Upholding the Value of Expertise

Michael White at Adaptive Complexity responds to a recent Huffington Post piece written by Terry Newell, which bashes "the democratization of science," saying "who cares what the experts say?" Newell argues that relying on individuals' expertise fosters "skewed judgments on complex questions." He adds, "A majority that feels it can safely ignore science can create far more havoc than science itself, and it will then be woefully ill-equipped for the twenty-first century." White writes in response that because, by nature, "any science is incomplete and imperfect," and because scientists still "have to make decisions about policy, about your health, about business plans, about things that matter to society," inevitably "few people come out of that process looking clean, but that does not mean expertise has no value."