If scientists want to be taken seriously when they present their theories, then they had better remind themselves of a host of assumptions that have been made in order to arrive at their "system of assumptions, accepted principles, and rules of procedure." Otherwise they simply play themselves and their audience for suckers.
This is getting pretty silly. Science is not subject to tinkering by non-scientists, and so has no need to have its procedures justified to the unwashed masses. Unlike most civilians, scientists are professionally required to vet their assumptions with extreme critical rigor. It is the audience that needs to come up to speed, or get lost, unlike politics, science is not dependent on winning a popularity contest amongst the under-educated masses that vote. Science has a product to offer, and the countries stupidly enough run not to buy it, fall off the map, eventually. For two obvious examples of countries that thought that politicians should examine science and improve its thought processes, try China and Russia in the last century.