Shane King wrote:
We never take into account that there might only be one dissenter, but that might be the best physicist in the world, and maybe he/she's right. How can we tell though? We don't evaluate who's the best physicist when making these decisions. Instead we just use the crude approximation of how many support the idea. I don't know about anyone else, but I still call that a measure based on popularity.
O.k., but since it seems to be a very odd and confusing use of the word "popularity", I recommend you find another way of describing it.
We evaluate credibility by a lot of different methods, hopefully in a thoughtful way, and hopefully in a way that is relevant to the particular context at hand. Trying to boil all that down into a single metric and calling it "popularity" seems a bit confusing to me (at best).
In general, if that one dissenter has a sufficient reputation in the scientific community, we will report on their views while at the same time noting that it is a minority position within the scientific community. That's perfectly legitimate, right?
In general, if some theory has wide popular support but none (or nearly none) in the scientific community, we will report on that, too. That's perfectly legitimate, right?
What would be illegitimate is in no way suggested or sanctioned by the NPOV policy: to take a look at popular opinion polls and then claim that the result is the truth. NPOV does not imply popularity is a valid means of judging the truth.
And, contrary to your assertions, I think the way things *actually work in practice* is *not* often a popularity context. Voting does go on, and more than I like, but more often, a minority view -- if presented by a reasonable person -- is something that we bend over backwards to report on faithfully and fairly.
We aren't perfect, of course, but we do this pretty well.
--Jimbo