When science becomes a story, people stop trusting science. Science became another fiat institution.
Once funding, tenure, and prestige became the currency of “knowledge,” the scientific method lost its grounding. Experiments stopped serving curiosity and started serving grants. Evidence became editorial.
The rationalist mindset isn’t dying, it’s been priced out and mostly silenced. Fiat turned science into storytelling because the incentives now reward coherence with the narrative, not correspondence with reality. Verification has been replaced by trust.