Scientific knowledge has recently become dominant in the cognition and interpretation of the world. Its dominance is a result of the competence and authority that science has. The process of the social reception of science has an idealising character. The growing trust in science, on the one hand provides a better opportunity for the rationalisation of behaviour and a better control of natural phenomena, on the other hand it can be a cause of numerous distortions. The transmission of knowledge is a social act as we gain almost all our knowledge from and through other people. In this social process, apart from valid knowledge, mystifications and illusions are also transmitted.