3. Scientists are no different than detectives, doctors, repair technicians, folks on a jury, or students who want to understand their world.  Scientists answer important questions the same way that these people do. And students should too.

What all of these people, scientists included, do to make sure that the answers to their questions are somehow based on reality and truth is to make sure that these anwers are based on "evidence."   Never rely on opinion, what's "obvious", or on what some "authority figure" has said in order to decide if the answer to a question is true or false.

The only way that scientists are different from the above folks is that in science the questions asked are about some aspect of the universe around us.