For those of you who have followed me for any period of time, you know I am very pro-science. I believe in learning science, math, and everything under the STEM umbrella. Obviously computer science is my specialty, but today I want to talk about the importance of science even if you are not planning to dedicate your life to it.

You do not need a PhD in biology or particle physics to appreciate how the scientific method works. You just need a basic foundation. That is enough to sharpen your internal bullshit detector better than someone who spent science class peeling glue off their hands.

I recently had an argument with a friend on Facebook who said, "You shouldn't blindly trust scientists." And I agree, you shouldn't blindly trust anyone. But this person was suggesting that the scientific community as a whole could not be trusted. That is where I draw the line.

One of the most beautiful things about the scientific process is that scientists love to prove each other wrong. If you can show a flaw in a long-held theory, congratulations, go collect your Nobel Prize. Scientists are not operating in some secret cabal to deceive the world. They publish their findings, which get peer-reviewed and often challenged by other scientists. It is the opposite of blind faith. It is structured skepticism.

Can you trust every individual scientist? No. But can you trust the process, the method, the structure, the collective weight of repeated, validated evidence? Yes. That is what science is.

Of course, not everyone can be an expert in everything. The days of the Renaissance Man are long gone. Nobody alive today can know everything about all the fields of science. That is why we specialize. There are experts in neuroscience, in physics, in botany, and yes, even in Microsoft Access. We rely on specialists. That does not mean we accept everything without question. But we should accept that people who devote their lives to understanding a topic probably know more about it than someone who skimmed a blog post. And no, "I did my research" does not mean you watched a YouTube video and suddenly became an expert.

Even in tech, I see this. When I first got into the computer business, I knew just about everything there was to know about personal computers from a user standpoint. But that was the 90s. Now the tech world has split into a million subfields. I know Access and VBA very well, but I know very little about Python or modern web development. Things change, and you have to pick your specialty. And you have to trust the people who know more than you do in those other areas.

The beauty of science is that if you really wanted to learn it yourself, you could. If you truly do not trust your neurologist, you could study neuroscience and prove them wrong. It would take years, but it is possible. That is the strength of science. It is knowable. It is reproducible. It does not require faith, it requires work.

And yes, sometimes science changes. But that is not science being wrong. That is science improving. We once thought the planets orbited in perfect circles. Then we learned they move in ellipses. That is not a failure of science. That is the entire point of science.

We need to teach more science in schools. Not because everyone needs to become a physicist, but because a basic understanding of science teaches you how to think critically. Sometimes people say, "Well, I'm 45 years old and I've never once used calculus or trigonometry in real life." And that may be true. But the point of learning those subjects is not to use them directly. The point is that they train your brain to think logically, to follow steps and rules, and to solve problems methodically. That kind of training wires your mind to succeed later in life.

It gives you that inner voice that says, "Wait a minute, that headline sounds off." When you see an article that says, "A study suggests eating 15 eggs a day turns you into the Hulk," you will pause. You will realize that one study, often with a small sample size, does not overturn everything we already know. But those are the headlines that get clicks. The corrections, the retractions, the follow-ups, they do not sell.

That is why we need to be skeptical, but informed. Not skeptical because we read something on a meme, but skeptical because we understand the structure of how knowledge is built.

And yeah, trust the science. Not necessarily the individual. But the method. The process. The peer review. The community.

This comes up all the time in Star Trek. There are plenty of episodes where the crew visits a primitive society that is technologically stagnant. Sometimes those societies reject help, and the crew has to honor the Prime Directive and not interfere, even when it means watching a planet mess up its own future. Other times, like that one episode where Picard had to prove to a group of people that he was not a god, he allowed himself to be shot with an arrow to make a point. That gentle nudge helped steer their society toward a more rational and scientific future.

Because that is what progress looks like. A little more light. A little more truth.

So no, you cannot learn all the science. But you can learn enough to sniff out nonsense. And that skill might be one of the most valuable ones you ever develop.

LLAP
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