Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science (Popular Science)

Rating:
Summary: Science as a religion...
Review: This is an amusing and ultimately very flawed book. At a time when the theory of the big-bang is heavily questioned and doubted, when gravity is now perceived as possibly being something other as what we've defined it by now, when Hawking is revising his up to now theories about black holes, when there's several -stil- missing links about human history which puzzle and throw into dissaray current anthropology (i could on and on for several pages), when it's become a proven fact that the Sphinx has water erosion marks, and on top of that, when one knows the literally countless cases where scientific theories such as the ones M.Gardner collapsed comically under the influence of new and old evidence, books like this can only be viewed with extreme scepticism at best.

The fact that certain scientists view science as a new religion is disturbing enough. That the public does so burdened by the pressures of the scientific community who will allegorically burn anyone at the stake who dares disagree with their official dogma is even more worrying.

Gardner has put together a collection of essays which are supposedly "defending science" and are battling crank theories and pseudoscience. That sounds like a noble cause but the problem is that for the most part Gardner uses theories that could be as shaky as the ones he attacks. The examples are too many to list down here.

A very effective antidote to ultra-dogmatic books like this is Charles Fort's books. As well as any independent or open-minded investigator who knows that science is as fallible as anyone else.

I still recommend this book though as a reference point on how religious-like dogma can infiltrate the ranks of those who put themselves high up on a podium to be the new messiahs wearing white robes. On that it serves as a perfect example.