Scientific skepticism seems to be on the rise in the past few decades

Scientific skepticism seems to be on the rise in the past few decades

Scientific skepticism seems to be on the rise in the past few decades (postmodernism, the climate change debate, controversy surrounding genetics & cognitive sciences, creationism, alternative medicine, etc). Some say scientific discoveries are relative; others say they are false; others say they are a conspiracy by special interest groups to sway public opinion, or keep people in the dark. This has raised a question I think we need to answer, as a society, if we are to draw the line between science, pseudoscience and charlatanism, and to move forwards into the future: what good reasons are there for trusting in scientists and their theories? What makes trusting what a scientist says about his or her specialty, or trusting a scientific journal or article or experiment on some specific theme, when we know little about it from experience, any different from trusting a member of the clergy or a holy text? All this, of course, from the point of view of a person who is neither a scientist nor knows intimately the ways in which scientists work (the hypothetical lay person). I know the two are somehow different, but I find it hard to articulate, besides saying "faith in education and the peer review system", which won't satisfy any skeptics. What do you think?

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