Scientific method
The scientific method is what most people invoke when they really mean just a higher degree of investigative integrity than ordinary mutual cognition. It is a serious mistake to confuse scientific shared cognition with moral cognition however, this error is called scientism.
See w:scientific method and w:scientism for more on these issues. We do not discuss them on the R&D wiki directly, but are quite interested in the overall question of what can be reduced to score or price premium and what can't.