Skip to main page content

Naomi Oreskes : Can Science Be Saved?: Moving Beyond Climate Denial

My Session Status

What:
Keynote
When:
11:00 AM, Monday 24 May 2021 EDT (1 hour 15 minutes)
During the Covid-19 pandemic, public debates about the validity of scientific findings and the value of science have intensified, as some Americans have actively resisted and even denied the legitimacy of scientific guidance about how to address the disease. What are the social and psychological drivers of public skepticism about science? How can skeptics be convinced otherwise? How do we evaluate the role of facts, of political affinity, and of personal identity in the rejection of scientific advice? According to Naomi Oreskes, Henry Charles Lea Professor of the History of Science at Harvard University, most people who reject science won’t be persuaded with more technical facts. They deny scientific findings because they do not like the implications of their veracity—what Oreskes terms “implicatory denial.” However, addressing those perceived implications—and answering the concerns or fear involved—can help us to make progress. This holds true in a range of domains, from Covid-19 denial to climate change.

Naomi Oreskes

Keynote speaker

My Session Status

Session detail
Allows attendees to send short textual feedback to the organizer for a session. This is only sent to the organizer and not the speakers.
To respect data privacy rules, this option only displays profiles of attendees who have chosen to share their profile information publicly.

Changes here will affect all session detail pages