Studies in History and Philosophy of Science xxx (2017) 1e9

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Studies in History and Philosophy of Science

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/shpsa

Science denial as a form of pseudoscience

Sven Ove Hansson
Department of Philosophy and History, Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Brinellvägen 32, 100 44 Stockholm, Sweden

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Science denialism poses a serious threat to human health and the long-term sustainability of human
Received 14 September 2016 civilization. Although it has recently been rather extensively discussed, this discussion has rarely been
Received in revised form connected to the extensive literature on pseudoscience and the science-pseudoscience demarcation. This
3 March 2017
contribution argues that science denialism should be seen as one of the two major forms of pseudo-
Available online xxx
science, alongside of pseudotheory promotion. A detailed comparison is made between three prominent
forms of science denialism, namely relativity theory denialism, evolution denialism, and climate science
Keywords:
denialism. Several characteristics are identified that distinguish science denialism from other forms of
Science denialism
Pseudoscience
pseudoscience, in particular its persistent fabrication of fake controversies, the extraordinary male
Climate science denialism dominance among its activists, and its strong connection with various forms of right-wing politics. It is
Creationism argued that the scientific response to science denialism has to be conceived with these characteristics in
Relativity theory denial mind. In particular, it is important to expose the fabricated fake controversies for what they are and to
reveal how science denialists consistently use deviant criteria of assent to distort the scientific process.
Ó 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction important characteristics in common with other forms of pseudo-

Due to the prevalence of well-moneyed and politically well-
connected antagonists of climate science, the phenomenon of sci-
ence denial has become an increasingly discussed topic in the last
decade. Several authors have commented on the similarities be-
tween unscientific rejections of climate science and similar re-
actions to other scientific areas such as evolution, vaccination, and
tobacco disease. The terms science denial and science denialism are
now commonly used to describe these anti-scientific activities, and
a literature is emerging that describes their common features
(Diethelm & McKee, 2009; Liu, 2012; Rosenau, 2012) and also the
personal, organizational and economic bonds between them
(Oreskes & Conway, 2010). However, few references have been
made in this discussion to the literature on pseudoscience and the
science/pseudoscience demarcation. The discussion on pseudosci-
ence is considerably older and much more extensive, and it is also
much more strongly connected to general themes in the philosophy
of science (Hansson, 2008; Pigliucci and Boudry 2013). It is the
purpose of the present contribution to show how science denial can
be understood as one of two major forms of pseudoscience. It has
E-mail address: soh@kth.se.
science, but also some characteristics of its own.
In Section 2 the concepts of science and pseudoscience are
briefly clarified, and a distinction is proposed between two forms of
the latter, namely science denialism and pseudotheory promotion.
The following two sections explore the characteristics of three
prominent forms of science denialism, namely relativity theory
denialism, evolution denialism, and climate science denialism.
Section 3 is devoted to four major epistemological characteristics,
and Section 4 to ten characteristics that may be described as more
sociological. In Section 5 science denialism is compared to pseu-
dotheory promotion, and characteristics that distinguish science
denialism from other forms of pseudoscience are singled out. In
Section 6 some implications of this investigation for scientific re-
sponses to science denial are pointed out.
2. Science, pseudoscience, and science denialism
Science is the practice that provides us with the most reliable
(i.e. epistemically most warranted) statements that can be made, at
the time being, on subject matter covered by the community of
knowledge disciplines. This includes statements on nature, our-
selves as human beings, our societies, our physical constructions,
and our thought constructions. (Hansson, 2013a) As I have argued

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.shpsa.2017.05.002
0039-3681/Ó 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.shpsa.2017.05.002
2 S.O. Hansson / Studies in History and Philosophy of Science xxx (2017) 1e9
in detail elsewhere, a statement should be considered to be pseu-
doscientific if and only if it satisfies the following three criteria:
1. It pertains to an issue within the domains of science in a broad
sense (the criterion of scientific domain).
2. It suffers from such a severe lack of reliability that it cannot at all
be trusted (the criterion of unreliability).
3. It is part of a doctrine whose major proponents try to create the
impression that it represents the most reliable knowledge on its
subject matter (the criterion of deviant doctrine). (Hansson,
2013a)
The term “science in a broad sense” in the first criterion in-
dicates that the word “science” is taken in a broad sense that also
includes the humanities. (This corresponds to the usage of the
German term “Wissenschaft”.)1 This broad definition simplifies
discussions on science denial and other forms of pseudoscience.
The misrepresentations of history presented by Holocaust deniers
and other pseudo-historians are very similar in nature to the mis-
representations of natural science promoted by creationists and
homeopaths.
Concerning the second criterion it should be observed that good
science is characterized not only by being reliable but also by being
fruitful for knowledge production and in many cases practically
useful. According to this definition, lack of these other qualities
does not suffice to classify a claim or a practice as pseudoscientific.
(It may be sufficient for classification as bad science.)
The third criterion excludes some practices that satisfy the other
two criteria but are still not called pseudoscience. In particular it
excludes fraud in science. This is a practice that clearly satisfies the
first two criteria but is still not called “pseudoscience”. It also ex-
cludes mistakes in science, for instance the inadvertent use of
grossly inadequate measurements methods. As I have discussed in
some detail elsewhere, the missing element in cases of fraud and
serious mistakes is a deviant doctrine. (Hansson, 1996, 2009, 2013a)
Isolated breaches of the requirements of science are usually not
regarded as pseudoscientific. Pseudoscience, as it is commonly
conceived, involves a sustained effort to promote teachings that do
not have scientific legitimacy at the time.
This doctrinal deviation of pseudoscience can take two major
forms. We can distinguish between science denialism and pseudo-
theory promotion. Science denialists are driven by their enmity to-
wards some specific scientific account or theory. Some typical
examples are:
climate change denialism
holocaust denialism
relativity theory denialism
aids denialism
vaccination denialism
tobacco disease denialism
Pseudotheory promoters are driven by their aspirations to
advance a theory or a claim of their own. This implies the rejection
of some parts of science, but that is not a primary goal for them,
only a means to promote their own theory. Some examples are:
astrology
homeopathy
iridology
1
The broad definition of the term follows from the basic definition of science
stated in the first sentence of this section. For further justification of this definition,
see Hansson, 2013a, 62e66, and 2015, 15e16.
Please cite this article in press as: Hansson, S. O., Science denial as a form of pseudoscience, Studies in History and Philosophy of Science (2017),
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.shpsa.2017.05.002
scientology
transcendental meditation
ancient astronaut theories
The two categories are by no means mutually exclusive. Most
pseudoscientific teachings seem to belong primarily to either of the
two, but often the practice of one leads into the other. The
distinction should therefore not be seen as a strict dichotomy, but
rather as a spectrum or continuum with many gradations between
its two endpoints. For instance, scientology is predominantly a case
of pseudotheory promotion, but as part of the promotion of their
own alleged solutions to psychiatric problems scientologists have
engaged in vitriolic attacks on virtually all forms of psychiatry,
including science-based psychiatric treatments that (contrary to
scientological practices) have well-documented beneficial effects
(Kent, 1999). Another interesting example is creationism. It origi-
nated in religiously motivated unwillingness to accept the over-
whelming evidence for biological evolution. In order to make their
case more credible, creationists have often portrayed their teach-
ings as some form of alternative theory about the origin of life, but
it is obvious from their writings that these more “positive” ele-
ments of the message have only a subsidiary role in relation to the
denial of evolution. (Boudry, Blancke, & Braeckman, 2010) All major
versions of creationism (including its skeletal version “intelligent
design”) are still predominantly forms of science denialism.
In order to identify some major characteristics of science deni-
alism, three influential forms of it will be compared, namely rela-
tivity theory denialism, evolution denialism, and climate science
denialism. Relativity theory denialism had its heyday in the 1920s
and 1930s but it still has enthusiastic adherents (Beyerchen, 1977;
Wazeck, 2009). Evolution denialism (creationism) has a long his-
tory, but the elaboration of pseudoscientific arguments against
evolution had a breakthrough in the 1960s (Kirkpatrick, 2000;
Montgomery, 2012). Climate science denialism (self-named
“climate skepticism”) got off the ground in the 1980s (Mooney,
2005; Oreskes & Conway, 2010).
3. Four epistemological characteristics
In this section, four characteristics of science denialism will be
introduced that are all epistemologically significant and closely
connected with the failure of these teachings to provide us with
reliable knowledge.
3.1. Cherry-picking
In order to form a well-considered scientific judgment it is
essential to evaluate the whole body of evidence. In many if not
most areas of science, reports can be found that might, if considered
alone, be taken to support a conclusion different from that which
follows from the full body of evidence. For instance, in clinical
medicine there are often case reports that seemingly contradict the
conclusions that are supported by the overwhelming evidence
from well-conducted clinical trials. Arguably, you can prove almost
anything you want by cherry-picking the evidence. A classic
example is the tobacco industry’s campaigns in the 1990s in which
cherry-picking was systematically employed to discredit the evi-
dence showing that passive smoking causes deadly diseases
(Barnes & Bero, 1998; Francis, Shea, & Samet, 2006).
The Conservapedia website entry “Counterexamples to Rela-
tivity” is a clear example of cherry-picking. It contains a long list of
observations and alleged anomalies that have the appearance of
counterexamples to relativity theory. (One of these purported de-
viations from the predictions of relativity theory is nicely explained
in Turyshev et al., 2012.) Similarly, the deniers of evolution science
 S.O. Hansson / Studies in History and Philosophy of Science xxx (2017) 1e9
constantly refer to a few pieces of evidence from the paleontolog-
ical literature that may, taken out of context, seem to gainsay the
scientific consensus on evolution. One example is so-called poly-
strate fossils, i.e. fossils (often tree trunks) that extend vertically
over more than one geological stratum. Such fossils may seem to
speak in favour of a diluvial account of sediment formation, but
they have a well founded geological explanation (rapid sedimen-
tation around a fossilized tree trunk) (Gastaldo, Stevanoviç-Walls, &
Ware, 2004). Another example is sites where geological strata
appear out of order, with strata classified as older lying above strata
classified as younger. This is explained by well-known natural
phenomena, namely folds and faults, for which evidence can be
found on sites of “inverted” strata (Matson, 2002; Schafersman,
1983). In addition, evolution deniers perform another type of
cherry-picking. Their literature is full of quotations by evolution
scientists arguing against some other scientist’s view on exactly
how evolution has taken place. By truncation and misrepresenta-
tion of these quotations (so-called quote-mining), they are pre-
sented as evidence that these scientists cast doubt on whether (not
how) evolution took place (Cracroft, 1983, p. 180). This is about as
sensible as it would be to use disagreements among historians on
exactly what happened on the Western Front in World War I to
argue that the war actually did not take place.
Cherry-picking of evidence has an equally prominent role in the
argumentation of climate science denialists. They also “[d]raw on
isolated papers that challenge the consensus view and neglect the
broader body of research supported by hundreds of papers” (Liu,
2012, p. 130). For instance, the Information Council on the Envi-
ronment (created and funded by the energy industry) used
anomalous local temperature trends that differ from the global
trends as “evidence” that global warming has not taken place
(Tucker, 2012, pp. 846e847). Another example is the use of the year
1998 as a starting point for describing temperature trends. Since
this was an unusually hot year, this creates the illusion of much less
global warming in recent years than what has actually taken place
(Mazo, 2013, p. 43). Quote-mining similar to that performed by
creationists has also been a prominent strategy of climate science
denialists, for instance in the so-called Climategate event in 2009
(Leiserowitz, Maibach, Roser-Renouf, Smith, & Dawson, 2013, p.
819).
3.2. Neglect of refuting information
Science evolves with time, and the assimilation of new knowl-
edge refuting what was previously believed is an essential part of
the scientific process. Pseudoscientists are remarkably reluctant to
give up their cherished ideas.2 For instance, homeopathy is still
unaffected by the knowledge obtained in chemistry in the last two
centuries. The same penchant for holding on to refuted claims can
be seen in all our three examples of science denialism.
In many cases, the outdated ideas that pseudoscientists fail to
abandon are entrenched everyday conceptions that science has
made obsolete (Boudry, Blancke, & Pigliucci, 2015). Relativity the-
ory denialism is an example of this. Its adherents refuse to give up
old, intuitively appealing, ideas on physics that have become un-
tenable due to the accumulated scientific evidence. Perhaps sur-
prisingly, most of the adversaries of relativity theory in the 1920s
and 1930s did not revert from Einstein’s to Newton’s physics.
2
As an anonymous referee pointed out to me, there is a close connection be-
tween neglect of refuting information and the previous characteristic, cherry-
picking. If you allow yourself to pick only the information that you like, then in-
formation that contradicts the claims you want to make will be left out. These two
characteristics can be seen as two sides of the same coin.
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3
Instead they held on to pre-Newtonian physics. One of the most
important features of Newton’s theory of gravitation was the
acceptance of action at a distance. This led to a new way of thinking
in physics that was later codified with the introduction of the
notion of a field (by Michael Faraday in 1849) (Weinberg, 1977).
However, action at a distance was perceived by many as unbe-
lievable, perhaps even irrational. The Swiss physicist Georges-Louis
Le Sage (1724e1803) proposed that gravitational forces are the
effects of a large number of small, invisible particles that put
pressure on physical bodies (Aronson, 1964). This might have been
a reasonable hypothesis in the 18th century, but it was no longer so
in the 20th century. However, it has been immensely popular
among private researchers opposing relativity theory, many of
whom have elaborated it in various ways, unperturbed by the
devastating criticism that was raised against it already in the
nineteenth century (Wazeck, 2009, pp. 143e166).
The anti-evolution literature is full of arguments that have since
long been thoroughly refuted but are still being used as proof that
evolution has not taken place. This is exemplified by the pictures of
fossilized tracks of dinosaurs and humans beside each other that
have allegedly been found in the limestone beds of Paluxy River in
Texas. These claims have been perpetuated in spite of convincing
evidence that although the dinosaur tracks are genuine, the adja-
cent tracks are “made with human hands instead of human feet”
(Weber, 1981, p. 17; cf.; Milne & Schafersman, 1983). Another
example is the claim that the human eye is so complex that it could
not have come about through evolution. This is based on the
assumption that a complete eye should have resulted from a single
event in a species with no prior form of light perception. However,
as Darwin himself wrote in On the Origin of Species (chapter 6), the
eye must have evolved in multiple stages beginning with light-
sensitive cells, in a sequence where each step had evolutionary
advantage (Cf. Nilsson & Pelger, 1994). Yet another example is the
chronology claims of young Earth creationism that have since long
been most thoroughly refuted by radiometric dating (Abell 1983).
The same pattern can be seen in climate science denialism. As
noted by Stephen Weart, “[t]he old claims that the carbon dioxide
spectra was saturated, that urban heat explained the observed
global warming, and a hundred others, long since refuted, kept
convincing novice readers that claims of global warming were
nonsense.” (Weart, 2011, p. 46) A further example is the recurring
claim that the currently ongoing warming of the Earth results from
changes in solar activity rather than from human activities.
Extensive studies have shown this to be unsubstantiated (Foukal,
Frohlich, Spruit, & Wigley, 2006; Lockwood, 2012). A website
devoted to scientific information about refuted arguments by
climate science denialists lists 193 such arguments (http://www.
skepticalscience.com/argument.php). Weart (2011) called them
“zombie arguments” since they are “dead arguments raised from
their graves” to be used against the conclusions drawn in legitimate
science. A major reason why they can be repeatedly resurrected is
that the denialists publish in non-peer-reviewed media. In peer
reviewed literature, refuted claims do not have much of a chance to
be reused in this way (Dunlap & Jacques, 2013; Hansson, 2016).
3.3. Fabrication of fake controversies
When unable to convince their audience that only their own
views are worth taking seriously, science denialists have adopted
the strategy of claiming that the issue is open and subject to a
genuine scientific controversy. To achieve this they only have to
convince decision-makers that their standpoint is credible enough
to be taken seriously. When NASA reports that a spaceship has
orbited around the earth, neither the American Congress nor media
call in a representative from the Flat Earth Society to defend the
4 S.O. Hansson / Studies in History and Philosophy of Science xxx (2017) 1e9
alternative view that the spaceship had circled around the rim of a
flat earth. From a scientific point of view, it is equally unjustified to
invite creationists or climate “contrarians” when evolution or
climate science is discussed. However, this may not be easy for
decisions-makers or the public to recognize, not least since it is
difficult for the scientifically untrained to “grasp the difference
between the results of a single study, a handful of studies, and a
scientific consensus, and such distinctions are not always
communicated clearly by the media.” (Holtcamp, 2012; A316)
These are difficulties that science denialists have often exploited in
a skilful way.
The deniers of relativity theory have spent considerable efforts
on creating the impression that they are serious contenders against
mainstream science. For instance, the American anti-relativist
Arvid Reuterdahl incessantly told the public that there was a
huge debate going on in science, in which the proponents of rela-
tivity theory were pushed back (Wazeck, 2009, pp. 268e269).
The original strategy of American creationists was to have cre-
ationism taught in public schools as the only account of the origin
of life. In 1968 the US Supreme Court ruled that a 1928 Arkansas
statute prohibiting the teaching of evolution was unconstitutional.
After that creationists changed their strategies and made demands
for “equal time” in schools their hallmark. The campaign for “equal
time” was much advanced by Ronald Reagan’s statement in his
1980 presidential campaign that evolution “is a scientific theory
only”, that it has “great flaws”, and that “if it was going to be taught
in the schools, then I think that also the biblical theory of creation,
which is not a theory but the biblical story of creation, should also
be taught.” (Holden, 1980).
From its very beginning, the proponents of climate science
denialism have also demanded “equal time”, but in public media
rather than in schools. From the tobacco industry they learnt the
craft of “manufacturing uncertainty” (Dunlap & Jacques, 2013;
Oreskes & Conway, 2010), i.e. creating the impression of a legiti-
mate scientific controversy when there is none. Some of their
means to achieve this will be discussed in Section 4. The employ-
ment of this strategy seems to have been highly successful in the
United States. A detailed content analysis has shown that after
1995, newspaper reporters started to create a “balance” between
legitimate climate science and allegedly scientific alternative views
represented by denialist organizations (Boykoff & Boykoff, 2004). A
similar “balance” between scientific and non-scientific views on
climate change was created in American television news. Conse-
quently, “through adherence to the journalistic norm of ‘balanced
reporting’, television news coverage of anthropogenic climate
change actually perpetrates an informational bias by significantly
diverging from the consensus view in climate science that human
activities contribute to climate change” (Boykoff, 2008, p. 1). News
reporting in other countries, including Britain and Australia, ex-
hibits the same pattern (McKewon, 2012, p. 277). This is an effect of
a resourceful campaign that deliberately promulgates a false pic-
ture of the state of science.
3.4. Deviant criteria of assent
As science progresses, new data and insights are accepted by the
community of scientists. However, such acceptance does not imply
that these new statements are taken to be true with certainty.
Acceptance of a new claim in empirical science means that this
3
Individual scientists who investigate what most colleagues believe to be too
implausible hypotheses can often have a positive role in the development of sci-
ence, provided that they perform these investigations in an unprejudiced way. Cf.
Kitcher, 1993, esp. pp. 68e72.
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claim is provisionally accepted (provisionally not doubted), or in
other words that it is taken for given by the community of scientists
until some new information turns up that gives grounds for
doubting it. The provisionality of scientific acceptance also requires
that such information is taken seriously and leads to open-minded
reconsiderations of the issue.3 Decisions on what to accept provi-
sionally in this sense are immensely important in science, but yet
they are made in a very informal way that is often difficult to ac-
count for. In spite of this, it is a process with strict standards of
evidence. The onus of proof falls to those who want a new claim to
be provisionally accepted, for instance by acknowledging a previ-
ously unproven phenomenon, or by introducing a new scientific
theory. These strict standards are necessary in order to ensure a
reasonably steady progress in science. If we accepted new ideas too
rashly, then the collective of scientists would too often go jointly in
the wrong direction, and scientific progress would be blocked by
mistaken assumptions. On the other hand there are limits to how
high the entry requirements can be. Since we cannot leave every-
thing open we will have to take some risks of being wrong. “Asking
for total certainty is based on a rather outdated view of science .
and in effect asks for the impossible. ” (Nerlich, 2010, p. 433).
It is an essential component of the ethos of science that the
standards for scientific acceptance should be fairly uniform and
that they should not be influenced by ideology or wishful thinking.
In sharp contrast to this, all three groups of denialists have a record
of applying deviant criteria for assent to scientific claims. They have
all put up tailor-made criteria for their enemy theories that are
almost impossible to satisfy.
One of the major criticisms that opponents voiced against rel-
ativity theory in the 1920s and 1930s was that the theory was not
sufficiently transpicuous (“anschaulich”) (Wazeck, 2009, pp. 183e
190). In Germany, the focal point of anti-relativity, attempts were
made to create a special “German physics” (deutsche Physik) that
would be transpicuous, and therefore also free from the mathe-
matical complexities of general relativity. Both Einstein and Planck
argued against the idea that physics had to be transpicuous, and
Einstein also pointed out that what people consider to be tran-
spicuous shifts with time (Wazeck, 2009, pp. 183e184). In addition,
anti-relativists required absolute certainty in matters concerning
the nature of time and space, something that is impossible for
physicists recognizing that these are empirical issues.
Anti-evolutionists have devised several ways to heighten the
demands on evidence for evolution. One of these is to require
experimental evidence in issues for which no experimental evi-
dence is possible. The evolution of new species in organisms with a
comparatively slow reproductive cycle, such as mammals and birds,
cannot in practice be demonstrated in experiments since such ex-
periments would take too long time (Raup, 1983, pp. 160e161).
Furthermore, the creationist notion of a species (“created kind”) is
constructed in such a way that creationists never have to
acknowledge the emergence of a new species (Cracroft, 1983). New
species have been obtained experimentally through evolution for
instance in Drosophila (fruit flies), but creationists claim that these
new life forms were not new species (Dobzhansky & Pavlovsky,
1971; Weinberg, Starczak, & Jörg, 1992).
Climate science denialists place excessive emphasis on possible
sources of error in evidence supporting the mainstream view,
whereas argumentation purportedly supporting the denialist view
are taken at face value. For instance, denialists put unreasonable
demands on temperature information from periods before the
thermometer was invented, and (much like the opponents of
general relativity) they oppose the use of complex mathematical
models as a means to understand complex natural phenomena
(Diethelm & McKee, 2009, pp. 2e3). This pattern has been called
 S.O. Hansson / Studies in History and Philosophy of Science xxx (2017) 1e9
“asymmetry of scientific challenge” (Freudenburg & Muselli, 2013,
p. 777).
The same strategy of asymmetry has also been employed by the
tobacco industry throughout its various campaigns against legiti-
mate medical science. For instance, scientific hirelings of the to-
bacco industry have argued that epidemiological evidence should
be systematically disregarded unless it presents very high odds
ratios or relative risks (Ong & Glantz, 2001, p. 1751). The same
requirement has also been raised by industry-affiliated pseudo-
scientists lobbying against reductions in human exposure to other
toxic substances (Rudén & Hansson, 2008, pp. 300-301 Samet &
Burke, 2001; Francis et al., 2006). These and other re-
interpretations of science by the tobacco industry would make
many health risks with a considerable death toll, including passive
smoking, immune against risk reduction measures.
Due to the close connections between the tobacco industry and
climate science denialists (Oreskes & Conway, 2010) it is plausible
that the strategy of asymmetric scientific challenge was consciously
transferred from the former to the latter. That it is a consciously
chosen strategy can be seen from a document from the George H.W.
Bush administration in 1990 stating that it was “not beneficial to
discuss whether there is or is not” global warming. The reason was
that “[i]n the eyes of the public, we will lose this debate. A better
approach is to raise the many uncertainties that need to be better
understood on this issue.” (Shabecoff, 1990) This strategy was car-
ried through both in his own presidency and in that of his son
(Leduc, 2007, pp. 261e262).
4. Ten sociological characteristics
This section will present some other characteristics shared by
the three groups of science denialists. These characteristics have
much less epistemological significance than the four discussed in
Section 3, but they can contribute to our understanding of science
denialism as a social phenomenon.
4.1. The enemy theory threatens the denialists’ worldview
In all three cases, the enemy theory threatens the denialists’
worldviews and their ingrained conceptions about the world. Rel-
ativity theory was (and is) a challenge to common sense. It shows
that we inhabit a world that we are not cognitively well equipped to
fully understand. Quantum theory does this to an arguably even
larger extent, and additional developments in physics have brought
us even further away from the transpicuous ideal of the relativity
denialists. Evolution theory is of course primarily a threat to
traditional religion, in most cases to a literalist variant of protestant
Christianity. Climate science creates problems for certain views on
politics and lifestyles, in particular for views that oppose the po-
litical interferences with businesses and lifestyles that are associ-
ated with demands for less CO2 emissions.
4.2. The enemy theory is complex and difficult to understand
Both relativity theory (in particular general relativity) and
climate science are based on non-trivial mathematics, which makes
them inaccessible to the vast majority of the public. Both evolution
theory and climate science are built on huge collections of data and
theoretical considerations from a wide range of disciplines. It is
difficult to grasp how all these data combine to provide strong
support for the respective theory. In all three cases, the inaccessi-
bility of the evidence makes the theory vulnerable to attacks
following the strategies mentioned in Section 3.
It could be argued that all of science is complex and difficult to
understand, which would make this an empty criterion. However,
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5
there are many examples in which the evidence that disproves
pseudoscientific claims is easily accessible and understandable. The
fact that standard homeopathic dilutions remove every molecule of
the allegedly active substance is a case in point (Baum & Ernst,
2009; Hansson, 2013b), and so are the experiments showing that
dowsers fail when they are deprived of all sensory clues to the
location of the target of their search (Vogt & Hyman, 2000). In the
many cases when the scientific consensus is based on (strong but)
less directly accessible evidence, this is a pedagogical difficulty that
pseudoscientists are eager to exploit.
4.3. Lack of competence
In all three cases the vast majority of the leading denialists are
“private researchers” without the academic credentials required to
become a researcher or teacher in the respective area at a reputable
university. Only in rare cases have qualified researchers in the
pertinent areas become supporters of denialism (Cook et al., 2016).
Of the three areas, relativity theory denialism has had the
largest participation of qualified researchers. They had in fact no
less than three Nobel Prize laureates in physics among their ranks,
namely Philipp Lenard (1862e1947), Johannes Stark (1874e1957),
and Charles Édouard Guillaume (1861e1938). However, none of
these had a strong standing in the international community of
physicists. Lenard and Stark were isolated both due to their deviant
ideas on physics and their staunch Nazism (Beyerchen, 1977;
Hentschel & Hentschel, 1996; Wazeck, 2009). Guillaume received
the prize for his applied studies of nickel-steel alloys. His prize was
controversial and he never had a strong standing in mainstream
physics (Cahn, 2005; Friedman, 2002).
Among the opponents of climate science, and in particular, those
of evolution theory, the participation of competent scientists has
been much smaller. Extremely few of the vocal creationists have
any relevant degree. “Scientific expertise” in creationism is pri-
marily provided by persons who have degrees in natural sciences
unrelated to evolution or in engineering.
The situation is similar in climate science denialism (Abraham
et al., 2014; Anderegg, Prall, Harold, & Schneider, 2010). Most of
the leading contrarians have no expertise in climate science. They
entered this field as the result of “the recruitment and funding of
scientists (of any discipline) skilled at public relations and willing to
oppose the ‘conventional’ viewpoint on climate change” (Tucker,
2012, p. 845).
4.4. A remarkable male dominance
A remarkable feature of the denialist literature is its male
dominance. Only two women seem to have been involved in the
anti-relativity movement of the 1920s and 1930s. One of them
(Margarete von Oppell-Patschke) was married to a prominent male
denialist, after whose death she wrote a pamphlet trying to defend
his views (Wazeck, 2009, pp. 55, 150e151). Women are equally rare
both in evolution denialism and climate science denialism. This is
particularly remarkable in the former case. There is a comparatively
strong presence of women in the legitimate biological sciences, but
they are virtually absent from the activities of evolution denialism
and creationism. This male dominance is difficult to explain, but as
Maarten Boudry pointed out to me, the audacity of claiming that
one understands a subject better than all the experts may conform
better with male then female stereotypes.
4.5. Inability to publish in peer-reviewed media
All three groups of science denialists exhibit a remarkable fail-
ure to publish in peer-reviewed scientific journals. This applied also
6 S.O. Hansson / Studies in History and Philosophy of Science xxx (2017) 1e9
to the few enemies of relativity theory that were established
physicists, even the Nobel laureates. Colleagues judged their writ-
ings on relativity as substandard, in spite of their (previous) valu-
able contributions to other parts of physics. Therefore their anti-
relativity texts were rejected by the physics journals (Wazeck,
2009, pp. 242e267) The situation is similar for the opponents of
evolution theory and climate science; both groups have failed
almost completely to publish in peer-reviewed journals. This stands
in sharp contrast to their own avowals of the scientific quality of
their claims (Scott & Cole, 1985; Anderegg et al., 2010; Abraham
et al., 2014).
4.6. Conspiracy theories
The leading proponents of these denialist movements have all
claimed that their failure to get published in peer-reviewed jour-
nals is due to some type of conspiracy which has also prevented
them more generally from gaining the recognition they deserve.
The opposition to relativity theory in the 1920s and 1930s was
dominated by anti-Semites who saw relativity theory as part of a
larger Jewish conspiracy. They were convinced that the established
physics journals and physics societies were all under Jewish control
(Wazeck, 2009, pp. 271e292). Creationists tend to see an atheist
and/or devilish conspiracy (Boudry & Braeckman, 2011, p. 155).
There is even a book from 1991 with the title “The evolution con-
spiracy”. Climate science denialists tend to see a “liberal conspir-
acy” (Aldhous, 2011). In an extensive study of more than 100 books
denying the reality of anthropogenic climate change, Dunlap and
Jacques concluded: “Strikingly, many of these books not only pro-
vide fallacious critiques of climate science but also present an
alternate reality in which global warming is a hoax created by a
conspiracy of supposedly greedy scientists, liberal politicians, and
environmentalists.” (Dunlap & Jacques, 2013, p. 713).
4.7. Appeals directly to the public
When failing to publish in scientific journals, science denialists
in all three categories have turned directly to the public. At the peak
of anti-relativity actitivities in the interwar period, numerous
pamphlets defaming relativity theory were printed, and a large
number of articles with similar content appeared in the popular
press (Wazeck, 2009, pp. 34e36, 252e258). In America the most
important outlet of these ideas was the ferociously anti-Semitic
Dearborn Independent that was one of the nation’s largest news-
papers (Wazeck, 2009, pp. 255e257). Today, both anti-evolution
activists and the opponents of climate science disseminate their
views primarily in books, pamphlets, and webpages intended for
the general public (Dunlap & Jacques, 2013). From the viewpoint of
public understanding of science it is a serious problem that writers
who get their science published in good scientific journals are
much less prone to write for the general public than those whose
manuscripts are almost invariably rejected by the scientific
journals.
4.8. Pretence to have a much larger support in science
Science denialists of all three kinds try to shape the impression
that they have much more support within science than what they
actually have. For this purpose they create institutes, conferences,
and sometimes even journals with impressive scientific names but
devoted to science denial. The “Academy of Nations” founded in the
United States in 1921, allegedly as an international scientific orga-
nization, was the most important such construction by anti-
relativists (Wazeck, 2009, pp. 310e328). Creationists have
launched a plethora of allegedly scientific organizations including
Please cite this article in press as: Hansson, S. O., Science denial as a form of pseudoscience, Studies in History and Philosophy of Science (2017),
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.shpsa.2017.05.002
the Creation Research Society, the Institute for Creation Research
and the Discovery Institute. Both creationists and climate science
denialists have spent considerable resources on the creation of
websites promoting their views, and the latter have even gone as
far as to set up a “Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate
Change (NIPCC)” that issues reports mimicking those of the IPCC (in
form, but certainly not in scientific quality).
In a strikingly similar way, all three denialist movements have
used petitions of scientists as a means to portray their views as well
supported in science. In all these cases, the scientific credentials of
most petitioners were unrelated to the issue at hand. In 1931, a
pamphlet against relativity theory, Hundert Autoren gegen Einstein
(A Hundred Authors Against Einstein) was published in Leipzig
(Wazeck, 2009, pp. 356e361). (According to an oft-told but seem-
ingly unsubstantiated anecdote, Einstein retorted: “If I were wrong,
then one would have been enough to refute me.”)
In 2001 the anti-evolutionist Discovery Institute published a
petition signed by 100 scientists, called “A Scientific Dissent From
Darwinism”. As noted in a press report, the signatories include “few
biologists but many evangelicals” (Chang, 2006). In 2007 a petition
against climate science was sent to the United Nations with the
rubric “100 Prominent Scientists ask the UN to Stop the Fear Mon-
gering and Get Down to Work” (http://www.globalwarminghoax.
com/news.php?extend.44). Another petition directed against
climate science identifies anyone as a “scientist” who has a Bachelor
of Science (http://www.petitionproject.org).
4.9. Fierce attacks on legitimate scientists
All three denialist movements have engaged in vicious personal
attacks on individual scientists. A large part, probably the majority,
of the anti-relativists of the 1920s and 1930s were anti-Semites,
and their anti-Semitic attacks against Einstein were virulent
enough to prevent him from visiting Germany (Wazeck, 2009, pp.
271e292). The foremost American anti-relativist, Arvid Reuterdahl,
was also an anti-Semite. Prominent defenders of both evolution
and climate science have found themselves subjected to various
kinds of harassment and threats (Egen & Keys, 1999; Gleick, 2010;
Salinger, 2010; Wright & Mann, 2013).
4.10. Strong political connections
These three forms of science denialism all have strong political
connections. As already mentioned, a large part of the anti-
relativists were anti-Semites and Nazis. In Germany, Nazi news-
papers attacked relativity theory whereas democratic newspapers
(as long as they existed) mostly defended it (Wazeck, 2009, pp.
257e258). Today, denial of relativity theory does not seem to be
connected with Nazism, but in the USA it has connections with
right-wing politics. Conservapedia, an Internet-based right-wing
dictionary, features articles attacking relativity theory (as well as
evolution and climate science).
The political connections of the other two forms of denialism are
well known. Evolution denialism is dominated by a Christian right
wing that seeks confirmation of its fundamentalist convictions.
Climate change denialism is dominated by a more business-
oriented right that opposes the government interferences in busi-
ness that the results of climate science are commonly taken to
justify. There is a strong correlation between political views and
beliefs on climate change. In the United States, belief in climate
change rose among Democrats from 60% in 2000 to 70% in 2010,
whereas it decreased among Republicans from 49 to 29% in the
same period (McCright & Dunlap, 2011, p. 176; McCright, Dunlap, &
Xiao, 2014).
 S.O. Hansson / Studies in History and Philosophy of Science xxx (2017) 1e9
One might expect this political one-sidedness to be specific for
these examples, and balanced out by other forms of science deni-
alism that are dominated by the political left. However, no evidence
seems to be available to confirm that this is so. Two forms of science
denial have often been taken to be predominantly left-wing,
namely disbelief in the scientific evidence confirming the safety
of vaccination and the safety of genetically modified food. However,
in neither case is the presumed connection with leftist politics
corroborated by the evidence. The available data indicates that both
anti-vaccination and anti-GM standpoints are either equally com-
mon on both sides or somewhat more common on the right wing
(Berinsky, 2012; Ceccoli & Hixon, 2012; Hamilton, Hartter, & Saito,
2015; Legge & Durant, 2010; Lewandowsky, Gignac, & Oberauer,
2013).
5. Comparison to pseudotheory promotion
There is a considerable literature on the characteristics of
pseudoscience, usually couched in terms of the demarcation be-
tween science and pseudoscience (For overviews, see Mahner,
2007; Hansson, 2008.). This literature can be divided into two
parts representing different approaches. One part is concerned
with finding an overarching, time-independent criterion that dis-
tinguishes science from pseudoscience. Prominent criteria that
have been proposed are falsifiability, puzzle-solving capacity,
integration with other sciences, and inclusion in a progressive
research programme. However, as I have argued elsewhere, in or-
der to be applicable across disciplines and epochs, such criteria
have to be so general that they cannot be used successfully to
determine in individual, concrete cases if a practice or theory is
scientific or pseudoscientific (Hansson, 2009; 2013a). The other
approach is more practice-oriented and presents less grandiose
criteria that are considered to be signs of pseudoscience rather than
necessary and sufficient criteria of demarcation. A large number of
lists of (usually 5e10) such criteria have been published. (For ref-
erences to such lists, see Hansson, 2008.) Judging by the examples
used in the literature presenting these lists, they have been
developed with a main focus on the forms of pseudoscience that we
called in Section 2 pseudotheory promotion, rather than on science
denial.
Two of the four epistemic characteristics mentioned in Section 3
are commonly found on such general lists of characteristics of
pseudoscience, namely cherry-picking and the neglect of refuting
information. (Hansson, 2008) There are abundant examples of how
theory-promoting pseudosciences satisfy these criteria. The use of
deviant criteria of assent does not seem to have been mentioned in
any of these lists, but arguably it should have been mentioned.
Theory-promoting pseudoscientists apply remarkably weak criteria
of assent to their own claims. For instance, proponents of pseudo-
scientific medical theories such as homeopathy, herbal medicine,
and chiropractic, consider their therapies to be efficient on the basis
of data that would be grossly insufficient in conventional, science-
based medicine (Singh & Ernst, 2008).
The fourth of our epistemic criteria, the fabrication of fake
controversies, is notably absent from the usual lists of criteria of
pseudoscience. More importantly, most cases of pseudotheory
promotion do not seem to involve the manufacture of fake con-
troversies. For instance, advocates of homeopathy and anthro-
posophical medicine tend to avoid controversies with science.
Instead, they commonly claim that their practices are compatible
with medical science and science-based clinical medicine, at least
in the sense that the two “paradigms” can allegedly coexist without
conflict. The fabrication of fake controversies seems to be an
epistemic characteristic that distinguishes science denialism from
pseudoscientific theory promotion, and this for a fairly obvious
Please cite this article in press as: Hansson, S. O., Science denial as a form of pseudoscience, Studies in History and Philosophy of Science (2017),
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.shpsa.2017.05.002
7
reason. Someone who wishes to promote a theory or claim usually
gains from describing it as conformable to mainstream science. In
contrast, for someone who wishes to denigrate a part of main-
stream science it would seem necessary to describe it as
controversial.
Among the criteria mentioned in the literature on pseudosci-
ence there is at least one with epistemic significance that appears
not to be satisfied by science denialism, namely belief in author-
ities. Many of the more prominent pseudoscientific theories are
dominated by an individual who usually founded the movement
and whose words are still taken to be the highest wisdom. Samuel
Hahnemann in homeopathy, Rudolf Steiner in anthroposophy, L.
Ron Hubbard in scientology, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in Transcen-
dental Meditation, and Erich von Däniken in ancient astronaut
theory are some of the best known examples. There does not seem
to be any similar examples of dominant persons in science denial.
Therefore, such dominance seems to be a characteristic of pseu-
doscientific theory promotion in contradistinction to science
denial. (However, not all forms of pseudotheory promotion have
this characteristic. It also seems to be absent from pseudosciences
that promote a theory supporting traditional religion, such as sin-
donology and so-called biblical and Mormon archaeology.)
Many of the sociological characteristics of science denialism
mentioned in Section 4 are also characteristic of pseudotheory
promotion. This applies for instance to lack of competence, inability
to publish in peer-reviewed media, conspiracy theories, appeals
directly to the public, and pretence to have a much larger support in
science than they actually have. However, some of the above-
mentioned characteristics of science denial seem to be less prom-
inent in pseudotheory promotion. For instance, the gender distri-
bution among promoters of pseudoscientific theories is a rather
mixed story; although some pseudotheories such as ufology seem
to have predominantly male activists others such as therapeutic
touch appear to be dominated by women. Furthermore, most forms
of pseudotheory promotion seem to lack a strong connection with
politics.
6. Conclusion
In conclusion, our comparison shows that these three forms of
science denialism have strikingly similar features in spite of being
devoted to quite different enemy theories. Many of these charac-
teristics are shared by other forms of pseudoscience, and our study
has confirmed the pseudoscientific nature of science denialism.
However, we have also seen that science denialism has some
characteristics of its own that are not shared by pseudotheory
promotion, in particular its persistent fabrication of fake contro-
versies, the extraordinary male dominance among its activists, and
its strong connection with various forms of right-wing politics.
The scientific response to science denialism has to take these
characteristics into account. As scientists we should not try to fill
the roles that science denialists have allotted to us on their agenda.
We should not act as if the denialists’ fake controversies were real
controversies, and neither should we accept the deviant criteria of
scientific assent that they try to impose on us. Our task is instead to
expose their strategies, their agenda, and the pseudoscientific
characteristics of their argumentation. And above all it is our task to
explain what science really is, why it should not be politicized, and
how it can provide humanity with a better common understanding
of the world we are living in.
Acknowledgement
This article was written as part of the project Mind the Gap e
Delay Mechanisms and Goal Failures in Swedish Environmental Policy
8 S.O. Hansson / Studies in History and Philosophy of Science xxx (2017) 1e9
that is funded by the Swedish Research Council Formas (grant
2014-595 211). I would like to thank Karin Edvardsson Björnberg,
Maarten Boudry, Angelo Fasce, Jesper Jerkert, and Markku Rum-
mukainen for valuable comments on an earlier version.
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