A bachelor's degree does set someone up to understand and explain things related to that subject. The larger problem is that his degree isn't in what most people would consider a scientific field. Even the softest of soft sciences gives someone a better understanding of how a study on a group of people should be designed. For example, a psychology degree should provide basic experimental design to cover how efficiency of psychiatric drugs can be judged. It's not always the case. But in general someone with a bachelor's degree in anything related to science should be able to pick up a journal and explain why any given study was performed in the way it was. Whether it's in their field or not.  Obviously the reliability of that will usually slip the further they get away from their actual background. But in general the main point is that they're scientifically literate when it comes to how and why studies are constructed the way they are. No matter what's being tested. The same isn't true when you take an engineering degree and try to apply that knowledge to a study of, say, antidepressants.