Anxiety, Uncertainty, and Enthusiasm


As an extremely anxious person, the future is utterly terrifying. Whether it is next week or next century, the future is essentially a seemingly endless stream of unknowns. When choosing a college major, I initially chose engineering simply because it lended itself to a decent job right out of college. This provided some much appreciated near certainty in my life. Certainty is one of the few ways to seemingly make anxiety completely disappear, at least temporarily. After realizing that engineering made me miserable, I decided to switch to Social Science, more specifically, psychology. Although this change led to more doubt about my future financial situation, one thing that is constant is my passion for the subject. Unfortunately, enthusiasm can only take you so far, especially when there is no certainty involved. 

Mental health fields are plagued with problems from the replication crisis to overprescription of psychiatric medications. It is unsettling to think that the foundation of the field I am studying could be crumbling as I spend thousands of dollars pursuing a Social Science degree. 

Social Science is not the only field dealing with some monumental problems. “Science Isn’t Broken” by Christie Aschwanden dives into the various problems that are arising across scientific fields as a whole. From the lack of credibility in peer reviewed papers to the unreliability in statistics, it is difficult to find certainty in science which is often blindly viewed as a field of definitive facts. This was made evident by the p-hack interactive tool which demonstrated the terrifying ability for anyone to interact with data in a way that compliments their personal views. By stating “Every result is a temporary truth”, Aschwanden summarizes the impermanence and therefore uncertainty in so-called discoveries mainly within the scientific community. 

In the article “Science is Getting Less Bang for Its Buck”, Patrick Collison and Michael Nielsen discuss the apparent decrease in scientific progress. Collison and Nielsen explain that this could be due to the need for more knowledge in order to make new discoveries. Although it is reasonable to assume that uncovering more complex science requires more education and therefore less frequency in discovery, their concern lies in the endless nature of science. Even if one topic might be nearly exhausted, aren’t there a countless amount of matters that have yet to be examined and therefore would not require as much background knowledge? According to Aschwanden, perhaps we should use more resources to re-examine discoveries of the past because science does not always get everything right on the first try. 

Regardless of the replication crisis, lack of credibility in peer review, and potential decrease in scientific discoveries, knowledge must continue to be gained through the work of new people in fields. Students must continue working towards degrees, even if there is a possibility their chosen field of study will crumble before they make it to the workforce. Whether it be due to an optimistic belief that there is still room for growth in understanding of the world or simply due to an overwhelming enthusiasm for the subject, I hope there will continue to be efforts to revisit widely accepted ideas and grow our collective knowledge by exploring new ones.


Katie Bloomer 

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