I was browsing Ars Technica this morning when I came across this article about allergies. It's an interesting read, but the thing that struck me this:
[Ruslan] Medzhitov is currently turning his attention to a question that could change immunology yet again: why do we get allergies? No one has a firm answer, but what is arguably the leading theory suggests that allergies are a misfiring of a defense against parasitic worms. In the industrialized world, where such infections are rare, this system reacts in an exaggerated fashion to harmless targets, making us miserable in the process.
What? The science isn't settled? It's interesting to contrast an article like this with just about any article that appears on Ars Technica about catastrophic anthropogenic global warming. Here's there's debate, uncertainty, respect that people of honesty and goodwill may have different opinions. There's no "allergy-deniers" who are in the pocket of big-EpiPen.
This is what science looks like.
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