Alternative facts

Since a couple of months, our vocabulary has been enriched with a new term: alternative facts. In many popular publications widely used, academic models have been swiped away based upon alternative facts, often leading to alternative truths. In the academic world, this has created an enormous turmoil. Models that are based upon often many many years of solid academic research seemed all of a sudden obsolete because people do not seem to like their underlying basis and/or their outcome and consequences. In the Netherlands, this has led to a public letter in one of our national newspapers, jointly signed by all the rectors/provosts of all Dutch universities, stating that sentiments in public opinion should not lead to disqualification of solid, evidence‐based, academic work. One of the underlying problems could be that the academic debate, which is an inherent part of the academic profession, is increasingly taking place on the open internet. Also in the past, academic models have been questioned, have been scrutinized, and have led to new, alternative models. Copernicus and Newton have led to Einstein and, from there, to the discovery of the Higgs particle. These “next steps in science” were often accompanied by fierce debates between different “parties/schools,” each giving their own contribution to the further development of knowledge. It is