Smoke and mirrors.

‘Agnotology’ the art of spreading doubt, distorts the skepticism of research to obscure the truth. Areas of academic life have been tainted by the practice, but some scholars are fighting back by showing the public how to spot such sleight of hand.

Any evidence can be denied by parties sufficiently determined. We ought to be wary of those who claim to be “all-purpose experts” in areas as complex as climate science and those who “invoke the hobgoblin of absolute proof.

 Other common tactics are calls for a focus on the “best evidence” rather than “exhaustive inclusion”, which can easily translate into excluding studies you don’t like and including the ones you do; and “paralysis by analysis"-insisting on more and more and more data in order to avoid doing anything”.