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FIFTY-EIGHT

CITIZEN SCIENCE

You know who's really good at figuring out things? People! Think about this: we put so much power in the hands of these fancy scientists and hold them up on pedestals in our heads. But take a moment and think of everything great you know of that has been invented. Bet you just thought of a bunch of founders, not a bunch of scientists! People naturally figure out and problem solve as they live their everyday lives – how often do you find a problem in your day or in your home and then solve it? This is called citizen science – the art of people figuring things out. Sure, doctors and scientists can be great...sometimes...or should I say some of them, but do not discount what others around you know because they don't have a credential. When people in the general public figure something out and don't have the shiny badge or credential, often it is labeled pseudoscience – we all know stories of someone who found a holistic cure for X and they were completely discredited because they weren't some board-verified doctor on someone's payroll. But if the cure works, what do we care? Pseudoscience, often viewed with skepticism, occupies a unique space of inquiry and imagination. While it might lack immediate empirical backing or the rigors of scientific methodology, history is peppered with instances where today's skepticism becomes tomorrow's science. Everything that is science today was once not science. How “science” comes to be science: everything is pseudoscience UNTIL it becomes science. AND science sometimes moves back into pseudoscience, even after being used, performed, and considered normal, only to be moved back into a category known as ludicrous. Lobotomies or bloodletting? Both were widely accepted and practiced “scientific” procedures, now banished to the land of never to be done again. Science moves in a multidirectional flow, and one must keep up and keep informed. In essence, commit to staying well-informed, challenging your preconceptions, and accepting that truth often lies beneath the surface, waiting to be uncovered by those willing to examine the evidence and think critically.

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