junk science

English

Noun

junk science (countable and uncountable, plural junk sciences)

1. (derogatory) Assertions or methods that have the appearance, but not the actuality, of scientific legitimacy.

   His testimony was worse than science fiction: it was junk science.

   • 2010, Naomi Oreskes, Erik M. Conway, chapter 5, in Merchants of Doubt:

     Tom Hockaday was an APCO employee, and March 1993 found him working closely with Philip Morris vice president Ellen Merlo to develop scientific articles to defend secondhand smoke and promote the idea that the EPA work was “junk science.”

   • 2022 June 9, Matthew Taylor, “Climate policy dragged into culture wars as a ‘delay’ tactic, finds study”, in The Guardian‎^[1]:

     Climate policy is being dragged into the culture wars with misinformation and junk science being spread across the internet by a relatively small group of individuals and groups, according to a study.

   • 2006, Roger W. Shuy, Linguistics in the Courtroom: A Practical Guide, page 99:

     Our field falls neither in the category of immediately acceptable DNA experts at one end of the spectrum nor in the category of the immediately unacceptable so-called junk sciences at the other end.

Usage notes

• A label used to attempt to discredit expert testimony and claimed scientific support for positions taken on some matters of public policy.

See also

• pseudoscience