Considering Sagan's actual Baloney Detection Kit

A couple weeks back when I reviewed Steele's What’s Natural? column regarding Carl Sagan’s advice, I took Steele’s quotes at face value, though I had some doubts.  Since then I've done some checking and the differences are striking and worth sharing.

One thing worth pointing out is that Jim ignores that the Baloney Detection Kit was about how scientists view problems and that laypeople could learn from that.  One thing that bothers me about Steele's take, is that he's always implying spectators and dilettantes are as smart as actual trained experienced experts. 

Here I simply want to allow Carl Sagan's own words to speak for him, though with an introduction from Maria Popova:

Through their training, scientists are equipped with what Sagan calls a “baloney detection kit” — a set of cognitive tools and techniques that fortify the mind against penetration by falsehoods:

The kit is brought out as a matter of course whenever new ideas are offered for consideration. If the new idea survives examination by the tools in our kit, we grant it warm, although tentative, acceptance. …

The Baloney Detection Kit: Carl Sagan’s Rules for Bullshit-Busting and Critical Thinking     -      

BY MARIA POPOVA

https://www.brainpickings.org/2014/01/03/baloney-detection-kit-carl-sagan/

… But the kit, Sagan argues, isn’t merely a tool of science — rather, it contains invaluable tools of healthy skepticism that apply just as elegantly, and just as necessarily, to everyday life. By adopting the kit, we can all shield ourselves against clueless guile and deliberate manipulation. Sagan shares nine of these tools:

1. Wherever possible there must be independent confirmation of the “facts.”

What’s natural about Steele’s take on Carl Sagan?- 97% - Pacifica Tribune 2/20

A study guide to Jim Steele’s  “What’s Natural?”, featured in the Pacifica Tribune.

What’s Natural? (#5)  Jim Steele, Pacifica Tribune, February 20, 2019

The Scientific Baloney Detection Kit. 

This is the second half of the previous post, please refer to it for an introduction.  

Basically Jim Steele is lecturing us on how to interpret Carl Sagan’s Baloney Detection Kit.  It promises to be an insightful journey into the workings of the libertarian deception.  

REPRINTED UNDER PROTECTION OF FAIR USE COPYRIGHT LAWS.  

My intention is a point by point review of libertarian deception in action.

(please click on image for sharp view)

Before we begin, let me share Sagan's (or was it Dr. Richard Feynman) sage advice for us science spectators: “Keep an open mind, but not so open that your brain falls out!”

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Jim Steele writes:  “To overcome our biases and strive for a greater scientific truth, our discussions will be well served if guided by Sagan's principles. Below I paraphrase the most pertinent points in Sagan's Scientific Baloney Detection Kit. (I add my comments in parentheses.)” 

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Wait a minute.  Check out what’s going on here, reread that first line.

“To overcome our biases” and “striving for a greater scientific truth.” Those are two very different things and must be recognized as such. 

Carl Sagan’s book was written to and for us regular people, non-scientists, we who look at the scientific community and their studies from the outside.   

Recognize that not everyone can be an Earth scientist.  It takes a particular perspective on life and a burning curiosity to understand nature, along with a disciplined character that’s always striving for greater scientific truth.  

The point I’m trying to get across is that before we can continue with this discussion - we must openly recognize who’s who.

What’s natural about Steele’s baloney kit #1 - via Pacifica Tribune 2/20

Apparently, Jim Steele's What's Natural? column is a weekly affair.  This week he cancelled his promised Changing Sea Levels #2 and instead shares pointers from Carl Sagan in his What's Natural? "The Scientific Baloney Detection Kit" Feb. 20th, Pacific Tribune.  It promises to offers an interesting journey into the mindscape of double standards and blindspots.  I'm limiting this post to his introduction which offered it's own share of talking points.  Then I'll be looking into Sagan's specific points in a later posting.

REPRINTED UNDER PROTECTION OF FAIR USE COPYRIGHT LAWS.  

My intention is a point by point review of libertarian deception in action.

(please click on image for sharp view)

Jim Steele writes: "Politicians from all sides manufacture "crises" and "demons" to promote their agendas superficially designed to fight those crises."

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Okay, no arguing that.  So far so good.

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"In his book “The Demon Haunted World," Carl Sagan famously published his Scientific Baloney Detection Kit, a "do and don’t" list to guide honest scientific inquiry." 

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Wait a minute.  How did we get from “Politicians” to “Scientific Inquiry” via a book written for laypeople?

In the book Sagan “aims to explain the scientific method to laypeople, and to encourage people to learn critical and skeptical thinking.” (WIKI)

Serious scientific inquiry is something that only the learned can do.  Of course, one can be self-taught.  But expert status in any field demands, learning, acquiring real knowledge, skills and experience.  

That is quite different from being a spectator trying to understand what the scientists and experts are talking about.

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"Sadly, climate science has been too politicized. But Sagan's advice can help separate the politics from honest science regards claims of a "climate crisis.”"

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Here again Steele strives to coalesce science with politics and public spin - that is deceptive nonsense.

Sagan’s advice is for us laypeople to develop some critical thinking skills in order to better recognize our thoughts and what to look for as we assess the various claims being tossed at us.

What drives scientists? - Richard Alley's Golden Nugget

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_WLArrksB4

UQx Denial101x Making Sense of Climate Science Denial

Published on Aug 24, 2015

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"The very foundation of scientific inquiry demands a vigorous skeptical challenge to every hypothesis. Several different hypotheses can explain the same phenomena. Anyone, scientist or layperson, can make assertions and models." 

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No Jim.  Not anyone can make assertions about climate models and other complex aspects of climate science.  It may work in that Hollywood world so many seem to be inhabiting, but not in the real physical world that we depend on for our life support systems.