One of the less obvious but seriously detrimental consequences of the Bush administration's betrayal of the public trust is the sowing of distrust of anything associated with "the establishment".  This has unfortunately spread into the realm of the sciences, and now almost every official governmental report issued by NASA, NOAA, USGS, CDC; as well as nongovernmental but peer-reviewed study, is called into question.  A certain degree of skepticism is not without cause.  Many of the government institutions we had traditionally trusted to remain nonpolitical and secular have been deliberately infiltrated by the Bush administration in an effort to convert them into tools of policy rather than tools of science.  Unfortunately this skepticism has grown into a cancer, and has indiscriminately metastasized to the very heart of well-established science.


An open-minded scientist should never dismiss alternative theories or any other unconventional hypotheses without question.  The “conventional wisdom”  - and I dislike this term - has been wrong many times in the past, and it will be wrong again if closed-minded individuals accept their views as sacrosanct dogma.  Good science does not enthrone its working theories, but rather seeks to always put them to the test.  As a result of this perpetual introspection, modern scientific “conventional wisdom” has been surprisingly accurate, otherwise it would not have become the “conventional wisdom” in the first place.


The strength of science is that it does not rely upon faith or emotion in its attempt to construct a framework to describe reality.  A hypothesis to explain an observed phenomenon is put forward; it is tested empirically; and if the hypothesis fails the test (i.e. results of the test contradict the hypothesis), the hypothesis is discarded.   That is the scientific method, and a scientist is obligated to apply the scientific method to all claims challenging established scientific theories.  If a claim cannot be tested through lack of data, it is neither proven nor refuted:  it remains conjecture and does not replace the established empirically proven scientific body of knowledge.  For instance, if there is a perceived reluctance of scientists to get behind the theory of "global dimming", that is because the claims of this theory do not stand up to experimentation using climatological models, not because science is closed minded to revolutionary ideas.  The theory is merely conjecture at best, or simply false.  It is not closed-mindedness to insist upon a rigorous application of the scientific method to theories like “global dimming”; it is a requirement to maintain the objectivity of science.  (Note that science was not closed minded to Galileo's revolutionary ideas about the cosmos; it was the church.)


We are all looking for answers.  Traditionally we have looked to established scientific organizations and governmental agencies as a reservoir of unbiased, dispassionate, well-researched knowledge. In an era of shaken faith in these established institutions, and in response to the vacuum of reliable non-politicized information at our disposal, it is only natural that we turn to other sources for our truth. Religious conservatives tend to turn to the Bible, and at that point, an appeal to logic and reason is often a lost cause.  Secular liberals, on the other hand, tend to turn to the iconoclasts.  These iconoclasts are often offering intellectually honest alternative ways of thinking, but many others offer a well-crafted, sometimes self-serving, semi-plausible, pseudoscience myth (the best lies are often concealed with enough truths to make the whole pill much easier to swallow).  Both types of iconoclasts are surrounded by the usual retinue of noble truth-seekers and conniving opportunists looking for a good venue to air out their own pet conspiracies.  


Critical thinking, healthy skepticism, and rationality are more important than ever under the circumstances set forth above. The Internet is a fantastic tool for research and information gathering, however the information is, for better or worse, unfiltered; and the water of knowledge pouring forth through our monitors contains many contaminants. It is relatively difficult to create a hypothesis, test it through rigorous application of the scientific method and well-designed experimentation, publish the test results in the established scientific forums, and survive the rigors of peer-review.  But it is this very process that assures that the information disseminated is reliable and as close to the truth as we can verify.  On the other hand, it is extremely simple to create a web page called TheTruth.com and claim that all contents found within are the absolute truth, but the establishment doesn’t want you to know.  It is an even easier sell when the track record of the current establishment is in the business of keeping secrets from you.  Whether the conspiracy theory of 9-11 being an inside job is true or not, the one thing for sure is that there is a conspiracy to keep the truth from you.


Once relegated to the graveyard hours of talk radio, we are now having primetime conversations about chemtrails, perpetual motion machines, mind control, microscopic engines within rocks, and Anglo-American Zionist conspiracies to keep the technology of intergalactic aliens out of the hands of the rest of mankind (I am not making this stuff up).  The phenomenon of Woo Woo science, once an amusing diversion, has become a serious distraction at best and a pernicious impediment to rational thinking at worst.  We face extremely serious issues at the present time.  Our democracy is slipping towards fascism; we are at risk of responding to the toxic fallout of a disastrous preemptive war by embarking upon an even larger scale catastrophic preemptive war; our national debt is at an all-time high and our public/private financial security is at an all-time low; our infrastructure is crumbling while our investments in the future are being neglected; our health-care system in failing millions of Americans, our educational system is mediocre and declining; and our traditional lead in science and technology is a glory of the past.  It is not closed minded to believe that under these circumstances, creating fires were there is no smoke is an indulgence we cannot afford.  


Conspiracies have and always will abound. Some of these conspiracies will turn out to the real; many more will eventually be revealed as fanciful constructions meant to prey upon our shared uncertainties, fears, and prejudices for personal gain; or to promulgate the conspiratorial paranoia of a select few. We need to proceed ahead on the basis of evidence and not feeling, otherwise we are no better than the unthinking emotional followers of demagogues like George W. Bush.