Is Pseudoscience The Solution To Science Literacy?

In EISTA03 the authors described an ambitious project they have embarked upon at the University of Central Florida to help improve public understanding of the basic principles of physical science, topics often included in the general education program at many colleges and universities. After the pilot course was very successful, the authors were motivated to work harder on the course and explore new directions. They thus decided to create versions of the course, nicknamed flavors, whereby each flavor used a particular genre or theme of movies: Action/Adventure, SciFi, Modem Physics, Superheroes, Astronomy, Pseudo-science. Among all flavors, the Pseudoscience flavor was especially praised by the students. Contrary to passive attendance in the traditional course, the class was full of passionate discussions driven by scenes in popular movies such as Sixth Sense, The Others, and Dragonfly. Almost every single person in the class (of 90 students) would participate in the discussions and defend his/her positions. These discussions often were passionate and quite \u27heated\u27. Eventually, scientific analysis was presented by the instructors who always maintained a skeptic attitude on any extraordinary topic requiring extraordinary proof, thus explaining how the scientific method works and what is acceptable and what unacceptable in science. Amazingly, a fraction of the students (not always the same students in all topics) did not always agree with the rational explanations; often their decisions were influenced by personal fears and biases or emotions. Their thinking at times revealed the introduction of arbitrary assumptions and acceptance of anecdotal statements. Many reasons have been put forward by scientists why they do not want to be involved in a fight against Pseudoscience. For example: pseudoscientific beliefs are irrational and therefore it is impossible to fight them with rational arguments; by even agreeing to discuss Pseudoscience we accept it as an established discipline; Pseudoscience is a background noise that does not harm science. All these (and many other) reasons may contain pieces of the truth, but they are not necessarily true. However, Pseudoscience posses a continuous and, in fact, increasing threat to our society. It is impossible to estimate exactly the irreversible harm that will do in the future. It is the scientists\u27 duty to act now to eliminate or, at least, contain this danger. Therefore, in a time when the science literacy of the public has declined and the threat of pseudo-science has increased, revising the traditional science course to present science through the window of Pseudoscience might offer not only a way to restore science literacy, but also a way to help society by eliminating misconceptions and attacking growing trends (astrology, remote viewing, psychic readings, etc) that might harm (financially or otherwise) innocent and trusting citizens