Chomsky had pointed out how scientific authority is used as a propaganda device to limit inquiry:
https://chomsky.info/20010527/
The indoctrination in post-secondary institutions also play an institutional role in giving rise to scientism. Science programs don't necessarily teach the history or philosophy of science, and nor do they look into limitations of the theories that are covered - this depends on the epistemology of the professor.
Even Tim Mauldin pointed the institutional failures among physics departments, where graduate students may know less about the foundations and problems of quantum mechanics than philosophy students who study them in more depth.