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During the Renaissance and Industrial eras science was a way to remove superstition, religious misconception, and irrational fears. The scientific method was proved to be valid and available to anybody who had access to education anywhere in the world no matter what their personal beliefs were. This ultimately lead to a situation in which people trusted the scientists, peer reviewed scientific articles, and scientific magazines even if written by people who had no scientific backgrounds.

In capitalism, credibility is a valuable commodity and science and universities (mostly privately founded ones in the USA) have been targeted by it. Advertising agencies have been using slogans backed up by questionable scientific studies which claim that "if you drink orange juice you won't get a cold" or "a glass of wine everyday is good for digestion" or "eating or drinking specific foods will help prevent cancer." Some magazines claim that some scientists will try to make their studies look more promising or even fabricate data in order to get more funding. Ref here here here and in some cases cure to diseases won't be investigated because the whole business is based on exploiting the disease.

Jeremy Corbyn's brother Piers Corbyn is a MsC weather forecaster who claims that the very idea of human activity being the cause of global warming is a hoax and the scientific community has been corrupted. ref here He also states that some forecasts that predict sea levels rising dramatically are either fraudulent or exaggerated and a carbon tax is a sham.

Richard Gage is an experienced architect and founder of Architects for 9/11 truth which is a group of 3000+ architects and engineers (all with university degrees ref.here ) who demand a new investigation. This organisation also uses 9/11 family member victims ref here and here. They claim that WTC building 7 could not collapse in free-fall for nearly 4 seconds by gravity alone which is a physical impossibility (3rd law of motion), one of many anomalies found.

Psychology and methods of manipulation have been used in advertising blatantly to sell products, ideas, and even wars or shape leaders people vote for. Then again there seem to be no boundaries on how unethical you can be. Distrust in science and mass-media have turn out in cases in which parents decided not to vaccinate their children because of irrational fears. ref here

Are there any relevant authors who claim that penal responsibilities should be demanded or even the lost of academic credentials for those people who engage in such practices? Are there any relevant figures who talk about the credibility crisis the western world is going through?

"They who have put out the people's eyes reproach them of their blindness." John Milton

"Science is the great antidote to the poison of enthusiasm and superstition." Adam Smith

  • People may avoid creating the tools to silence people because they wouldn't want the wrong ones silenced? – christo183 Aug 13 '19 at 11:54
  • @christo183 Interesting point. Why not take those to a grand jury to dissipate doubts and give them the attention they demand? –  Aug 13 '19 at 13:05
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    On your claim that science is losing credibility: I think there's an argument to be made (perhaps not on SE) that this is because those who write about science (in advertising, the press, etc) are not very good at it, and tend to misrepresent the accurate scientific findings. – jhch Aug 13 '19 at 16:52
  • There was plenty of misrepresentation during Renaissance and Industrial age, it is nothing new. And criminalization is not always the best way to achieve the desired result. Given the vague boundary between embellishment and misrepresentation, and free speech concerns, [false advertising laws](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_advertising#Regulation_and_enforcement) are typically civil, not criminal, and aimed at deterrence. It would be even better if the public learned not to take advertising and pop-science at face value instead of relying on the government to police it. – Conifold Aug 13 '19 at 21:57
  • @Conifold when you use your official credentials to make a stand you are taking some responsibility. This historical distrust in politicians is now extended to scientists and mass-media and perhaps to justice, police, banking, military, etc. How does affect society when there is nobody you can trust? I guess too many people here just don't want to look into the abyss. –  Aug 14 '19 at 07:45
  • Trust is earned, and should not be awarded indiscriminately. "Politicians", "scientists" and "mass-media" are generalistic fictions, there are concrete people and media outlets, some more trustworthy than others. Access to information is much easier now than in the past, so trust-but-verify (looking into the author's background, cross-checking, etc.) is easier to do as well, but it does take effort. I am not saying the problem did not grow, but so did the means of dealing with it. Members of society need to take personal responsibility for maintaining their society to avoid the "abyss". – Conifold Aug 14 '19 at 07:57
  • @Conifold I agree with you that omission is also an action. Take for instance the minority 3000+ A&E. They are either brave but incompetent for defending a flawed theory or the majority of them (who are not part of the truth movement) are just cowards, apathetic or even indirect mass-murder criminal shills that won't do anything about it because of fear or excessive comfort. I guess the truth is told when it's no longer relevant, when it doesn't cause any hard feelings. –  Aug 14 '19 at 08:08
  • Ask yourself what you know with 'certainty' about the truth value the claims of 'scientific climate change? How would you describe the measuring devices, their placement globally, the amount of earths surface measured, the time spans covered and compared with to determine the validity of all of the above? If you do this you will find that there is only .00001% of the earth measured and that all of the truth value in climate change claims are all imagined projections. That is true. It is still important for all of us to 'believe' that this change is real and to act on it,NOW. It's just false. C –  Aug 16 '19 at 10:57
  • @CharlesMSaunders Thanks for the comment. The question is about the lost of credibility of the Scientific community not about 9/11 nor Climate changing nor vaccines. –  Aug 16 '19 at 11:17
  • @pbxman- the question began by asking if scientists or others who are naysayers of climate change should be vilified. My response was that anyone who supports the notion of climate change does so on a purely emotionally charged imaginary basis, because there IS no scientific measurement by any instrumentation available over any given historical time frame that PROVES that man-made climate change is an irrefutable fact. There are only a set of gullible 'believers' who pride themselves in debasing human achievements and acting as if we are self-destructive morons! CMS –  Aug 18 '19 at 19:48
  • @CharlesMSaunders The question is not about scientific facts but scientific credibility. Do you have a link with references on "credible" scientists who can back up your statements on climate change. –  Aug 21 '19 at 15:52

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An extensive List on wikipedia List_of_scientific_misconduct_incidents (nothing on global warming nor 9/11 considered by capitalistic mainstream media as mere "conspiracy theories")

Joachim Boldt (Germany), an anesthesiologist formerly based at the Justus Liebig University Giessen, was stripped of his professorship and criminally investigated for forgery in his research studies.Boldt has had 96 of his publications retracted...

Alfredo Fusco (Italy), a cancer researcher at the University of Naples, has since 2012 been under criminal investigation for fraud, including manipulation of images in his published studies.Fusco has had 21 of his publications retracted...

Supachai Lorlowhakarn (Thailand), an official at Thailand’s National Innovation Agency (NIA), plagiarized 80% of his PhD thesis concerning asparagus cultivation.[262] Lorlowhakarn was in 2012 found guilty of criminal forgery, had his PhD degree retracted, was fined, and received a six-month suspended jail sentence, but was not dismissed from NIA...

Added link to the question which has over 60 references below. here. Among those the most remarkable seem to be:

What can we learn from the Korean cloning fraud? Journal of Medical Ethics

Krimsky S (2007) When conflict-of-interest is a factor in scientific misconduct. Medicine and Law 26

According to an article by globalresearch

Private corporations have full and complete control over the proprietary research and trial data in their possession. This means they have the discretion to decide what data to release or not ref here

“The case against science is straightforward: much of the scientific literature, perhaps half, may simply be untrue.” Dr. Richard Horton

Books on the subject:

Russell, Bertrand. “Icarus or the Future of Science,”

9/11 as USA False Flag

Italian Nobel Prize winner (literature) Dario Fo in his last years defended that 9/11 was a false flag operation orchestrated by some mafia-style corrupt elements in the US government ref here There are no records of the Swedish Academy warning or threatening any awarded winner for doing such claims or misconduct.

In the case of Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth there are no records of any agency private or governmental trying to sue them for ethical misconduct. On the contrary they are working together with similar non-profit organisation called Lawyers' Committee for 9/11 Inquiry to take their case to the grand jury. ref here whose requests seem to have been continuously delayed or ignored.

At the Kent University in the UK on April 2014 the possibility of a controlled demolition was debated. Most professors in physics and chemistry showed a clear inclination towards the controlled demolition theory. ref here

Doctor J. Leroy Hulsey from the University of Alaska stated that there were 0 possibilities of building 7 collapsing only because of fire. ref here

Europhysics magazine published a Peer-reviewed articled in which 2 professors and 2 engineers refuting the official FEMA report. ref here This article was not covered by any mainstream media.

German Phd in Mathematics Ansgar Schneider refutes the official theory. ref here

Global Warming

There are no examples of scientists being retracted of their academic skills for their claims. Also there are no disclaimers in coastal real state sellers warning of the consequences of sea levels rising because of it nor in the bank mortgages loans.

Community
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  • Another aspect to consider would be the level of interconectedness of a particular claim. It would be easier to discredit/punish a scientist whose work is self-contained as opposed to one having based his research on the work of hundreds of others. I.e. it wouldn't work to dis-acclaim a quarter of the country's scientists all at once. As soon as non-scientific motivations enter the decision to make scientific claims the door is wide open for non-scientific reasons to pursue, _or not_, the truth of the matter. – christo183 Aug 14 '19 at 07:27
  • @christo183 in other words, you just don't want to accept the level of corruption of in the world nowadays in terms of "fake news, corruption in science and politics" –  Aug 14 '19 at 07:38
  • Play around with commas in that quote and see how many combinations make sense... :) - But in fairness, "corruption in science" may be a bit strong, and "compromise" a somewhat weak alternative. Truth is less important than funding, hence even the good guys are playing a dirty game... Point is your main question is extremely valid, but exploring it on a high level entails some very high stakes. – christo183 Aug 14 '19 at 08:14
  • @pbxMan- My point to you my friend is that you are the one who began this by making unsubstantiated and wooly generalized claims about misrepresentations. As a Spinoza specialist what I have learned from him is that many of us have a powerful predilection towards believing what we read when it matches our own belief system; but we are unaware of it. You must become the final arbiter of what is true or false.If you wish to act as a philosopher. So-called credible sources are discredited and purported scientific laws of nature are overturned and dismissed. We need a new standard of truth. CMS –  Aug 22 '19 at 21:35
  • @CharlesMSaunders interesting point. I'm familiar with motivated reasoning, cognitive dissonance, confirmation bias and some other flaws of the mind. Am I making misrepresentations or you don't want to consider other possible options? I believe you can't cure without a proper diagnosis and truth is needed here. BTW all my references are posted and there plenty of credible people "with university degrees" which old the same views as me. As for ae911truth I don't think they need extra lessons in physics perhaps most people do. There is no domino effect nowhere near the speed of free-fall. Thanks –  Aug 23 '19 at 06:31
  • @PbxMan- First, thank you for your responses and I must apologize for my half-baked comments in response to your thoughtful question. If you wouldn't mind. My work is in Spinoza's philosophy charlessaunders5.academia.edu. I visited your profile page and noticed the question on Descartes doubt. Spinoza was considered the leading expert on Descartes philosophy and wrote a book on it , Descartes Principles.In his philosophy he lambasted Descartes for hypocrisy. He said, we cannot doubt what we know to be true. His contention is that starting with doubt yields nothing. Look forward to more. CMS –  Aug 24 '19 at 20:34
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You might like to check out this website https://retractionwatch.com

It's fascinating the scams that scientist get up up to. They are, after all, just people.

You say - "Distrust in science and mass-media have turn out in cases in which parents decided not to vaccine their children because of irrational fears."

I would rather say that parents do this because of perfectly rational fears to do with the topic of your question.

I'm unsure why you mention Corbyn's brother or Richard Gage. I don't know the former, but the latter seems to be a fine example of someone employing science to counter propaganda and guesswork.

  • It's a good point. Many newspapers lead with misleading scare stories (the Daily Mail in the UK is particularly infamous). If those are your "evidence" then the fears are perfectly rational, in the same way as medieval peasants were perfectly rational in killing old women they thought were witches. The problem is the information sources (tabloids today, the Church back then) providing dodgy information. The problem is rarely scientists themselves, and when it is, their careers in science tend to be over as soon as they're found out. – Graham Aug 13 '19 at 21:56
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    You didn't answer the question, called anti-vaxxers "perfectly rational", and claimed that the 9/11 Commission report, FEMA's study, and the general consensus about what happened is "propaganda and guesswork" with no evidence or citation whatsoever. Yet somehow you are being upvoted. Philosophy's greatest weakness is its inability to reject nonsense and it shows here. – JounceCracklePop Aug 13 '19 at 22:11
  • @CarlLeth The answer is only 10 hours old you should give it more time. – Cell Aug 13 '19 at 22:56
  • @Graham People often do not realize how long it can take to read an article, hence if you know that the author has a fraudulent past you will not waste the potential hours upon days to understand it regardless of its truthfulness. Most articles are also very poorly written to be understood but rather a correct (formal) representation of the result. So it takes a certain amount of trust to become a highly-cited researcher, rather than being correct or not. – Panda Aug 14 '19 at 05:56
  • @CarlLeth I think you've missed the saddest point. The *leaders* of the anti-vax movement are clearly either actively evil or insane. But the modern journalism of "show both sides" has failed us, because it presents these people as the "other side" of the argument, rather than a rational person with knowledge in the field. It's equivalent to debating cosmology with someone who makes claims for a flat Earth. But if the media present their insane views as credible, people may be fooled into making decisions based on totally bogus information. The decisions (and fear) are still rational. – Graham Aug 14 '19 at 10:24
  • The point is that scientists cannot be entirely trusted. People who do not trust them are not idiots. It is a matter of judgement. Where scientific reports endorse commercial products one should be wary. I remember the period during which many scientists went public to endorse the benefits of giving up butter for margarine, and advised pregnant women to take Thalidomide, and this sort of lunatic advice is common. We have to use our commons sense, and in my opinion scientists on average have a below average amount of this. . . . –  Aug 14 '19 at 12:36
  • @CarlLeth - I think you need to read what I wrote more carefully, You have bowdlerised my words. –  Aug 14 '19 at 12:38
  • @DavidBlomstrom - Yes! I'm struggling to understand why anyone would call people who are against certain kinds of vaccination 'evil'. I've never been called evil before, along with many friends and acquantances, and I do not believe it is okay to post such comments on a philosophy site. It seems no more than common sense to be wary of pumping kids full of chemicals just because the pharmaceutical industry says it's okay. –  Aug 19 '19 at 13:16