Science-based policies and scientific science-based decision-making tend to hone in on this first question of misinformation. They tend to think the public is ignorant scientifically illiterate and incapable of Processing the information they've been given or even misled by hostile actors preying on their ignorance and They have focused a lot of attention on that problem how to better inform the public how to create better public understanding of science through You know different ways of presenting the information Sort of infotainment to activities and other kinds of things of that sort Now I'm not gonna sit here and say that there is not information there's not misinformation out there. There aren't you know People who misunderstand the science but that in itself is not the sole situation and actually Public misunderstanding of science is is less bad than you might think right if you look at some of the data out there Now Maya Goldenberg in the case of Vaccines has argued that this is really missed the mark It's not so much that people don't understand what the scientists are telling them don't understand the science There's some of that but but not wholly the problem is is that they don't trust the scientists because Scientists typically are taking a public health perspective. They're looking at risk in the aggregate and benefit in the aggregate and Making decisions in that way and presenting information in that way, but What many parents as as decision-makers about childhood vaccinations in particular are worried about is Individual risk to their child and whether the risk-benefit calculation for their particular child is correct and There's there's a host of reasons why you might be worried about that And if you want to find out more information about that often what you're met with is this is this Answer that assumes you're just ignorant right assumes you don't understand what's going on assumes that you can't make educated decisions about risk but You know as as Goldenberg points out, right? You know, why do you want to put your child at risk, right? That that seems like bad parenting right you want to you know, okay, maybe the benefits outweigh the risks But who can who can explain that to me? How can we weigh those things? that's the kind of information that parents feel that they're not getting and so they seek it elsewhere and That's you know, how they become open to a certain kind of misinformation You might think about it and you know, we could we could we could go back and ask fire oven. Should we trust science, right? Fire oven might say look no you shouldn't trust science, right? Why because trust makes you kind of dependent and You know Dependent on the sort of interest of the scientists What you should do is you should be a critical thinker and you should try to understand the science for yourself and make your own judgments Well as Heather Douglas argues That's really that's a that's a lot to ask, right? In fact, we are kind of dependent on the experts in a lot of cases to Help us understand things that are quite technical So what what we might instead be What we might instead focus on is Being critical trusters, right? That is thinking critically about whether scientists or the scientific or medical establishment is trustworthy, right and You know, one of the things that focusing on trust centers are thinking on is You know that it's that it's not just about information. It's not a purely epistemic question, right? Trust involves not just believing that The person you're trusting or in this case the group that you're trusting or the institution that you're trusting is honest It's going to deal truthfully, right? But also that They're they're they're going to act with integrity and that that, you know, they're going to Respond to your dependence upon them with the appropriate level of of care and concern You know, you might say that if you try, you know, if I trust someone to To to dogs it for me to watch my dogs, right? I not only have to believe that they're competent, you know, they know how to take care of a dog I also have to believe that they have the end my interests and the interests of my dogs at heart, right? and that's a that's an ethical kind of relationship that's an ethical commitment and If if they are if I think, you know, they know what to do But they're, you know, going to be distracted or they're not going to be focused on my My particular dogs, maybe they're focused on the the welfare of dogs in general And not the welfare of my particular dogs I might pick someone else the dog set, right? Because I want a dog sitter who's going to take care of my dogs, right? And I think it's similar. It's a similar worry With some parents and vaccines, right? And so What if Goldenberg is right about that then Concerns about the public understanding of science really need to be retooled in the direction of Fostering public trust of science and that's a two-way street, right? It's not just about better communication strategies to suggest trust but also it's a it's about Making sure that the activities and institutions of science have the right relationship to the public so that they are trustworthy In some cases, especially with with modern medicine, there are real work. There are real reasons to worry About that about say the role of financial conflicts of interest and the relationship between public health and individual decision-making So that's what we're talking about today. I hope that gives you a good Sense of what's at stake with these issues and I look forward to hearing what you think on Discord or in the comments of the video or in our live class Otherwise, I'll see you next time