I am also keenly interested in the scientific pursuit of ever more accurate stories about how things work. I don't think I would have nearly the appetite for accuracy if I needed to counter a more miserable existence with more comforting, reassuring, affirming stories. The lure of wishful thinking is, in part a function of what you're up against. The more pain you're in, the more wishful thinking you'll naturally want and need.

For those of us with relatively cushy lives then, it's no good telling those with difficult lives that they ought to face reality. In this often cruel and always unfair world everyone deserves to tell whatever stories give them comfort enough to get by. We could call it The Right to Believe.

It's also no good to have wishful thinking imposed on the scientific pursuit of accurate stories. We could call it The Need to Know. People should be free to believe whatever wishful stories get them through the night, but science should be free to pursue whatever accurate stories will get us through the crises. Climate change, extinctions, epidemics, cancer-the conflict between the right to believe and the need to know isn't some intellectual debate, it's a hot war, so let me word it more directly:

From science to belief: We honor your right to believe whatever comforts you, but get it the hell out of the way of science, because even unimpeded, science can hardly keep up, and only if it keeps up will it save our children, even your children, oh wishful thinker.

From belief to science: You scientists caused most of those crises in the first place and how dare you say your method gets at truth better than other methods? Why are you qualified to make that claim? Because you've decided you're right? Do you know how many wishful thinkers say exactly the same thing? What makes you think science is so special that we all have to get out of your way?

As pretentious as it sounds, science can make special claims. The universe either complies with or defies our beliefs. Reality pushes back. As Aldous Huxley said, "facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored." The universe simply complies more with scientific accounts.

Imagine parallel annual reports from two human ventures, one for science and one for, say, religion. Or imagine centennial or millennial reports. No matter what period you measure, science's report would be vastly thicker. No matter what opinions we might hold on the subject, our intuitions recognize that science is winning the accuracy game. So no, it's not just like any other way of believing. Even the people who claim that science and wishful thinking are indistinguishable intuit this. Their argument undermines itself and reveals deference to science. They are trying to make a compelling objective case that there is no way to make a compelling objective case.

This backhanded, reluctant deference to science is understandable. We may grumble about sciences' pretentiousness, especially when science disappoints our wishful thinking, but at least tacit deference to science is all-pervasive and not arbitrary. When religious fundamentalists need results, they rely on doctors and engineers rather than faith healers or prayers.

Blurring the distinction between the sources of scientific theories and beliefs will not resolve the conflict. A popular alternative is to sharpen the distinction between their consequences: Yes, science and belief are different. The good news is that they can co-exist because beliefs have consequences for values whereas science by itself does not. Science is just facts. If you look at the entire body of what science tells us, by itself it has no values in it. It's only descriptions and explanations.

The problem with this approach is that science is never just by itself. It's always in interaction with us. To illustrate, consider this dialog:

Andy: (lights a cigarette)
Bob: You know, scientific evidence suggests that cigarette smoking causes cancer.
Andy: Don't tell me what to do.
Bob: I'm not. I'm simply drawing an objective factual causal connection. It has nothing to do with values.
Andy: Since you know full well I don't want cancer, your statement of scientific fact was, in effect telling me what to do.
Bob: Ah, but don't you see, science itself is not concerned with whether you don't want cancer and therefore I'm not tell you what to do.

Does Bob convince you that science has no bearing on values; that the two realms could co-exist in parallel with no interaction? Facts bear on values. Though the values may reside in us and not science, science interacts with us. We can't keep science from mucking about where our beliefs and values reside.

I want to suggest an alternative way to resolve the conflict between the right to believe and the need to know: What if believers could admit that their beliefs were not accurate? To do this would require a maneuver I'll call strategic gullibility. It would mean being able to say about some of our ideas, "I know my belief probably isn't true but I believe it anyway because it makes me feel good. It helps me get through the night."

Is that even technically feasible? Can we feel the power of theories, ideas, and stories that we doubt are true?

In practice we're not bad at it. We have visceral responses to literature, story telling, movies, TV, sexual fantasy, drug-induced hallucinations, and dreams. We know they're fiction and yet we have strong responses to them. We don't mind admitting it. We consider it normal, perhaps because we designate these activities as make-believe and cordon them off from consequences, or at least from direct consequences. Could we do that with our churches and spiritual practices? Would we want to?

I'll take that up in another article next week. But I'll here end with a confession: I employ strategic gullibility. I've succeeded in writing an essay a week for six years under no pressure to do so. If I missed a month or even two, the most that would come of it is a charitable friend or two who might say "Where are your articles?" And yet I believe I am operating under a firm deadline. I know I'm not under deadline but I find it useful to imagine a bunch of readers out there who will be frustrated if I don't get something out this week. I believe it though it is not true. Strategic gullibility serves me well.