How should we conduct science?

‘Discours de la methode pour bien conduire sa raison, et chercher la verité dans les sciences. Plus, la dioptriqve. Les meteores. Et la geometrie. Qui sont des essais de cete [sic] methode / [René Descartes].’ (1637) (Wellcome Images: CC)

Science doesn’t pretend to have all the answers. Sometimes, however, scientists do. They claim all sorts of things and we should be wary. Not because there’s something wrong with science or scientists per se, but scientists are humans, too, and you have to watch the ones who think they’re superior to the rest of us.

I thought for today’s column, I’d look at some of the ways scientists have hidden behind ‘science’ in an attempt to establish their own superiority or claim some kind of spurious ‘truth’. And I want to ask: how should we conduct science?