Why aborigines and science deniers can’t argue about solar eclipses

People may reject climate change and vaccine science, but they easily believe scientists about solar eclipses. (?Igor Zh./Shutterstock)

This article was originally published in The Conversation. This article was published in Life Sciences' Expert Voices: Columns and Insights.

If you have been paying attention, you know that on August 21, we will usher in a special cosmic feast: the 2017 American Great Solar Eclipse.

The Moon's Shadow will track 4, starting in Depoe Bay, Oregon, and ending 93 minutes later in McClellanville, Southern California, covering 1,000 kilometers across the continental United States from coast to coast. . As a result, tens of millions of Americans will enjoy a rare natural wonder: a total solar eclipse.

Canada, unfortunately, will not experience a total solar eclipse, but the scenery will still be impressive: the Sun will be 86% eclipse in Vancouver, 70% eclipse in Toronto, and 58% eclipse in Montreal. Canadians who want to experience totality from the comfort of home will need to wait until April 8, 2024 (Hamilton, Montreal and Fredericton), August 23, 2044 (Edmonton and Calgary) or 2079 May 1 (Saint John and Moncton).

Meanwhile, back here in 2017, everyone is focused on August 21st. In the path of the eclipse, schools will be closed, traffic will be a nightmare, and Days Inn rooms will be on sale for $1,600 a night. Absolute Confidence in Eclipse Predictions

What is most striking among all this excitement and frenzy is the lack of "eclipse deniers." No one doubted or questioned the detailed scientific predictions of what would happen.

I will be watching the eclipse from Simpson County, Kentucky. , where I am expecting, I will be joined by thousands of people, all of us knowing in advance that our ensemble will start at 1:26:44 PM and end 141 seconds later. It was impossible for any of us to imagine that these predictions could be wrong even for a second.

No one will argue in advance that the jury is still out on the solar eclipse, that scientists have tampered with data, that the solar eclipse was faked by NASA, that exposing children to the solar eclipse will cause autism, and that even the solar eclipse is from China. Human deception. Across the continent, there will be climate deniers, creationists, anti-vampires and flat-earths looking up through their eclipse glasses, all soaking up this wonderful moment along with everyone else.

[Editor's note: Astrophysicist and popular science communicator Neil deGrasse Tyson also responded to the core points of this article in his editing. ]

Here's a mystery: Why do people, scientifically but without question, unanimously accept the ridiculously specific predictions of every solar eclipse? "One possible reason why science is selectively dismissed is that we have been right every time before. But for most people, a total solar eclipse is a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Most people will not experience such predictions first-hand." , they have to believe that what happened before will happen again to someone else.

Another explanation could be that, unlike the case with climate change or vaccination, the science behind solar eclipses is simple and uncontroversial. .While astronomers have been making fairly accurate predictions of solar eclipses for thousands of years, the calculations required are very complex and far beyond the mathematics covered in high school and even many college courses. Reproduce or confirm these eclipse predictions for yourself, the more likely answer is that the eclipse is not a threat. There is no danger that the eclipse will threaten our lifestyle or standard of living. There is no anti-eclipse lobby trying to set the story, and therefore no well-funded art campaign to raise questions in our minds or subtly shape our thinking. Scientific research. The laws of science

The science - and the extraordinary experiences that result - are left to us.

The thing is, we. There's no way to choose which scientific facts or facts are controversial and which are not. The same strict scientific laws apply everywhere

So if you're willing to pay a non-refundable fee for your eclipse hotel. A deposit, if you let a 30,000-foot steel pipe transport you to a small town in the path of totality, if you check the weather forecast on the morning of August 21 and hope for clear skies, if you pay for breakfast with a credit card, if That afternoon when you took a picture of the solar eclipse with your smartphone, you staked your bank balance, your August vacation, and your life on the fact that science is testable and replicable. This is false. Theories don't stand up to scrutiny and testing over time.

Total solar eclipses are strange cosmic coincidences and an awe-inspiring and extraordinary experience, but they also serve as a profound reminder of how emotions, money and... When politics is stripped away, no one at our core is a denier of science.

Bryan Gaensler, Director, Dunlap Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics, University of Toronto

This article was originally published in The Conversation. Read the original article. Follow all expert voice issues and debates on Facebook, Twitter and Google+ and be part of the discussion. The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the publisher.

This version of the article was originally published on Live Science