COVID policy skeptics may put 'rationality and autonomy' to 'horrifying ends,' academics fret Posted on MIT and Wellesley College data scientists have published a paper that undercuts the prevailing media portrayal of skeptics of government COVID-19 policies as ignorant and unscientific, even while warning that their emphasis on "rationality and autonomy" can be put to "horrifying ends." Skeptics of government COVID-19 mitigation methods, such as mask mandates, "often reveal themselves to be more sophisticated in their understanding of how scientific knowledge is socially constructed than their ideological adversaries," the researchers acknowledge However, their skepticism, based on their own analysis of scientific data and unwillingness to defer to a "paternalistic, condescending elite," also might embolden the kind of people who attacked the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, they warn.