The Challenger and the anti-vaxxer

It always makes me smile when I see a writer using the word ‘arguably’. 

I’ve done it myself, and I know what it means. ‘Arguably’ is a neat way of suggesting that there is a great case for what I’m about to say, but I’m not actually going to make it here. That may be about not feeling that secure about the case, and therefore preferring not to state it openly and expose it to scrutiny.

I came across it recently in a book about the close relationship between two thinkers of the eighteenth-century enlightenment, David Hume and Adam Smith. ‘Arguably the greatest of all philosophical friendships’. Well, yes, maybe. But was it greater than, say, Plato and Socrates? Russel and Wittgenstein? Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir? Arguably it was. But he doesn’t make the argument.

Well, he doesn’t make it in the preface, which is where I found the comment. That same preface starts with the words “David Hume is widely regarded as the greatest philosopher ever to write in the English language”. 

That’s another fine trick. 

“Widely regarded”? How widely? Who are these wide guys? 

What the author’s really saying is that he thinks it possible – you might say arguable – that David Hume is that great a philosopher. But he believes we’re more likely to believe it if he can convince us that a lot of other people agree.

The Challenger exploding

Do you know the film The Challenger Disaster? Originally entitled The Challenger,  a better title, since it isn’t just about the Challenger space shuttle which blew up on take-off, killing everyone on board. It’s much more about the scientist who challenged the authorities by insisting on finding out the reason why the shuttle exploded. Made for TV by the BBC, it’s a gem of a small story of a terrible event and a brilliant man’s refusal to be prevented revealing the truth.

The man was one of my favourite physicists, Nobel-prize winner Richard Feynman. William Hurt plays him superbly. The thing about Feynman is that, once he was brought into the enquiry into the disaster, much against his initial reluctance, he refused to be brow-beaten or diverted from finding out what went wrong. By his own admission, he was no expert on rocket design – he was a theoretical physicist – but he insisted on asking the right questions, of the right experts, Until he managed to extract the right answers.

William Hurt as the challenger Richard Feynman

Certainly, the United States owes it to him that it knows why the Challenger exploded. The challenger Feynman made sure of that.

The film shows Feynman explaining his attitude towards science.

Science teaches us what the rules of evidence are. We mess with that at our peril. 

He didn’t just say that. He lived it. He came to conclusions only as they were revealed by the evidence and advanced them only once the evidence was sufficient. Then he reached judgements that were solidly based. 

Earlier, the film quotes him saying:

Science is a way to teach how something gets to be known, what is not known, to what extent things are known (for nothing is known absolutely), how to handle doubt and uncertainty, what the rules of evidence are, how to think about things so that judgments can be made, how to distinguish truth from fraud, and from show.

Science lives with doubt. Scientists know that today’s theory is as good a description of reality as they have managed to construct so far, and therefore they’ll use it because there’s nothing better. But tomorrow it may have to be replaced by something more reliable. That’s a good reason for not getting too certain about any one theory: it may close your mind to the next theory just around the corner. 

That though isn’t how the human mind likes to work. It wants certainty. It wants to know a few things for sure.

That’s why we have, for instance, an anti-vax movement. Robert Kennedy, Junior, a lawyer with no medical or scientific training at all, has come up with some statements about vaccinations that he proclaims with total certainty. There is no doubt about them in his mind. There’s nothing to question there.

That’s so much more satisfying than the Feynman approach with its accommodation of doubt and uncertainty. So people follow Kennedy, because what he’s saying belongs to the realm of what is ‘widely regarded’, that useful expression suggesting something must be true because so many believe it. Which is sad, considering that this Kennedy is the lesser son of a great father, the assassinated Robert Kennedy, brother and Attorney General to John F. Kennedy, and arguably the best President the United States never had (see? I can do that ‘arguably’ thing too).

Anti-vaxxers really are unable to handle doubt and relative truths. Anti-vaxxers react with mock horror to news of fully vaccinated people becoming infected with Covid. But no one ever argued that the vaccination gave absolute protection to absolutely every variant of the disease. It only protects a high percentage. But understanding that means accepting statistical truths. They’re not intuitive. So some feel it easier to write them off as lies or damned lies.

I’m glad to see that the anti-vax movement seems to be losing momentum. Feynman’s preoccupation with following the evidence may be getting through at last. Hundreds of millions have been vaccinated and only tiny numbers have suffered ill consequences. On the other hand, vaccines are clearly protecting, to a high degree against infection, and even in cases of infection, against serious symptoms.

Even anti-vaxxers we meet are coming around and agreeing to get themselves vaccinated at last. As we queued for a booster, we were impressed by the number of people going for their first shot, converted vaccination sceptics.

They’ve seen that despite the doubt and uncertainty, the approach of scientists like Feynman offers a better and safer way forward than the dogmatic certainties of the likes of Robert Kennedy.

Meanwhile, I’m looking forward to reading the book about Hume and Smith. There may have been some curious expressions used in the preface, but a preface is just an accessory. The main act is the book itself, in this case, The Infidel and the Professor by Dennis Rasmussen, and i suspect it will be compelling reading.

I’m looking forward to it.