"Do not believe what the scientists tell you. The natural history we know is a lie, a falsehood sold to us by wicked old men who would make the world a dull gray prison and protect us from the dangers inherent to freedom. They would have you believe our planet to be a lonely starship, hurtling through the void of space, barren of magic and in need of a stern hand upon the rudder." —Exalted 1st edition rulebook

The extreme end and/or reason forScience Is Bad. May overlap by also presenting scientists as badand wrong.Science is badong.

In this trope, science is fundamentally incorrect: itlacks objectivity anddoes not describe anything "real". There are a number of general forms in which the error of science is considered:

• As culturally constructed rather than objective, and thereby does not describe any "facts."
• As a system of beliefs and processes crafted byDeadWhiteEuropeanMen (DWEM) and thus irrelevant and destructive to groups X, Y, Z...
• As simply ineffectual in providing an adequate understanding of the world.
• Much more rarely, in a fictional verse, the natural laws (or at least some of them) are such that attempts to analyze them scientifically are doomed to failure. In such a case, it's normally made clear that they're not commenting on science in the real world.

This is not the same kind of wrong as that in theScale of Scientific Sins: there it'sethically wrong.

Strongly associated with the Romanticist side ofRomanticism Versus Enlightenment, along withScience Is Bad. See alsoMother Nature, Father Science,Aesoptinum,Science Marches On. A common feature ofThe Masquerade. When overlapping withScience Is Bad, can be associated withDumb Is Good. IfScience Is Useless, this may be because it's wrong. May be presented through aStraw Vulcan.

This can be hard to reconcile with violations ofMagic A Is Magic A. There really shouldn't be any reason a system of observation can't find a pattern with magicunless that magic is specifically changing its behavior upon being examined. Even when this is the case; it often seems theonly time magic changes its rules is to invoke this trope.

This can also contradict one of the most prevalent sub-tropes ofScience Is Bad, namely,Technology Is Evil. After all, evil technology presumablyworks, which means that at leastthat science wasn't (empirically) wrong. One possible way to have both tropes isAesoptinium;because science is wrong, the technology became evil in a way the scientists didn't intend, though we can still say Science Is Bad because the scientistsshould have known better than to make something withPotential Applications.

Often anyAgent Scully questioning the magic isn't really usingscience but rather a belief in machines. Agood scientist wouldn't only complain that something isn't possible upon discovering something that contradicts previous knowledge. They'd explore the implications, test why the result is happening, see if it can be replicated, and list the various causes and effects that can be observed related to the event—although, admittedly, many would be quick to dismiss any claims of the supernatural out of hand, because the supernatural is kind of by definition stuff thatshouldn't work. TL;DR: If Science is Wrong is proven, it becomesa scientific worldview.

Obviously, good scientists arerare where this trope is invoked.

Comic Books

• Subtly played with inThe Books of Magic, wherein it is explained that the magical explanation for a supernatural event is always correct... but so is the scientific explanation, depending on who is observing the supernatural. People who truly do not believe in magic will never, ever encounter it in theDC Universe because of this effect.
• This strip byQuino illustratesGod's opinion on the Laws of Physics.
• Jack Chick comics frequently carry this message, along withScience Is Bad - belief in evolution makes people not just misguided, butevil!
  • Also,evolution is a religion.
  • Oh, and it doesn't stop at evolution either. Why do planets keep orbiting the sun? What,Gravity? You heathen! It's obviously because Jesus is so awesome.

Eastern Animation

• Thirty Eight Parrots has a short where the protagonists want to cancel the law of gravity... because it's immoral to hit you on the head with a coconut.

Fan Works

• This comes up in theHarry Potter and the Methods of Rationality outtake dealing withThe Matrix, at the bottom ofthis page.

Morpheus: The machines tell elegant lies. (Pause.) Neo(in a small voice): Could I please have a real physics textbook? Morpheus: There is no such thing, Neo. The universe doesn't run on math.

Literature

• Averted in theIncarnations of Immortality series. The series is set in a world in which both magic and science are useful. For example, magic carpet manufacturers compete with car manufacturers. Both have unique strengths and weaknesses.
• H.F., the narrator of Defoe'sJournal of the Plague Year, eventually concludes that all the proposed scientific explanations for plague are incorrect, including the microbial theory which we understand today as true.
• In Milton'sParadise Lost, Raphael tells Adam that God would laugh at astronomers who try to understand the motions of His heavens, implying that the universe was too enormous for a mortal mind to fathom.
• The first book inThe Dresden Files has Harry mentioning that Science has been treated as the source of all the answers in the 21st century, which means people are left without a clue when they encounter the supernatural. The attitude tones down soon after that.
  • May also fall under the clause of 'scientific analysis is doomed to failure' version as well. Its mentioned that the rules of magic can shift and alter. This is reason Harry keeps Bob around, to track these changes in with more accuracy than any mortal could manage since Bob is himself a being of pure magic.
    • Of course, this leads to the question of whetherhow the rules of magic will shift can be predicted...
  • The series actually treats science with a fair amount of respect. Harry is often shown using various laws of physics, usually mass and/or momentum, to assist his spells in order to enhance their effects or impact.
• Aristophanes andJonathan Swift, both of whom portray scientists as busybodies with way too much time on their hands, coming up with complex solutions to simple problems or silly answers to things that don't need answering. Aristophanes'Socrates inThe Clouds explains that thunder is not caused by Zeus, but (as science has proven) clouds farting. Swift's Laputans attempt to replace language with a system of tapping sticks and visual signs, but "the masses rebelled, demanding to speak in the manner of their ancestors; such irrevocable enemies of science are the common people."
• Good Omens fits this pretty nicely, since within the book the universe really is about 6000 years old (having been created in 4004 BC),The Bible is pretty literally correct, etc. Scientists aren't exactly portrayed asbad, just kind of pointless. ("The whole business with the fossilized dinosaur skeletons was a joke the palaeontologists haven't seen yet.")
  • Let's not forget that by the endit's been proven that even the immortal creatures who have existed more or less since the dawn of time (the angels and demons) don't really have any idea what's going on either; they're just better at pretending they do. As the book puts it,

"God does not play dice with the universe. He plays an ineffable game of His own devising, which might be compared, from the perspective of any of the other players,[1] to being involved in an obscure and complex version of poker in a pitch-dark room, with blank cards, for infinite stakes, with a Dealer who won't tell you the rules, and whosmiles all the time."

• InAmerican Gods one character comments on the pity he feels for confused scientists when they find a skull or skeleton which doesn't quite fit the established patterns in the area. This is because the scientists are completely ignorant of the real reasons these objects are there: Egyptians landed in America thousands of years ago. He insinuates that they will always be incorrect because their scientific reasoning will not allow them to reach this conclusion.
• Aversion (and possibly deconstruction):Distress byGreg Egan hascharacters attempting all three originally mentioned attacks on science, and corresponding defenses of science. His repudiation of the notion of science "only being valid for white men in Europe" is given in a speech by a black South African physicist, who points out that what she and all her colleagues have discovered applies equally to every cubic Planck in the observable universe and that logic doesn't care what gonads you have.
• Scott Adams loves this trope in his written work. See his statements on the paranormal and evolution.
• InBlack Easter, a black magician sends a demon to drive a physicist mad by revealing to him that science is ultimately a meaningless concept.
• Surprisingly averted inArtemis Fowl. Our current understanding of scientific concepts are wrong, yes, but that's only because we're basing it on our observations, and the Fairies go out of their way to keep us from noticing magic. There's nothing wrong with the scientific method in general.
  • And Artemis mentions that the laws of physics make significantly more sense once you incorporate magic in as one of the fundamental forces, but being the boy genius he is doesn't go into details.
  • Lots of the magic tends to have pseudo-scientific justifications as well. It's a weird example.

Live-Action TV

• Arrested Development has this wonderful scene

Gob: So, a young neighborhood tough by the name of Steve Holt's gonna be here any minute... Michael: Your son. Gob: According to him... Michael: And a DNA test. Gob: I heard the jury's still out on science.

• Krzysztof Kieślowski'sDecalogue I: professor father and genius son think everything can be understood in mathematics and solved through their computer. The computer is able to calculate what the mother is doing, but comes up blank when the son asks what she is dreaming of (a religious aunt is able to provide the answer: she is dreaming of her son of course). The son goes skating on a frozen lake, because the computer says the ice will hold three times his weight. The ice breaks and the son is frozen to death.

Recorded and Stand-Up Comedy

• Deconstructed by Dara O'Briain in one of his live shows, where he discusses homeopathy and his irritation with it. He points out that the real-life accusation levelled at science that "it doesn't know everything" is inherently flawed because the whole point of science is that scientists arefully aware that they don't know everything, and if they did "it'd stop"—there would be no point in continuing.
  • Enjoy! Don't drink while he's talking.
• Tim Minchin really hates this trope and will often go on rants about homepathy but perhaps the best example of this would be his beat poemStorm

Tabletop Games

• In theNew World of Darkness sourcebookSecond Sight, science is presented not only as being wrong aboutPsychic Powers, but activelydamaging to their activation - scientific scrutiny makes them harder to use. Which is, of course, why no use of psychic ability ever passed the Randi Challenge (aside from the fact that everyone who entered was a charlatan; actual psychics were too busy conning casinos or playing the stock market). To be even more specific, it's not science itself butskepticism which weakens psychic powers, it just unhappily coincides that scientists are the best equipped and inclined to be skeptical. As presented, psychic powers are strengthened in the presence of true believers, but a group of skeptics (or just one who has bought the Merit "Doubting Thomas") will alter probability to the point where the likelihood of success becomes equal to the likelihood of achieving aCritical Failure.
  • InHunter: The Vigil, there ARE scientific approaches to fighting the supernatural that are highly effective. Task Force VALKYRIE and The Cheiron Group both rely on scientific understanding of the supernatural in order to produce high-tech weaponry or magical surgery. The Null Mysteriis have even inventedFantastic Science.
  • The compact Null Mysteriis consists of rationalists who apply the scientific method to supernatural phenomena. A small subgroup of Null Mysteriis is devoted to finding answers to supernatural phenomena that fit already established scientific law; they're presented as being horribly misguided and are often given disproportionate screen time. Other members of Null Mysteriis are really on-the-nose on some topics, comparatively speaking (such asslashers): inWitch Finders a unified theory of magic is presented as something of a holy grail, while inSpirit Slayers they're excited to have proven that spirits and werewolvesviolate conventional physics.
• InGenius: The Transgression, Wonders are inherently non-repeatable phenomena, which causes a problem for anyone trying to scientifically test then verify with additional tests. This might be because mad science is inherently unexplainable but it could just as easily be becauseMad Scientists are explicitly not any good at proper science. On the other hand,sane scientists are assumed to be right but simply haven't come across mad science.
  • • However, it's just as explicitly mentioned that Wonders must at least be nominally possible and follow basic logic: for example aCool Car still needs proper wheels and a proper engine, and they will work on principles similar to normal engines and wheels but they will be much more effective than they "should" be. On the other hand, stuff like telekinesis rays do not work onany real life principles. The proportion of real science to mad science also gets smaller as the Genius gains greater Inspiration, eventually culminating in wonders that will only appear scientific anymore at first glance and run mostly on Mania.
• AnOld World of Darkness example:Mage: The Ascension (usually) posits thatall Science is Wrong—except when enough people believe that it's not. The Technocracy convinced humanity that science is right during the Enlightenment, though, so mundane reality works on observable principle as long as people believe it does. The whole point of the game is that Awakening allows the True Mage(tm) to flip mundane reality and the collected observers the bird and do things through "discredited" systems of magic/faith/pseudo-science. The mere presence of mundanes who believe in conventional science also tends to make True Magic go awry in non-repeatable and/or fatal ways, making it basically impossible to objectively observe magic.
• Ironically, whileExalted exemplifies the trope in the page quote (which appears on the back cover of both the first and second edition core rulebooks), the setting itself generally subverts it through heavy use ofMagitek andFunctional Magic. It's not that the setting is unscientific, it's just that it takes place in a world where theRule of Cool isencoded into the laws of physics. Most of the setting's most powerful artificers, spellcasters, and thaumaturges are described as having approached their trades with a decidedly scientific mindset; powerful artificers are even called 'Sorcerer-Engineers'.
• Similarly, thePlanescape setting. Science can't really cope with stuff like a spire of infinite length with a city at the top. Since the entire setting runs onClap Your Hands If You Believe andYour Mind Makes It Real, well... The Guvners are trying to find the laws of the Planes, only there is an opposite faction that believes there aren't any. This complicates matters.
• InUnknown Armies, science and magic and reality have a very complicated relationship. For the most part, science is completely accurate until it butts up against magic, which is run byYour Mind Makes It Real—magic users are literally so obsessed with their worldview that they impose themselves upon reality. It's also implied that science is only accuratebecause ofClap Your Hands If You Believe. That is to say, as civilizations rose and people began thinking in more orderly terms, the world settled down into something that can be defined by science, and magic significantly weakened. Modern scientific positivism was basically the death knell for "easy" magic, meaning you now have to be quite insane to actually pull off magic of any real power anymore.
• Sciencewas wrong inCthulhu Tech; emphasis on the past tense, there. The discovery ofarcanotechnology and the associated theory merely expanded what science knew, to include things like sorcery and the thermodynamics-breaking D-Engine. Of course, these new developments tend to drive researchers crazy, but that's a problem with the human mind, not science.
• The premise behind the occult RPGNephilim is "History is a lie. Science is a delusion"; pretty much everything you learned in school is a deliberate falsehood by a race of immortal supernatural beings to keep humans as passive prey. Scientists either intentionally falsify data, or are members of the Grand Conspiracy.
• 7th Sea averts this: Until recently, thechurch was the biggest sponsor of scientific studies, believing that by understanding their deity's creation, they'd become closer to it. Then, the head of the church died and with no successor in sight, theinquisitionran amok, declaring the end of the world nigh and pressuring universities to close so that man could focus on preparing their souls for the next world instead of wasting time trying to understand the present one...

Web Comics

• OneXkcd"Tesla Coil": The world doesn't actually make sense. Science doesn't work. No one told you because you're cute when you get into something. Still, neat toy.
  • "For scientists, this can be the hardest thing about dreams." Averted in general. "Science: It works, bitches."
• InGunnerkrigg Court, Gillitie Wood holds to Ethereal Tenet, which seems to boil down to belief that magic and the universe can't (and shouldn't) be explained.

Tom Siddell: Etherial Tenet can be summarised as "It just does, okay?"

• • The court itself is quite keen on "ethereal science" whether they can come up with a working theory of magic is yet to be seen.
  • Those who see beyond what's accessible even to most magic using creatures, such as Zimmy (who is powerless touse what she sees there) and Coyote (who…isn't) claim that "magic" stuff is nothing special, merely interacting with normally invisible parts of Universe. In this view even the Court mostly just goes for the low-hanging fruit.

Web Original

• Played for laughs inLonelygirl15, in which Bree'sCatch Phrase is "Proving science wrong!" She creates a series of videos which purport to disprove scientific theories (but don't).
• The episodic erotic web-novelTales of MU has this as part of its premise. It essentially inverts the usual order of things, where the students are in college to study magic but a few of the loners and outsiders dabble in "science" and are made fun of for actually believing the rubbish. The protagonist delivers alongAuthor Filibuster on this topic... the very same protagonist who attends a college devoted to the study of magic, and expounds at great length in an earlier chapter on her interest in theMagitek that their civilization runs on. Erin is many things, but "consistent" is not one of them.

Western Animation

• This is the basis ofThe Simpsons episode "Lisa the Skeptic." When Lisa tries to prove that the angel skeleton isn't real using scientific means, much of the Springfieldian community decides to dismiss science altogether, epitomized by Moe's line of, "What has science ever done for us?" It turns out Lisa wasright. The angel skeleton was planted in the ground as a viral marketing ploy.

Other Media

• Believers in the paranormal--Psychic Powers,Alien Abduction, and otherNew Age ideas—often criticize science for being too closed-minded to accept their ideas.
• The jury is still out on whetherPaul Feyerabend is an example of this trope. On one hand, he heavily criticizes the "scientific method", claiming that scientists give less attention to results that challenge their notions (and even siding with creationists for some time). However, inThe Trouble With Physics, Lee Smolin argues that Feyerabend's disdain actually stems froma devoted preoccupation with scientific inquiry.
• Played with by paranormalist author Charles Fort, who spent most of the 1920s and 1930s cataloging various accounts of "damned things," or phenomena which "science" categorically explains away as nothing of any significance. These included topics likePsychic Powers, spontaneous combustion,teleportation, and many other similar matters. However, as Fort himself wrote, he didn't believe anything he wrote of, but merely felt that everything we take for granted (religion, politics, scientific positivism) should be questioned constantly to keep them vital and relevant (a positionRobert Anton Wilson would come to describe as "ideal skepticism").
• Post-modernism and post-structuralism are philosophical movements that reject any kind of firm, immutable truth. Science at its best is an incomplete description of an observation made using flawed tools, and at its worst, a dogmatic inquisition that locks up heretics guilty of blaspheming Reality under the designation "mental illness".
• There is a well-regarded journal article titledWhy Most Published Research Findings Are False, which posits that entire fields of contemporary science may be "null fields," i.e. completely bogus.
• This article inHarper's describes a group of people who have come to the conclusion the entirety of physics may be, if notwrong, at least correct only in a very limited circumstance, and that science itselfmay be unable ever to find, let alone explain the laws of physics. This group is called... um... "physicists."

• Trope
• Science Is Wrong
• Narrative Devices
• Romanticism Versus Enlightenment
• Anti-Intellectualism
• Tropes On Science and Unscience