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coffeesp00ns  ·  3476 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: What Does “Scientific Consensus” Mean?

Well that depends on what someone is trying to use his argument to say. If one is trying to say "Consensus isn't enough", then of course I agree. If someone is trying to say "Disagree just because it's the consensus", then I have to disagree, because that doesn't follow Crichton's argument.

If someone is saying "There's no such thing as a scientific consensus", then I also have to disagree because that's not really the point of what Crichton is saying. What he is saying, fundamentally is that "Just because something is a consensus doesn't mean it's correct, and so using consensus alone is insufficient evidence." Furthermore, he goes on to say that one person with verifiable evidence can "overrule" a consensus opinion. He's not wrong, but as they say "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." The reality is that this very rarely happens, and it is even rarer for new evidence to be found to actually be in contradiction of the consensus. Consensus changes very little in science because it is based on evidence.

    Disprove its logic

Well, he's making a conditional fallacy here, so I'd be careful how seriously I took the logic.