When Did People Stop Trusting Experts?

A minority of Americans believe that the Theory of Evolution is true, despite the almost universal acceptance of it by biologists, the experts.

About one third of Americans believe that global warming simply isn't happening despite the combined opinion of all the academies of science around the world.

About one quarter of Americans believe that vaccines are harmful to children despite the World Health Organizations statement that vaccines are the greatest health success of all time, and the elimination of smallpox and polio by vaccine.

About one third of Americans believe the Bible is inerrant, without a single mistake, despite the Bible factually contradicting itself repeatedly and if taken literally it contradicting geology, biology, cosmology, some history, and probably more than that. Many Americans believe the gospels were written by the Apostles and have remained unchanged since that date despite the evidence from Biblical scholars.

Now, I am not talking about a lack of trust in a particular expert. There is an enormous slew of charlatans, honest people in error, nutjobs, the mistaken, and independent thinkers with impressive credentials. I even think it is good to an extent that such people exist. A great example is the vaccine scare. Essentially, a paper was written and published by an Andrew Wakefield M.D. that suggested there might be a link between the MMR vaccine and autism. he then gave a press conference saying MMR probably caused autism. The media published papers stating this as fact and vaccination dropped from 93% to 75% and cases of measles rose to 24 times their previous number in Britain. How is this a good thing? It is good because scientists then tested for a link between vaccines and autism, established there wasn't one and also established that not giving vaccines dramatically increases illness. Knowledge increased and therefore over the long haul health will increase as a result.

What I am talking about is the lack of trust in experts en masse. That the far less educated and intelligent are more correct than not just an expert, but the combined opinion of almost all the experts there are. This stance actually decreases with increased education. In other words, those least able to make an informed opinion on a subject are the ones most likely to hold their opinion above that of the experts.

Paul Krugman, a Nobel prize winning economist, attributes this in his New York Times blog to the vast increase of cable tv news programs. On cable news the problem is that the default method for discussion is to always get two opinions on a subject and then have a debate as if both debaters had equal justification for their positions. So you get instances where Richard Dawkins, a respected biologist, will discuss evolution with Bill O'Reilly, a talk show host with degrees in history and journalism, as equals on the subject. Krugman's essential point is that opinions are not equal. If you ask a cosmologist and a plumber how to fix your leak the plumber knows more than the cosmologist. If you ask the cosmologist and the plumber about the early stages of the Big Bang the cosmologist knows more than the plumber.

I think equally important is the rise of the "authority on everything." I think two excellent examples are Oprah Winfrey and Bill O'Reilly. Now, neither of these people are flash in the pans. They both have been around for at least a decade with a large and loyal audience. That audience trusts these people as authorities. When Oprah endorses Deepak Chopra as a spiritual and medical authority millions of people take that on trust, because Oprah said it. When Bill O'Reilly says that Hilary Clinton wants to control every facet of your life millions of people take that on trust. The thing is that in order for this trust to happen the "authority on everything" has to seem like "one of you." On other words they have to not talk in big words, or say things are complicated, or actually be qualified in the subject.

The sad thing is that once these opinions are established in someone's mind (yes, even you) it is extremely difficult to change. Research has shown (and a cursory look around facebook or internet forums should confirm for you) that a logical argument against an opinion, backed up by evidence, actually increases the strength with which that opinion is held. That's right, the more dumb you make the other persons opinion look, the stronger they will hold to it.

How can this change? Well, for a start I think it important to note that the opinions of populations do change over time, and generally towards the arguments supported by evidence. So there is hope, but only over time. Unfortunately I think that this happens through the process of shaming. Over time what happens is that those who are undecided generally are moved by the controversy to look at the evidence objectively and have an opinion. This usually means that over time a majority of people think the opposing view is foolish, and then they laugh at those who hold it. At some point there comes a tipping point when having an opinion makes you a laughing stock. Being a laughing stock is a far, far better method of convincing someone to change their mind than objective information.

Do you trust experts? A great way to test this is to think about whether you have any opinions that derived from experts with which you agree, but really wish were not true.