Me. Welcome to the You Are Not So Smart Podcast.

Episode 168. Oh, oh, oh, oh. And, um, and, uh, and, uh, Our guest in this episode of the You Are Not So Smart Podcast is Dave Levitan, a science

journalist with a new book titled, Not a Scientist,

How Politicians Mistake, Misrepresent,

an utterly mangle science.

So my name is Dave Levitan.

I am a science journalist, and last year I published a book called Not a

scientist how politicians mistake misrepresent and utterly mangle science which I

think is why you're talking to me so So it's a good place to start, I guess.

In the book, Levitan takes us through 12 repeating patterns that politicians fall into when they mistake,

misrepresent, and mangle science.

Some are nefarious and intentional, some based on ignorance, and some are just the normal business

of politicians managing their public image or trying to appeal to their base.

But as a foundation and as his title, Levitin begins with the phrase,

I'm not a scientist, which is a tell-tale rhetorical technique that, as he explains, politicians use

when they are about to present an argument that would be better presented by someone who actually knew what they were talking about.

I had been annoyed by that phrase, that I'm not a scientist phrase for years.

In fact, by the time I was doing the book, it was already sort of going out of fashion a little bit.

It was really, you know, sort of used a lot more and I want to say sort of 2009, 10, 11, almost always to do with climate change, but it could certainly be used for other topics.

So it was sort of rattling around in my head a little bit, and then once I decided to use that as

the title, which did sort of make a lot of sense to me,

I went back and started trying to find its origins and that's where the intro to the book comes from,

...