Comment by SturgeonsLaw

>Pfizer representatives in front of the EU parliament would not testify that their vaccines actually worked.

It's typical for people in science and related fields to use carefully chosen wording, to hedge, and to speak in terms of probabilities instead of certainties.

For a general public who is used to the unashamed and unearned confidence of the usual people who get in front of a camera (politicians, celebrities, pundits) this can make it appear as though the scientific position is one with a less solid foundation, when it's usually the opposite case.

Scientific communication has been focused on insiders for so long that many communicators don't realise how it sounds to the outside world. Even the fundamental terminology is affected - a scientific theory is an overarching explanation that combines multiple pieces of evidence and creates the best synthesis we can on a topic, but to a layperson the word theory means "vague idea".