than that.

It's not that the public doesn't trust the abilities of scientists.

It's that they don't trust their motives. We have a long literary tradition that meditates on scientists that "only cared about whether they could, not whether they should," and the politicization of sciences makes people wonder not whether scientists are incompetent, but whether they have "an agenda," i.e. whether scientists are basically lying through their teeth and/or pursuing their own political agendas in the interest of their own gain, rather than the public's.

At that point, it's not that the public thinks "If I argue loudly enough, I can change nature," but rather "I don't understand what this scientist does, and I'm sure he/she is smart, but I don't believe they're telling me about nature; rather, they're using their smarts to pull the wool over my eyes about nature and profit/benefit somehow."

So the public isn't trying to bend the laws of nature through discourse, but rather simply doesn't believe the people that are telling them about the laws of nature, because they suspect those people as not acting in good faith.

That's where a kinder, warmer scientific community comes in. R1 academics with million-dollar grants may sneer at someone like Alan Alda on Scientific American Frontiers, but that sneering is counterproductive; the public won't understand (and doesn't want to) the rigorous, nuanced state of the research on most topics. It will have to be given to them in simplified form; Alan Alda and others in that space did so, and the scientific community needs to support (more of) that, rather than sneer at it.

The sneering just reinforces the public notion that "this guy may be smarter than me, but he also thinks he's better and more deserving than me, so I can't trust that what he's telling me is really what he thinks/knows, rather than what he needs to tell me in order to get my stuff and/or come out on top in society, deserving or not."

Which is basically also the only way that any rebellion/revolution has managed to succeed in the past.

I mean, I live in a low crime neighborhood. Thanks for pointing out the crime of having offered up "southern conservative". Indeed, I live south of the Potomac, and embrace the traditional "conservative" values of individual liberty, equality before the law and private property that are currently under such systematic attack by godless Commie sodomites. Guilty.

Wow, I think you've reached damn_registrars levels of making stuff up out of whole cloth. Everything I say underscores disregard for truth? You've moved past strawmen to a comprehensive sort of Dyson sphere of tautology surrounding me now. Let me give you a golf clap. [clap]. Does the sound penetrate this bubble in which you've encapsulated me?
Can I ask where this bubble is going, since you're doing all the driving?

What I actually want is to constrain the Federal government to its original enumerated powers. But the truth doesn't seem to amount to much with you anymore.

What I actually think, not that it amounts to a fart in your thunderstorm of stereotype, is captured nicely here:

Let's stipulate that this is an 80/20 ratio in favor of delegation, and that when we say "delegation", we mean, "what the large-frogskin donors want".
But shag all that. Let's focus on what matters: your strawman collection.

The retail replacement cost is why it's insane to put it in your pants pockets.

"I just dropped a grand on this. I know, I'll subject it to huge forces and see what happens!"

Why would you do that?

I frankly don't see any difference. Big, fat force, tiny little space. That's not good for a sheet of glass, a sheet of metal—hell, you've seen what happens to a sheet of paper after spending all day in your pockets. People learn that in grade school.

If it really has to be on your waist somewhere, get a holster. Otherwise, just carry the damned thing, or put it in a shirt or coat pocket, briefcase, backpack, etc.

Since the '90s, I've never regularly carried a mobile device in my pants pockets. Obviously, it would break, or at least suffer a significantly reduced lifespan. On the rare occasions when I do pocket a device for a moment, it's just that—for a moment, while standing, to free both hands, and it is removed immediately afterward because I'm nervous the entire time that I'll forget, try to sit down, and crack the damned thing.

Who thinks it's okay to sit on their phone? Why do people think they ought to be able to? It literally makes no sense. It's an electronic device with a glass screen. If I handed someone a sheet of glass and said, "put this in your back pocket and sit on it!" they'd refuse.

But a phone? Oh, absolutely! Shit, wait, no! It broke?!?!