The secularization of science as an effect of the crisis of expertise

The massive exposure in media of scientists, during the Sars-Cov-2 virus spread, made them more known and popular; however, it may also have signaled the beginning of an unexpected decline in public trust towards them, as certified by some researches and surveys (Hamilton & Safford 2021, Goldenberg 2021, Pew Research Center 2020 and 2022). From a pilot study (online survey), conducted 2021 in Italy on more than 4,000 interviewees, emerges that a scientistic and positivist vision of science has begun to crack. Unlike, a consistent element of people (between 20% and 30% — hence, still largely a minority) seems to share a constructivist epistemological model, unmoored to presumed certainties and absolute truth, and more focused on conflicts between knowledge and a continuous questioning of expert knowledge. The social dynamics of this phenomenon does not seem to be, at least in the first instance, the outcome of a delegitimization of science from social media; rather the result of the traditional media exposure of scientists. Precisely, the mediatization of the conflicts between scientists and experts, the disillusionment for their excessive promises, some failures of their predictions, the politicization of expert debates, the radicalization and dichotomization of the scientists' opinions, some overt conflicts of interest and relations with big pharmas (Sismondo 2018) may have contributed to generating a skeptical attitude of part of the population (a minority, but growing). These factors may have concurred to the strengthening of a disenchantment and critical sentiment towards scientists, a sort of "secularization of science". References Pew Research Center, Feb 2022, “Americans’ Trust in Scientists, Other Groups Declines Hamilton, L. C., & Safford, T. G. (2021). Elite Cues and the Rapid Decline in Trust in Science Agencies on COVID-19. Sociological Perspectives, 64(5), 988–1011 https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2023-01-25-covid-19-increased-public-trust-science-new-survey-shows Maya J. Goldenberg (2021), Vaccine Hesitancy. Public Trust, Expertise, and the War on Science, University of Pittsburgh Press.