Sometimes, people use consensus to convince us. However, the consensus is often a false consensus. A popular idea is often false. False ideas can become “common knowledge” when they’re promoted or when other ideas are “cancelled” by message control and coercion.
<quote from RealReality.org/Real_Faith_and_Reason_Vol_2_-_Scientia.pdf>
False Consensus
Here’s an illusion. It’s a false consensus. Some people think the majority wants message control. They think most people favor punishing viewpoints that aren’t politically correct. We can see the cancel culture at work. We hear the rhetoric from every form of media and “education.” The fallen human mind creates that illusion, but most people don’t think that way. The illusion conflicts with reality.
A 2016 survey sheds some light on actual public opinion:
84% believe that “attempts to censor or punish scientists for holding dissenting views on issues such as evolution or climate change are not appropriate in a free society.”
94% believe that “it’s important for policymakers and the public to hear from scientists with differing views.”
87% think that “people can disagree about what science says on a particular topic without being ‘anti-science.’”
86% think that “disagreeing with the current majority view in science can be an important step in the development of new insights and discoveries in science.”
93% of American adults agree that “teachers and students should have the academic freedom to objectively discuss both the scientific strengths and weaknesses of the Theory of Evolution.”
88% agree that “scientists who raise scientific criticisms of evolution should have the freedom to make their arguments without being subjected to censorship or discrimination.”
95% of Republicans believe that teachers and students should have the freedom to discuss the scientific strengths and weaknesses of evolution—but so do 93% of Democrats and 94% of Independents; so do 96% of theists, 92% of agnostics, and 86% of atheists.
87% of Republicans oppose attempts to punish or censor scientists who hold dissenting views on issues like evolution and climate change—but so do 84% of Independents and 82% of Democrats, as well as 86% of theists, 83% of agnostics, 76% of atheists, 82% of women, and 86% of men.
95% of Republicans think it’s important for policymakers and the public to hear from scientists with differing views—but so do 94% of Democrats, 93% of Independents, 95% of theists, 92% of agnostics, 90% of atheists, 95% of women, and 93% of men.
In the public arena, we hear a growing chorus arguing for the government to punish or criminalize dissenting scientific views . . . But for the public, free speech in science is not a partisan issue. It’s supported by the overwhelming majority of people across party lines, gender, religion, and age. ~ Dr. John G. West (the political scientist who directed the survey) EvolutionNews.org
<end quote>
