Tomasz Witkowski
Moderator Editors
Paweł Fortuna
Institute of Psychology, JPII Catholic University of Lublin
Abstract:
The article is an answer to the commentaries on our article On psycho-business, tolerance and responsibility, or strategies of pure scientists. In the first part we summarize and comment upon the few proposals that have been made of how to counteract pseudoscience and psycho-business. In the next part we express our doubts as to the role and tasks of science that have been described by participants in the discussion. An analysis of the so-called junk science produced by the scientific community is presented in justification of our doubts. The subsequent part of the article is devoted to controversies related to differences in understanding of the concepts of pseudoscience, quasi-science and proto-science by the authors of the commentaries. We also analyzed the legal aspect of the provocation and discussed the issue of responsibility for its results, as well as answered the criticisms re: the placebo effect, limiting of the discussion solely to the area of psychotherapy, and the methodology of the research presented in the original article. A part of our article was devoted to answering some individual accusations and doubts expressed by the authors of the discussion. In summary, two points of view were juxtaposed. On the one hand the picture that emerges from the opinions shared by participants of the discussion is that threats presented in the original article were exaggerated and pseudoscience is difficult to define and control. In answer to this point of view, we presented facts that testify to the presence of pseudoscience in many high education institutions as well as in official curricula.
Keywords: psycho-business, pseudoscience, quasi-science, proto-science, junk science, provocation
Cite this article as:
Witkowski, T., Fortuna, P. (2008). If everything is alright why is everything so wrong?. Psychologia Społeczna, 9, 372-382.