If you’re dealing with science skeptics—whether they’re family members, colleagues, or community members—you’ve likely discovered that facts alone don’t change minds. I’ve spent years navigating these conversations, and I want to share what I’ve learned about building bridges instead of walls.
Open with the Right Question
Before you dive into any defense of science, try this: ask the skeptic, “What’s the most important question you’d like to have answered?” Not about science specifically—about anything that matters to them.
This simple exercise accomplishes something profound. It shifts their mental framework from defending what they think they know to acknowledging what they don’t know. Psychologists call this the “illusion of explanatory depth”—most of us overestimate how well we understand complex phenomena until we’re asked to explain them in detail.
When someone articulates a genuine question they want answered, you’ve created an opening. They’ve just demonstrated that there are things worth investigating, things that aren’t immediately obvious, things that might benefit from systematic inquiry. You’ve also moved them from a defensive stance to a curious one.
The next step recognizes that science skeptics often have legitimate concerns about how scientific findings are communicated, applied, or used to justify policy decisions. The mistake most people make is assuming skeptics are simply ignorant or irrational—this approach is both counterproductive and often wrong.
Instead of defending science as an institution, help them understand what science actually does. Frame it as humanity’s most systematic method for distinguishing between what we think we know and what we can actually demonstrate. This shifts the conversation from authority to process, building on that initial acknowledgment that there are things worth investigating.
Here’s a counterintuitive strategy: embrace uncertainty as science’s greatest asset. When skeptics point to changing recommendations or conflicting studies, don’t get defensive. Instead, explain why this flexibility is precisely what makes science trustworthy. Wait, What?
Consider the boundaries that make knowledge possible. A molecule becomes meaningful because we can identify its structure and predict its behavior. A medical diagnosis becomes useful because we can distinguish between healthy and diseased states. Without these conceptual boundaries, we’d be swimming in undifferentiated information.
The key insight: limitations create meaning. If something had no boundaries, no constraints, it would be indistinguishable from everything else. Science’s power comes from acknowledging what it can and cannot measure, predict, or explain.
Many skeptics become frustrated when scientific categories don’t have clean, absolute boundaries. They see this as evidence that science is unreliable. You can reframe this concern by acknowledging that reality itself is continuous and complex.
When does being healthy become disease? When does a hill become a mountain? These questions don’t have neat answers because the phenomena themselves exist on spectrums. This isn’t a failure of scientific thinking—it’s an accurate reflection of how the world actually works.
Fuzziness at the edges is evidence that science is honestly grappling with complexity, not trying to oversimplify it.
Instead of asking skeptics simply to trust scientific authority, invite them to engage with the process by asking better questions. Here’s where the philosopher David Hume offers us a powerful tool: Hume’s fork.
Hume argued meaningful statements fall into two categories: relations of ideas (like mathematics and logic) and matters of fact (empirical observations about the world). Everything else, he suggested, should be “committed to the flames” as meaningless speculation.
This framework helps skeptics ask more productive questions: “Is this claim about logical relationships that we can prove definitively, or is it about observable facts that we can test but never know with absolute certainty?” Most scientific claims fall into the second category—they’re our best current understanding of observable patterns, not eternal truths carved in stone.
This philosophical perspective does something crucial: it builds humility into the conversation. When we acknowledge that empirical knowledge is always provisional—always subject to revision based on new evidence—we’re not weakening science’s credibility. We’re being honest about how knowledge actually works.
Science isn’t a monolith—it’s an ongoing conversation among thousands of researchers who constantly challenge each other’s work, always operating within the boundaries of what Hume showed us about human knowledge.
Science skeptics often share your underlying values: they want reliable information, they care about their families’ wellbeing, and they’re concerned about being misled. The disagreement isn’t about goals—it’s about methods for achieving those goals.
When you encounter changing scientific recommendations, frame them as evidence that the system works as intended. The process of science involves constant refinement and the humility to change course when new evidence emerges. This isn’t a bug—it’s a feature.
When someone says “Scientists keep changing their minds,” try responding with “That’s exactly what we want them to do when they discover new evidence. Would you prefer they stick with outdated information?”
When they point to disagreements between experts, acknowledge that scientific understanding develops through debate and refinement. This is how we gradually build more complete pictures of complex realities.
Science deserves appreciation not because it provides perfect answers, but because it offers the best method we’ve developed for pursuing reliable knowledge. It’s a tool that acknowledges its own limitations while constantly working to expand understanding.
Your goal isn’t to convert skeptics into uncritical believers. It’s to help them engage more skillfully with scientific information—to question more thoughtfully rather than dismiss wholesale.
In productive conversations, science and skepticism aren’t enemies. They’re essential partners in the ongoing human quest to understand what is. Frame your discussions about this shared commitment to truth-seeking, and you’ll find much more common ground than you expected.
The Scientific Method:
- A systematic approach to understanding the natural world through observation, hypothesis formation, controlled experimentation, and peer review.
- It begins with observing phenomena and asking testable questions, then proposes falsifiable hypotheses—explanations that can be proven wrong through evidence.
- Scientists design controlled experiments to test these hypotheses, collect and analyze data objectively, and subject their findings to scrutiny by other experts who attempt to replicate the results.