Scientific Facts People Refuse to Believe

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Seeing how this forum is dedicated to science, I thought I would post this here.



https://slappedham.com/10-science-facts ... o-believe/

Anyway, I came across that video/article by SlappedHam years ago, and it has stuck with me ever since. The most unsurprising item on their list is the fact that many people reject evolution. There is evidence of it everywhere, as some organism is constantly evolving into another. Sure, it's generational, and the process is extremely gradual, but there are mountains of evidence for it. Yet, much of the general public dismisses it in favor of creationism or intelligent design.

Of course, the publically dismissed facts that SlappedHam presents in the video/article are only the tip of the iceberg. What other scientific facts does a large chunk, if not the majority, of the general public refuse to believe?

Here are some I could think of:

1. Vaccines don't cause autism.

https://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/concerns/autism.html
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-sho ... d-in-a-yea

This notion of correlation between the MRR vaccine and autism rates has been debunked numerous times by neuro-scientists, but the anti-vax movement keeps going strong. It is partially because of the movement that the pandemic was such a disaster. To make matters worse, there are no signs of the movement ceasing anytime soon.

2. Race is a social construct

https://www.scientificamerican.com/arti ... sts-argue/

Thanks to our near-identical genotypes, it is incredible how we are more alike than we realize. Homo sapiens is the only living human species; the last subspecies (Neanderthals) died out 40,000 years ago. Race has no place in our modern biology because our differences are literally only skin deep.

Sadly, systemic racism continues to be a reality thanks to ignorance, basing a hierarchy on something as fallacious as skin color and appearances, which are a byproduct of phenotypes (that only account for a very, very tiny portion of our genetic makeup).

3. Homosexuality is a naturally occurring phenomenon

https://www.forbes.com/sites/dawnstacey ... a394397fa7
https://www.news-medical.net/news/2006/ ... ality.aspx

Even with science backing it, gay marriage still struggles to get proper recognition. Despite legalization in some places, many same-sex couples still deal with marginalization and fear ridicule.

4. Spanking is harmful and detrimental to children

https://www.gse.harvard.edu/ideas/usabl ... king-brain
https://www.developmentalscience.com/bl ... r-behavior

No matter how much evidence continues to mount, authoritarian parents and other adults will continue to use corporal punishment as a form of discipline. You know we have failed as a species when we can't criminalize this cruel practice, yet we have no problem outlawing a harmless herb (more on that in a bit).

5. There's no such thing as free will, and it is only an illusion

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/ar ... ll/480750/

While it may appear that we have free will, far too many factors influence our everyday decisions. I, for one, cannot believe in free will, given how there are too many influences. No choice we make is truly 'free." Nevertheless, the illusion is so overwhelmingly powerful. It is of little wonder that people reject determinism and believe in free will.

6. Eating fat doesn't make one overweight (that would be sugar)

https://www.livescience.com/54984-high- ... eight.html

Low-fat snacks are still advertised to help individuals to lose weight but are ineffective due to how much sugar they contain. It may sound logical that consuming foods with fat causes obesity, but that is not the case.

7. Marijuana isn't all that dangerous

https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/legal ... ws-n312876
https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/legal ... co-n312876

We're all quite familiar with the growing (no pun intended) acceptance of marijuana and how it is being legalized in some places while being decriminalized in others. I live in Oregon, and marijuana is a normal part of our day-to-day life. However, there are still places and anti-drug advocates that are obstinate about marijuana's notorious reputation and still view it as "the Devil's lettuce."

8. (Some) Prescription drugs are the real gateway drug

https://www.latimes.com/projects/oxycontin-part1/
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Bayer

I learned this fact from Adam Ruins Everything, and it makes sense that pharmaceuticals have the potential to open the way to abusing street substances. It is all the more reason why the FDA needs tighter regulations on pharmaceutical companies and their products, especially with the ongoing Fentanyl crisis.

9. There is no such thing as 'types', and alpha males and their beta counterparts are social constructs

https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/articl ... alpha_male
https://www.scientificamerican.com/arti ... ea-a-myth/

Ironic that faulty animal observations could lead to toxic labeling and unscientific categorization. Humans are complex, and we cannot easily be broken down into alphas, betas, gammas, omegas, etc. Not to mention that human nature is relative and changes when circumstances do. Yet, the alpha/beta dichotomy will continue to be a thing due to social thought and how it is the way of the world (especially within dating).

10. Secondhand smoke is dangerous

https://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/secondhand-smoke/
https://www.cancer.org/cancer/risk-prev ... smoke.html
https://news.gallup.com/poll/174833/smo ... smoke.aspx

This rejection of science is dangerous as it gives careless smokers an excuse to disregard the health of those around them. There is hope that many governments have laws that ban smoking in crowded public places—that and how smoking has declined for years. Nevertheless, there are still those who reject the science regarding secondhand smoke.

Don't do IT , its bad for Yah..! liked the above list, although ,inspite of it being a longer OP, think
many more things could be added to it , especially in the bible belt of the US of A .

But more seriously some politicians want to apply the beliefs to REAL Life things and make laws considering these things...To gain political favour in their circles or their own electorate ..which is really depressing .. Makes you wonder why some other countries do not hold the US in very high regard ..Consider our Politicians are being an embarassment to the entire population of the world , especially as suppose to be leading the world in various things.
And the criminal part is , WE are trying to enforce concepts on the rest of the worlds governments.( Idiocracies)
Worse is that many follow along, and even follow our politican lead. In suppressing their own people .

The Earth is ~4.2 billion years old, created by the Big Bang

Climate change is occurring right before our eyes.

Evolution is real.

But...

masturbation really DOES make you go blind!

Don't let anyone tell you otherwise!

Ok, I had the 10 points. It’s all right, so good so far.

I'm going to wait for this topic to fill up and I'm going to find out that I'm going to end up "becoming" one of *them*.

11. Microwave ovens do NOT make foods radioactive. They use radio waves to induce electric currents in foods. These radio waves are not produced by fission, fusion, or the Bremsstrahlung effect (which produces x-rays, not microwaves).

12. Solar panels neither cool the sun nor emit grass-killing radiation. The former is simply ridiculous while the later is an assumption made after observing that the plants under a field-installed solar array were stunted due to shade or dead due to being trampled by the installers.

A more widespread belief is that irradiating food, which is how they prepare Parmalat for distribution, will make it radioactive

More Scientific Facts People Refuse to Believe:

13. Homeopathy is Quackery. People do not understanding the difference between real science and beliefs based on anecdotes and testimonial evidence.  Homeopathic treatments are no more effective than placebos, except maybe when treating dehydration, which any source of ordinary tap water will do.

14. Feng Shui is Just Another Way of Arranging Furniture.  Alleged 'evidence' for its effectiveness is based on anecdote and there is a lack of a plausible method of action; this leads to conflicting advice from different practitioners of feng shui.  Feng shui has always been based upon mere guesswork.  However, over the centuries, it has become distorted and degraded into a gross superstition.

15. Autistic Enterocolitis: The name of a nonexistent medical condition proposed by discredited British gastroenterologist Andrew Wakefield when he suggested a link between a number of common clinical symptoms and signs which he contended were distinctive to autism.  The existence of such an enterocolitis has been dismissed by experts as having "not been established".  Wakefield's now-discredited, retracted, and fraudulent report used inadequate controls and suppressed negative findings and multiple attempts to replicate his results have been unsuccessful.  Reviews in the medical literature have found no link between autism and bowel disease.

Sounds like my mom, who blamed my having to run to the bathroom right before school on eating sugared cereals. Could have just as easily blamed it on autism, but I found out as an adult it was just anxiety, in this case about facing school bullies (which is also associated with autism, of course.)

And marijuana is not perfectly safe, and overeating anything (fat, sugar, bran) can cause obesity.

People say "if it's a plant, it has to be fine, it's natural, blah blah blah..." so I tell them to try some hemlock or belladonna.

That IS an entry that doesnt really belong...about marajuana. Its not crack, crystal meth, or PCP, but it isnt mother's milk either.

On the other hand theyve always assumed forever that "eating fat makes you fat", and only recently even tried to test that scientifically, and the verdict does seem to be the "eating fat doesnt make you fat". So I guess that you can go ahead and drink whole milk now.

I have one as someone who has fed her dogs a raw meat diet, but I don't feel like arguing about that

The second-hand smoke thing may be correct but it's counter-intuitive. If it's that dangerous to be in the same room as a smoker who fills his lungs with lots more smoke than the bystanders inhale, how come the smoker can carry on for decades before coming to harm? I'm not saying it's not true, just that it's natural that people don't believe it. Doesn't help that the health professionals tend to limit themselves to just the bare conclusions instead of explaining the apparent paradox.

Interesting thread, thanks!

Only if you nut in your eye.

I did a research project on it and it isn't bad at all. The reason it can't be recommended is how idiodic people are. Yes you might have to sub in things. Yes it gets gross and you cannot skip it. Yes you have to properly store meat. And just like with a human child, you better know emergency first aid for choking.

Just like you can technically have vegan cats but you have to sub in so much stuff, it would be better to never do it. Ever. Of course its mostly made to keep vegans from killing their pets and freak of nature cats that would otherwise die in the wild from dying.