Metaphors for countering pseudoscience

Kruglanski and others have an interesting article in the October/November 2008 edition of Scientific American Mind on the use of metaphor to determine framing in countering terrorism. It holds some lessons for those of us who try to counter pseudoscience and quackery in education and other related fields. The article is not fully available online and I shall therefore summarise it briefly.

Kruglanski et. al. point out that terrorism and counterterrorism was framed differently by successive US administrations, especially by the use of different metaphors when discussing these issues. These metaphors and the resulting framing influenced the actions taken against terrorism. Presidents Nixon and Reagan used disease metaphors. Clinton used justice metaphors, while Bush used war metaphors. According to Kruglanski et. al., framing couterterrorism as war has certain costs:

"It threatens to corrupt society's values, disrupts its orderly functioning and reshuffles its priorities. War calls for the disproportunate investment of a nation's resources, with correspondingly less left for other concerns, including the economy, health care and education."

This was clearly written from a specific ideological perspective and someone else may have concluded differently about the implications of the war metaphors being used. The fact is, however, that the metaphors used had some influence on the actions of participants.

There is a great deal of controversy in Psychology on issues of metaphor and framing. To misquote Bob Sutton, this is a field where strong opinions are strongly held. I am not current with the details of disagreements in this field. Different views that need to be considered are those of Steven Pinker, George Lakoff and Daniel Kahneman. A much discussed debate between Pinker and Lakoff, with some informative comments, can be found at this link. Chris at Mixing Memory commented extensively, if somewhat ad hominem, on the debate.

Framing the fight against pseudoscience

In using the word fight, I am already framing the action against pseudoscience as a war. In fact, it it difficult to avoid war metaphors. In a recent post on the blog Neurologica, neurologist Steven Novella made extensive and conscious use of war metaphors. He justified it thus:

"We are also in the midst of an endless culture war, a struggle between two aspects of human nature. On the one hand are the proponents of mysticism, superstition, pseudoscience, and anti-science. On the other are the defenders of science and reason.

Some of my skeptical colleagues have objected to the military analogy, but we are engaged in a real struggle, and we are fighting over more than bragging rights. The stakes are real: control of resources, support and recognition of government, the running of institutions, access to the media and to the halls of academia and education."

I believe that war metaphors are inevitable in this "fight". This holds the danger of alienating possible converts to science and reason, but there is hopefully little chance that the war metaphor will become literal.

A second frame is that of ridicule. Examples of this are to be found in many posts on the blog Bad Science by Ben Goldacre. Words (not necessary metaphoric) that signal a frame of ridicule include bullshit, nonsense, woo, quack, granfalloon, gullibility and so forth. The danger of using this frame is the thin line between legitimately ridiculing the opponent and his/her position on the one hand, and the use of ad hominem and straw man fallacies on the other (not Goldacre, just generally). Ridicule, even more than using the war metaphor, will harden attitudes and may prevent converts to science and reason. Having said that, the chance of converting the pseudoscience huckster gurus is slim. The targets for conversion should be the camp-followers (i.e. franchise holders) and the consumers (i.e. parents, teachers, schools). Well directed ridicule (against the gurus) may sway their attitudes. An example here was the ridicule Paul Dennison, the founder of Brain Gym, was subjected to on television.

A third and last frame (I'm sure there are more) is education. Words that would signal an educational frame include information, knowledge, evidence, training, science and so forth. A good example of an organisation that operates according to an educational frame, is Sense about Science in Britain. The targets of activities from within an educational frame would mainly be the potential consumers of pseudoscientific approaches. The vehicles through which education should proceed include the mass media, the internet and blogs such as this one. Education has the problem that it often assumes pre-existing knowledge and attitudes that its targets do not always have, often because of inadequate school and tersiary education. These include inadequate knowledge of science and scientific methods, of critical thinking, added to which a general lack of mindfullness and questioning attitudes.

In conclusion, different metaphors and frames should be geared to the intended targets one wishes to influence. There is a place for war talk, ridicule, education and probably for many additional frames I did not think about. So let the fight against pseudoscience continue (metaphorically)!

More views on metaphors and framing:

Grey, W. (2000). Metaphor and Meaning.

Iyengar, S. (2005). Speaking of Values: The Framing of American Politics.

Ward et al. (2008). Metaphors are mindfunnels (Mainly reflecting George Lakoff's views). Hat tip to Sonja from Narrativelab for this last reference.