[SampleMan]

Scientists, especially academic ones, often have a lot of baggage (written work, grants, prestige) that clouds their objectivity to new ideas.

If science is a methodology of objective confirmation of a hypothesis by peers, then I think science often loses. Pressing on and delivering irrefutable facts that silence the opposition (not necessarily convince them) is all that matters.

In less provable areas of science (dinosaur extinction, global warming), herd mentality reigns. It doesn't appear as important to be correct, as it is to be accepted. Going off the reservation is counterproductive to getting grant money.

[AndyJackson]

It doesn't appear as important to be correct, as it is to be accepted.

I take it you are not a scientist. All of the pressures that you have listed on those who do science is true, to some extent. In the end, however, the only thing that counts is being right. Pursuing a career in sciece by perpetuating untruth is very very precarious, because sooner or later someone will come along and show to the whole wide world just how wrong you are. It is, to understate the case, very very embarassing. If academic fraud is involved you can lose your job and be banished from research.

No human activity is free of politics, but science does have ultimate objective standards, and is about finding the truth. Virtually every professional scientist, except on a bad day, will tell you that that is what he has signed up for.