convictions

Many think it is important and good to have convictions. These people are wrong. A lack of convictions signifies one of two things: apathy, which really means laziness, or scientific thought. In response to this, many would say, "you are mistaken, because science teaches us that things can be known scientifically, and that we can believe in its facts with conviction. Ultimately, science is the pursuit of such convictions." They are right to recognize science as a pursuit, but they misunderstand the significance of this pursuit. The science they have studied is a body of accepted knowledge, and the experiments they may have conducted as part of their schooling are largely conceived as harmless exercises to illustrate known truths. While they are busy citing what others have discovered by doubting, criticizing, and examining, they fail to recognize that only this doubting, criticizing, and examining can be called science. Science, the pursuit of understanding, is a methodology, not a body of knowledge, and certainly not a field that harbors conviction.
Conviction is the belief that regarding a particular point of contention, one's own opinion is true. The man of conviction can be likened to the scientific dilettante. He may know and understand all sorts of established facts about the nature of things, but he lacks the skepticism that marks the mind of the true scientist. He is likely to grab hold of any idea either conceived or encountered and become its champion, parading his conviction through the streets, shouting it from the rooftops. In this way he becomes the enemy of science, the enemy of understanding, and the very opposite of what he claims and believes himself to be.