> Those claiming that "the science is settled" are trying to manipulate the public.
No, they aren't.
Settled != correct. But what most crackpots fail to take into account is that if you want to challenge the scientific status quo you need an actual argument, i.e. you need propose a better alternative to the current-best explanation, one that either accounts for data that the current-best explanation does not, or one that has fewer free parameters. You can't just say, "Science has gotten it wrong in the past so it probably has got it wrong now, and therefore you should pay attention to my crackpot theory." The status quo is the result of a lot of hard work. It may not be right, but you have to at the very least understand how it became the status quo before you can seriously challenge it.
No, they aren't.
Settled != correct. But what most crackpots fail to take into account is that if you want to challenge the scientific status quo you need an actual argument, i.e. you need propose a better alternative to the current-best explanation, one that either accounts for data that the current-best explanation does not, or one that has fewer free parameters. You can't just say, "Science has gotten it wrong in the past so it probably has got it wrong now, and therefore you should pay attention to my crackpot theory." The status quo is the result of a lot of hard work. It may not be right, but you have to at the very least understand how it became the status quo before you can seriously challenge it.