News — ScientificMethod

Enlarge / Senator John Cornyn (center, black suit) takes a photo with the 2017 astronaut class. (credit: NASA Johnson) On Friday, Texas Senator John Cornyn took to Twitter with some advice for scientists: models aren't part of the scientific method. Scientists have responded with a mix of bafflement and exasperation. And Cornyn’s misconception is common enough—and important enough—that it’s worth exploring. Cornyn’s beef with models echoes a talking point often brought up by people who want to reject inconvenient conclusions of systems sciences. In reality, “you can make a model say anything you want” is about as potent an argument...