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Well made point from the Bad Astronomy guy. Scientists and other smart people are constantly being put down in politics, and even in popular culture. The elitist scientist is the bad guy, but the streetwise and resourceful everyman is the hero.

Except in the recent film, Iron Man. In this case, the hero is a resourceful, elitist scientist, and the bad guy is the elitist corporate fatcat. Hopefully this film won't be the exception that proves the rule. Hopefully we can get back to the golden age where scientists were like movie stars.

Bad Astronomy Blog - Why do politicians hate smart people?

Let me make this clear: people are generally experts in a field for a reason. They’ve studied it. They’ve experienced it. They’ve done research, published papers, looked at the results, tried to interpret them, made predictions, done further experiments. They learn from what they experience.

That’s why they’re experts.