Key Insight
Update on Saturday, February 23, 2013 at 9:55AM In response to understandably mystified commentators: The post, in addition to being poorly executed, is … 1 part self-deprecation: Obviously, Stats Legend Andrew Gelman isn’t talking to or thinking about me at all. (BTW, subscribe to his blog if you don’t already; he is proof of Dewey’s point that science consists neither in an ... Read more
In response to understandably mystified commentators :
The post, in addition to being poorly executed, is …
No, no, no, no! Valid science does not communicate its own validity. It needs certification of its validity from forms of authority that are connected to the lives of everday people, whose wellbeing depends on their accepting as known by science more things than they can possible understand for themselves. Creating and coordinating those systems of certifcation is extremely challenging in a liberal demcoratic society . We must therefore use an appropriately directed science — a science of science communication — to overcome the challenges or else we risk dissipating the value of all the knowledge that science gives us.
So my reaction isn’t really narcissitic. But it certainly is evidence of an impending nervous breakdown of some kind.