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How Journalists Distort Science with Balance
The scientist's job is to discover truth about the natural world, and the journalist's is to report the world's events accurately. Why are these two professions so often at odds? Chris Mooney discusses how journalism fails science in this month's Columbia Journalism Review. If you applauded Jon Stewart's plea to "stop hurting America," Mooney's analysis will strike a chord; the he-said-she-said approach to truth fails in all kinds of venues. (via: WorldChanging)
The more you realize journalists are wrong. It doesn't matter what the subject is, the vast majority of journalists have no clue what they're talking about. Yes, there are exceptions, but they are few and far between. Once you realize they're wrong about things you know, it leaves everything else they say about subjects you're less familiar with in doubt.
...is to get you to tune in at 11. You give them way too much credit. They stir the pot, scare the parents, overhype the cancer cure or weight loss drug, or show soldiers with puppy dogs as the need arises.
Journalism is enertainment for profit and sciense is well, SCIENCE!
-- "Life's not fair, but the root password helps."
Balance doesn't mean that if one person speaks the truth for 10 minutes, you have to have another person to lie for 10 minutes.
Truth is often indeed subjective, but the mere existence of a differing opinion doesn't automatically make that opinion valuable or credible.
Sometimes the news lets us down, then again there is a lot of bad science out there. Funny how the science "facts" depend on who is funding the research.
roamingfeet
Off topic, mod down. The article talks about how irresponsible journalists present fringe science as proven facts. In the scienftic world you can find some folks with very outlandish views who have been proven wrong, but the views they have often seem to appeal to those with certain agendas (like journalists). These folks are often outspoken but cannot produce facts to back up their position. There there are the legitimate contrarians who really are onto something but it's not accepted practice and all they get is bad press. Unless you do your own research it's hard to tell which is which the way it's reported in the papers and magazines.
Lets also not forget that business often sponsors research that puts certain products in a good light. Journalists love printing that kinda stuff.
"Wine is good for you"
"Coffee is good for you"
etc...
It's all distorted science to keep share prices up.
Crossfire itself wasn't hurting America. The idea that all discussions must involve side A and side B and neither can agree is hurting America. Lack of common ground is hurting America.
Stewart's premise was that real debate isn't happening. One side yells at the other side. Whoever can delude the most people wins.
However, I don't think a fair, logical discussion of the issues would work (for long) on network television. People want to see the gladiators fight -- certainly not gentlemen.
FORTUNE FAVORS IRONY
The scientist's job is to discover truth about the natural world, and the journalist's is to report the world's events accurately.
Indiana Jones said it best:
The scientist's job is to discover *FACTS* about the natural world, not truth. There's a difference. Interpreting those facts may give you some insight into an underlying truth, but that requires a human insight, something beyond the application of the scientific method to an investigation.
In short, the way I see it there are six questions you can ask about stuff that happens: Who, what, where, when, how and why. The first five are the domain of science. The last is not, because it requires that there are alternative possibilities, and as we all know, nature doesn't cheat.
"Lawyers are for sucks."
- Doug McKenzie
Truth is often indeed subjective, but the mere existence of a differing opinion doesn't automatically make that opinion valuable or credible.
Yes! Yes! Yes! I carouse about in orgiastic delight! You speak TRUTH, my brother, a truth that those who disdain intellectualism and science itself have used to their advantage for many years now! A balanced report on global warming is not presenting whether or not it is occuring, but the degree and rapidity of it. A balanced report on evolution is not between Richard Dawkins and Mullah James Dobson. It's between Dawkins and Gould.
Siddhartha Buddha, man, I think what you said should be emblazoned upon the forehead of every journalist on the planet.
And then we should have Rupert Murdoch drawn and quartered, set fire to the Fox News building, and then have a BBQ of Rush Limbaugh. But that's just me.
It's very easy to dole out critique to journalists, a lot harder to actually be one. I write for a living, in a newspaper. My chosen field is IT and tech, and I feel like I have very good grip about the stuff. But I can't write an article like "Explorer sux0rs!, Firefox pwns j00", it has to ta in consideration every side of the subject. Not to mention that the MS lawyers would have a defamitation suit field day if I make the slightest mistake.
"...the stupid contrarian, the individual who is unwilling to accept the obvious but instead clings to the often illogical notion that there is always a deeper answer..."
That sounds to me like the hallmark of 'GroupThink', which is not a good thing. I am willing to tolerate contrarian, even "stupid contrarian" thinking, because quite often the contrarians do indeed wind up being the "visionaries" you so derride. No one says you have to belive them. Why advocate their suppression?
"Creativity is allowing ones self to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep" - Scott Adams
...the journalist's is to report the world's events accurately.
The journalist's job is draw more eyes to the paper/tv station that they work for. Why do you think that USA Today has been so successful?...it's because of all the pretty colors & graphics, not because of the content or accuracy. If the statement above were true, than we'd be seeing the corrections on the front page.
Just another day in Paradise
The problem is that you report a commonly respected view and a view of a whacko .. A reader has no idea what the view of 95% of of the scientists are .. cause the whacko's view appears with equal footing.
While Fox and CNN aren't the best, you have other alternatives than the Comedy Channel...
The NYT, the BBC, Al-jazeera, Haaretz, the Washington Post, and Bloomberg all offer news from a variety of perspectives. You won't be able to tap into any one source and get an objective look at current events, but if you look at things from a variety of perspectives you should be able to make a pretty clear picture.
I can guarantee you that the army of writers propping up South Park and the Daily Show do this in order to formulate their opinion on world events.
"If you think you have things under control, you're not going fast enough." --Mario Andretti
Which is why when we read articles, we all need to be critical thinkers.
In the scienftic world you can find some folks with very outlandish views who have been proven wrong, but the views they have often seem to appeal to those with certain agendas (like journalists).
Uh, no, it's not the journalists' agendas which match the fringe scientists. The fringe scientists in question tend to be anti-abortion, anti-climate-change, and anti-evolution. How does that fit in with the media's so-called "liberal bias"?
No, it's their requirement to "tell both sides of the story" which is the problem: their editors insist they find someone who disagrees with mainstream science, and they then tend to present both views as "equally valid".
But if you'd RTFA, you'd know that...
If sources are all that are presented without analysis, set up in a fight of loudness, we literally have teams to root for and no concept of the possible lies and inconsistent fantasies one may have and the other may not.
"Reality TV News". Incredibly cheap. Easy to commentate. Easy to "not get into trouble" but at its core it caustic: opinions and fantasies are given equal time with facts and failures, hoping they will "sort themselves out".
Some exists in the Other Party, but big examples are obvious. A commentator said that Bush and others now have just left one word off the PR concept of "Plausible Deniability". It doesn't need to be Plausible anymore. Iraq. Budget concerns. Health costs. Going to Mars without any money. Ignoring Korea and claiming "action."
Of course, most of all, Science is treated as a "opinion field" instead of a factual discipline of proof-required self-censoring societies.
Nietzsche is dead - God
So who gets to decide that "the other side" doesn't have a legitimate argument for a specific issue? Who is the arbiter of the veracity of one side's claim, if not the court of public opinion?
Segregation was long-standing social, legal and political *institution*, and despite King's complaints about the media, it's almost entirely (except in the minds of a select few) disappeared from American life, both as an institution and as a point of advocacy.
Perhaps it might have been overcome more quickly if the media had simply ignored the claims of those in favor of it, but what happens when the media does that with something like Iraq, Terrorism or some other issue where the claim that apparently lacks moral superiority is merely dismissed?
I have far less faith in science and scientists than I used to. In the late 70's academics were telling us we'd be out of fossil fuels in 10 years.
But that should give you more faith in scientists, not less. A good scientist is one who revises what he believes as new evidence arrives.
The contrarians the article objects to - creationists, disbelievers in global warming, etc. - if those guys had said in the late 70s that we'd be out of oil in ten years, they'd be saying now that we haven't had any oil since 1988, and all the evidence that we have oil - cheap energy, vehicles running on gas - is merely liberal bullshit being distorted by leftie agendas.
I think I'll take mainstream science any day. It may not have the truth, but at least, unlike the pseudo-science the current administration is so fond of, it's asking the right questions.
I'm a scientist, and there is constant pressure to boil everything down into an "elevator message", the sort of one-sentence thing you tell someone on an elevator when asked what you do or what you're advocating (e.g. "Cigarettes cause cancer."). The problem with this is that real science worth doing can rarely be summarized this way without losing important details!
Unfortunately, the media doesn't want to hear things like "Global climate is very complex, and the impact of industry must be studied in detail because we don't really understand how sensitive a complex system is to big changes in certain parameters." That's boring . What they want to hear is "Global warming is dooming humanity!" or "Global warming is nothing to worry about!". Both of those get more attention and sell more product. Presenting both of these points of view in the same article makes for an exciting "debate", creates controversy deliberately, and again makes everyone's advertisers happy.
The competitive pressure for the sound bite, the quick statement that gets your attention even if it's not remotely accurate or true, is killing real journalism, science, and generally most intelligent public discourse about complicated issues.
The biggest complaint I have is that journalists and science writers dumb down the details of a story. It's not clear whether they do it for editorial reasons (the reader would just be confused by numbers anyway) or because the writer doesn't understand, or is lazy.
There are a lot of people who have what I call a "Scientific American" level of understanding. We took physics in college, but we aren't working physicists, for example. We can understand most topics if put in context, but it's a little beyond us to fully understand an article in some specialized journal.
A second complaint is that writers tends to accept the assumptions that mosts scientists do. They don't challenge the framework, but simply accept the groupthink. If a contrarian scientist comes along, they may cover the story but it's usually followed by someone saying the guy is a wacko for challenging the crowd.
So call me contrarian if you want, but just give me the numbers. The opinion of the crowd wouldn't matter as much as it does if writers gave more of the details and let us draw our own conclusions.
sigs, as if you care.
Today, scientists can't say anything that appears to agree with the church, because they'll loose their funding, their credibility and possibly their lives.
Stop. Just stop. And learn something about how science really works before you start on the persecution complex, okay?
Scientists can say anything they bloody well want providing they have the evidence to support the statement. That's how science works. That most of science does not agree with the church is entirely because the church's claims are supported by little to no evidence. Even the most respected scientists in the world must support their claims with evidence. And even Steven Hawking can be wrong.
People's desire to believe they are right is much stronger than their desire to be right.
Unless you do your own research it's hard to tell which is which the way it's reported in the papers and magazines.
That is the whole point of the article! Journalists are forced to produce a balanced view of an issue where only one view has any real credibility! And then after awhile, the view that shouldn't have any credibility has achieved some simply because it gets mentioned by reporters. No wonder why our election was so close, why we can't decide anything anymore. It takes something like the WTC attack for people to agree - and I for one don't want it to cost that much every single time we have to get together on something.
I submitted this story last night, and it didn't get posted.
This is the same reason that our adversarial legal system also falls flat. Having two skilled attorneys argue each side of a case just proves which is the better debater, not which is 'right' or 'true'.
Unfortunately, I can't think of any better system. Having someone in power decide (Judge, King, etc) is worse.
- For the complete works of Shakespeare: cat
What you've missed is skepticism. A lot of people have Ph.Ds, or are considered industry experts, etc. It is very easy for them to get attention from reporters, or to masquerade hypothesis as proven theory.
Just as harmful is when a scientist makes a perfectly valid claim that is based on a certain set of preconditions or stated assumptions, but the media fails to report these preconditions or assumptions.
Don't lose faith in science and scientists. Lose faith in your ability to believe in every piece of information that comes (or only purportedly comes) out of the scientific community. Science is a system that depends heavily on peer review and skeptical inquiry. You have to consider all sorts of details that you won't get from most media outlets before you can seriously expect to be able to consider the validity of a statement, including not only the assumptions made in a study or experiment, but also the structure of that study or experiment. Otherwise, you are deciding whether or not something is true when you don't even know what the thing whose truth you are evaluating is.
If you don't believe in DNA evidence, then you're a stupid contrarian.
You better be pretty damn sure that someone is guilty if you're going to execute them for a crime, and if valid and trustworthy DNA evidence to the contrary doesn't lead you to have a "reasonable doubt" then you are not a reasonable person.
Education is the silver bullet.
The NYT, the BBC, Al-jazeera, Haaretz, the Washington Post, and Bloomberg all offer news from a variety of perspectives.
The NYT, BBC, Al-jazeera and the Washington Post all offer the same viewpoint. Sometimes it seems that reading Al-jazeera's web site gives a more balanced view than the other three. The Washington Times and Wall Street Journal would offer some balance there.
Haaretz offers a (centrist?) viewpoint on Israel.
Bloomberg offers, mostly, financial news.
"If a frog had side pockets, he'd carry a hand gun" - Dan Rather
Well, you have to make sure the grant providers get their money's worth. The problem with how the grants are given out is that prospective projects are listed with hypothesis, expected conclusions and practical implications. It is difficult to get funding if no one wants your expected conclusions to come out. Almost no one is doing science just to see what might happen; accidental discoveries do happen but only by serendipity, not by paying scientists to simply explore. Coming to different conclusions is alright but the 'file drawer problem' means studies which 'successfully' show a view are more likely to be published than those which are unsuccessful.
$#!^ happens, but why does it always have to happen to me???
Was it Dilbert who asked, "When did ignorance become a point of view?"
Education is the silver bullet.
There was a dilbert in which Dilbert tells dogbert he's thinking of getting acupuncture. Dogbert says "the theory here is pooking yourself with needles make you feel better."
Dilbert "When you put it like that it sounds stupid"
Dogbert "sometimes sarcasm can make you think more clearly"
Its true of news too
According to a Nov. 2, 1994 Journal of the National Cancer Institute paper abstract:
For more references, see this biased geocities page.By omitting this important relationship, the Columbia editorial is itself biased.
The moderators
You can't win Darth. If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine
I was going to say "liberal", but that's hardly an accurate word to use for such absurd elitism.
Last time I checked, 'liberal' would be inaccurate to describe elitism of any degree. You should invest in a dictionary that's not written by Ann Coulter.
now you'd like to do the thinking for other people, using the media as your proxy.
If you think that the scenario you outline is limited to liberals, you are seriously deluded. Everybody twists facts to support their positions. Everybody.
I'd rather have reporters than journalists myself.
Free Mac Mini Yeah, it's
Apparently, you're saying the media should only report one side of an argument.
Did you know there is plenty of evidence to show "global warming" is a cyclic event tied to the solar cycle? In fact, the ozone layer hole grew for 20 years, shrank for 20 years, and grew again. Correlating with the solar cycles.
Did you know there is plenty of evidence (or lack of) to show Scott Peterson, just MIGHT not have killed his wife and kid? Even I think he did it, but you can't rule anything out because then you'd be reaching a premature conclusion--THE COMPLETE OPPOSITE of the goals of science which are to not rule out anything and to examine all evidence to find a conclusion.
How can you be fair and objective if you don't report every side? I'm firmly convinced that liberals, for instance, don't like Fox News because they dare report conservative viewpoints without contempt and give them the same air time that liberal viewpoints get. Heaven forbid Ann Coulter get the same airtime George Soros gets on CNN! Liberals are used to CNN and the mainstream media where journalists label others as "conservative" but never use the word "liberal." I've never heard them say "liberal group MoveOn.org" but I've heard them say "conservative right-wing group Swift Boat Veterans for Truth." What's the difference?
A classic pattern of the stupid contrarian is that they confuse the theoretically possible with what reasonably can be expected. In the Scott Peterson case we see people seriously considering that a Satanic cult was behind the murders. It is possible isn't it? Sure, its also possible that Martians came down and committed the crime and then high-tailed it back home. It is theoretically possible. Since we cannot say Martians did not do it beyond a shadow of all theoretical possibility, we must acquit. Thus thinks the Stupid Contrarian.
I agree with the general thrust of TFA, but I think that it gives short shrift to one of the real difficulties: that of trying to explain frequently very complex theories to the non-specialist. I'm a professional scientist, and am frequently asked to talk to the public (typically intelligent but naive in the sense of 'uninformed'). I find preparing this kind of talk MUCH more difficult and time consuming than that required for presenting to my scientific peers. There is just a vast amount of assumed knowledge implicit in any professional talk. Little to none of that background is understood by the general population (journalists included). Try to explain genome research if your audience only has a basic knowledge of DNA, with no concept of introns, exons, splice variations, or regulatory elements. So I spend half my time just trying to get my audience up to speed. This is why I have nothing but repect for those few scientist who CAN do this well. You may not like his "billions and billions", but Carl Sagan could communicate his ideas on cosmology to a naive (but intelligent) audience.
The 'stupid' contrarians aren't necessarily, and it is stupid to think otherwise.
Cases in point:
a) when did the theory of tectonic plates originate although being dismissed despite evidence from the 'fringe' (1912)? When was it accepted (~1965)? ( coincidentally, after the death of its originator.) Here is a more
telling commentary on the acceptance of that theory.
b) how many scientists believed in brontosaurus (they were wrong)? How about the fringe group that believed in the warm-blooded-ness of dinosaurs?
c) how come when Thomas Gold's theories on the deep biosphere and the origins of petroleum come up, the 'concensus' is touted as dismissing him. And yet it is rarely mentioned that Russian and European scientists have accepted and built up considerable evidence that he's right. Now that he's dead you will see a swing to acceptance of his theories (by the North American consensus makers) which has already begun.
You seem to suggest that only the contrarian does not accept the popular 'consensus' or the 'obvious'. In fact, the consensus may be just as polluted by the politics of the field and its journals. The 'obvious' simply is no measure of reality (quantum physics anyone?).
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.
Does anyone really believe that in the long run Exxon/Mobil will be better off when the world wakes up to what they've been doing?
The point being that journalists should use some sort of rational criteria when determining which opinions to include on a given piece. For example, if I were doing a piece on the existence of extra-terrestrials, I would go out and do research on what opinions on the subject existed. Likely, I'd come up with a list that would include: "there are no aliens because God says so," "given probability and what we know of the universe, it is unlikely there are aliens," "given probability and what we know of the universe, it is likely there are aliens," "They could, I guess," and "aliens exist and abducted me last night."
In investigating each of these opinions, it would quickly come out that several of the opinions have little in the way of facts behind them. What evidence is there that aliens abducted some guy from Kansas? Does "because god says so" qualify as evidence for or against the existence of aliens? Further, and opinion like "they could exist, I guess" isn't really worth much, is it? What does that opinion add to the discussion?
Now that the opinions have been filtered a bit, we are left with those opinions which have some backing and credibility. There are still multiple sides to the argument, and there is still debate about facts, evidence and probabilities.
Think this is elitest? Fine. Let's add those filtered opinions back into our story. But do we give those opinions equal time? Do we spend as much time on "because God says" as we do on the guy who has poured years of research into a given subject as we do for the "they could, I guess" opinion? Why?
Others might say, "give the ideas a share of time based on popularity of the ideas." Ick! That seems a pretty lame set of criteria to me. That would mean that we'd probably give the "because God says" crowd more time than the "aliens abducted me!" crowd, even though neither group has any evidence backing them up.
What I'd ask of journalists is to give various ideas time based on the credibility of those ideas. This is obviously subjective and puts a big burden on journalists to do their research and use objective criteria for considering each idea. But then again, isn't that what most people EXPECT journalists to do? The sad fact, is that popularity seems to be the most common set of criteria for reporting on a subject. When has popularity EVER been an indicator of truth?
Given this, if I were doing a program on existence of aliens, I'd focus heavily on the scientific opinions using probability, astronomy, and physics, and make passing mention of the God and abduction ideas.
Taft
You're right on W.R.T. evolution, considering that both Dawkins and Gould (R.I.P.) are decades-long internationally recognized experts in their fields. I believe you didn't handle the "global warming" thing fully, since there are *credible* opposing views.
Where evolution has been successfully used (c.f. disease resistance and accumulation of mutations, etc.) and its predictions essentially validated, there isn't much question there. Those who "don't believe in evolution" simply have their heads in the sand. However, until the recent arctic report, the human contribution to possible climate change was still somewhat arguable, though evidence was mounting. (With the arrival of the arctic temperature change report, "global warming" is headed for similar levels of assurance...)
The bottom line really is that journalists have a responsibility to detect *and report* on the current consensus of recognized scientific authorities. When there is a disagreement from the "contrarians", those arguments may be brought forward, with the clear disclaimer that they are out of the mainstream of scientific consensus, and their credibility should be measured accordingly. There *are* occasions when the contrarians are right. (I refer the reader to the treatment of proponents of plate tectonics until their eventual validation. They were considered to be *total crackpots* for many years.)
Your last paragraph is over the top though I am sure it was meant mostly in jest. While I think Murdoch/Fox/Rush are doing *everybody* a disservice, and could even be contributing to genuine disaster with their blatant and public stupidity, your last paragraph probably pisses off many who need persuading about the value of (steadily improving) scientific consensus.
Isn't it odd how everyone else is an idiot while you're full of understanding about the world?
Isn't it interesting how all journalists are wrong and that anyone sitting behind a computer has more insight into what's right all the time?
Yes, journalists make mistakes. Probably not as often as you think. On the other hand, perhaps they make mistakes as often as programmers do. Journalists also have incredible restraints, such as time or column inch limitations in which to get the idea across. Yes, it's good to be skeptical and I've seen inaccurate portrayals of things I know about as well, but by and large the reportage of tech issues I've seen in the mainstream has been reasonably on target.
http://www.rootstrikers.org/
Yes, we're talking science -- not politics. The aggregate opinions of the community have no bearing on the issue. Data does.
From Aliens Cause Global Warming By Michael Crichton:
"Let's be clear: the work of science has nothing whatever to do with
consensus. Consensus is the business of politics. Science, on the contrary,
requires only one investigator who happens to be right, which means that he
or she has results that are verifiable by reference to the real world. In
science consensus is irrelevant. What is relevant is reproducible results.
The greatest scientists in history are great precisely because they broke
with the consensus.
"There is no such thing as consensus science. If it's consensus, it isn't
science. If it's science, it isn't consensus. Period.
"In addition, let me remind you that the track record of the consensus is
nothing to be proud of. Let's review a few cases.
"In past centuries, the greatest killer of women was fever following
childbirth . One woman in six died of this fever. In 1795, Alexander Gordon
of Aberdeen suggested that the fevers were infectious processes, and he was
able to cure them. The consensus said no. In 1843, Oliver Wendell Holmes
claimed puerperal fever was contagious, and presented compelling evidence.
The consensus said no. In 1849, Semmelweiss demonstrated that sanitary
techniques virtually eliminated puerperal fever in hospitals under his
management. The consensus said he was a Jew, ignored him, and dismissed him
from his post. There was in fact no agreement on puerperal fever until the
start of the twentieth century. Thus the consensus took one hundred and
twenty five years to arrive at the right conclusion despite the efforts of
the prominent "skeptics" around the world, skeptics who were demeaned and
ignored. And despite the constant ongoing deaths of women.
"There is no shortage of other examples. In the 1920s in America, tens of
thousands of people, mostly poor, were dying of a disease called pellagra.
The consensus of scientists said it was infectious, and what was necessary
was to find the "pellagra germ." The US government asked a brilliant young
investigator, Dr. Joseph Goldberger, to find the cause. Goldberger concluded
that diet was the crucial factor. The consensus remained wedded to the germ
theory. Goldberger demonstrated that he could induce the disease through
diet. He demonstrated that the disease was not infectious by injecting the
blood of a pellagra patient into himself, and his assistant. They and other
volunteers swabbed their noses with swabs from pellagra patients, and
swallowed capsules containing scabs from pellagra rashes in what were called
"Goldberger's filth parties." Nobody contracted pellagra. The consensus
continued to disagree with him. There was, in addition, a social
factor-southern States disliked the idea of poor diet as the cause, because
it meant that social reform was required. They continued to deny it until
the 1920s. Result-despite a twentieth century epidemic, the consensus took
years to see the light.
"Probably every schoolchild notices that South America and Africa seem to fit
together rather snugly, and Alfred Wegener proposed, in 1912, that the
continents had in fact drifted apart. The consensus sneered at continental
drift for fifty years. The theory was most vigorously denied by the great
names of geology-until 1961, when it began to seem as if the sea floors were
spreading. The result: it took the consensus fifty years to acknowledge what
any schoolchild sees.
"And shall we go on? The examples can be multiplied endlessly. Jenner and
smallpox, Pasteur and germ theory. Saccharine, margarine, repressed memory,
fiber and colon cancer, hormone replacement therapy. The list of consensus
errors goes on and on. "
At least CBS corrected themselves and apologized. Fox publicly stated that they should be able to deliberately misinform the public, and took that issue through the courts.
When I say, "don't lose faith in science and scientists," there are a couple things working here. First, when I say science I'm talking about deliberate and informed application of the scientific method. When I say scientists, I mean the scientific community as a whole and over the long run.
I am not saying that someone should accept that the scientific community or any one scientist is always right. After all, that would run contrary to the basic tenets of science.
Sorry to break it to you but american media does nto have a "liberal" bias. To the rest fo the world, even your CNN has a "rightwind" bias. Thats how we perceive you. It might be that your so right wing that even blantantly right wing media seems lefty.
Main stream science is rarly even covered, it's always fringe science that gets press.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
On the other hand, he cites specific examples of the problem that he criticizes. In each case, he doesn't rely solely on his own knowledge, but refers to genuine experts in each field. As a journalist, one task he should be good at is evaluating the credentials and credibility of his sources, and conveying that information in his writing.
I also don't think he has a problem with a reporter who presents both sides of an issue where there exists genuine scientific dispute. Mooney's complaint is with reporters who present individuals with weak credentials and conflicts of interest as credible alternatives in order to produce a "balanced" story.
Do we care about Chris Mooney's opinion on a purported link between breast cancer and abortion, or between anthropogenic carbon dioxide and global warming? We do not, and we should be skeptical of it because he isn't qualified by training or experience to make judgements in those areas. Do we trust Chris Mooney when he reports the opinions of the National Cancer Institute or the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change? We do, because those organizations have studied those issues, and are credible. In other words, we don't trust Mr. Mooney to run his own clinical trials, but with formal training in journalism he ought to be able to assess the qualifications of his sources. Journalists who don't do so are being tremendously irresponsible, misleading, and plain lazy.
~Idarubicin
A lot of people seem to be missing the real problem here. Let's say journalists only report one side - which would, of course, be the "right" side. Except...right according to whom? The journalist who is NOT trained in the field (or they'd be working in a lab, not a newsroom)? The large corporation whom the journalist works for? An opinion poll of some group? The say-so of a government agency (and isn't THAT a scary thought!)? Who?
/. isn't exactly mainstream, you know...)
When people complain about a journalist presenting two sides of a debate, what they want is for the journalist to pick just one side, AND for it to be the side they agree with. This just isn't always going to happen.
Having a journalist give equal weight to some fringe view is frustrating, but if it annoys you, just remember - it's pretty much a given that something you believe very strongly is a fringe view to someone. (Such as open source/free software, which outside of
Still not convinced? Okay, imagine that a journalist does an article on something you have no real clue about. Maybe something about the economy, or south american politics, or chinese military power, or whatever. Assume they report one view. Quick! Is that a mainstream view, or is the reporter feeding you some fringe view? How could you possibly know? If the reporter gives two opposing views, well, you still don't know which is "mainstream" (whatever the hell that means), but at least you know that debate exists, you can go look the details up, and then wonder why the reporter even included one of those views. It's not perfect, but it's better than getting a monoculture rammed down your throat.
Speaking of which - Fox tends to have a pretty poor reputation around here, at least partly because they don't bother with the "he said/she said" school as much as other broadcasters do. Instead, they present what they thing is "right". Which is fine - but...doesn't look so nifty when you don't agree with the reporters definition of "right", does it?
Wow. Just - wow.
I never really knew what lipstick on a pig looked like before.
The article explaining that dinosaur tracks are mostly in a straight line, so that means they were running away from the great flood was particularly delusional.
Oh, and this gem on the speed of light was just amazing.
Education is the silver bullet.
is the report by The Lancet that US troops have killed 100,000 civilians. This number is being reported everywhere as a recorded facts
When this study was first reported, I saw dozens of people on Slashdot questioning it's validity and debunking it. They proclaimed those who made the study poor scientists, and pointed out the statistical margins of error. You are here again proclaiming it to be poor science, and how the media simply regurgitates it.
Well, I'd like to know, how many civilians have been killed in Iraq? What is your best guess, and where are you getting your figures? I looked around and could not find even one other study, aside from the Lancet one, that even attempts to apply any scientific method to discovering this number. I looked at numbers reported in the media, and still reported in the media, and all of them are guesses based either on the reports from a few hospitals in less devastated areas, or by modifying another news agency's report.
I agree that this study has potentially serious flaws, it's sample size is too small, and much of the media has done a poor job of explaining the likelihood that it could be very wrong. But at the same time, I think it is moronic to attack the credibility of the only study conducted that actually has ANY credibility.
If you, as a scientist, were asked to estimate how many civilians have been killed in Iraq, what numbers would you rely upon? What study has a better methodology and execution? If you don't like this study, why don't you go try to conduct one of your own in the middle of a war. The scientists who conducted the Lancet study should be lauded for their efforts to come up with a figure that has some backing in scientific method. Their numbers are not facts, and should not be presented as such, but they are still the most credible numbers to be presented thus far.
In fairness, this depends on what you mean by "the church". These days any reasonable church recognizes that it is their job to inspire, to seek justice and compassion, etc., not, for example, to attempt to determine the exact age of the earth by calculations from biblical family trees.
One of the sources of our current problem is that discussions of religion in the United States are so dominated by the fundamentalist fringe.
While not a Christian myself, I recognize that Christianity has a lot to value in it, and it distresses me to see kids being brought up to believe that the only way to stay true to their principles is to swallow this sort of pseudo-science.
--Bruce Fields
Does anyone really take that Crichton essay seriously? i love how he attempts to dispute decades of intensive research in Global Warming by a lot of hand-waving and mumbo-jumbo. I think he doesn't understand what true skepticism is.
I have a Ph.D. in physics, but I don't consider myself to be a god-like, super-genius who knows all there is to know about everything. However, every time I meet someone for the first time and they discover what I do, the typical reaction is that I am all-knowing and all-seeing. They then proceed to ask me about anything and everything, from Steven Hawking's theories about time and whether or not cell phones cause cancer. Most of the things non-scientists ask me about are things that are so far outside my area of expertise that I know just as little as they do about the topic. People are in awe of scientists because they have terrible misconceptions about what kind of people choose careers in science and what scientists actually do at work all day. They also tend to think that we get paid way more than we do!
The awe that people have for scientists can lead journalists to consult scientists who know absolutely nothing about the topic of their story. Journalists are not immune to the "someone who has a Ph.D. in physics must know everything" syndrome. I remember seeing a story on TV when Cassini was launched in which the journalist consulted an "expert" on the issue of whether the radioactive material Cassini used as a power source posed a significant danger if something went wrong during the launch. The "expert" was a scientist, however he was a string theorist. If the journalist had even a little knowledge of the issues involved, they would have consulted an aeronautical engineer AND a nuclear physicist AND a medical doctor AND a meteorologist to help assess the risk. String theory has nothing to do with any of these things!
Everyone, even some scientists, tend to react emotionally when they hear certain words and phrases. Some examples: "radiation," "cancer", "anthrax," and "giant asteroid passing within 10,000 miles of Earth." Journalists and politicians know this well, and use it to their advantage every chance they can get. Unscrupulous scientists also know how people react to these things and do not feel guilty about using the public's fear and lack of understanding to promote themselves. The scientist I saw on TV for the Cassini story should have admitted to the journalist that he was not an expert on spacecraft design.
Until the public at large learns more about science and how to determine if someone is really an expert, politicians and journalists will always be able to manipulate science to their advantage. Scientists can help by trying to educate people, but they also have to be willing to admit when they don't know something.
It occurs to me as I start writing that even if you read this, I'm probably wasting effort. If your listening comprehension is so bad, why should I assume your reading comprehension is better?
Stewart's point, obviously lost on dumbasses everywhere, was that mainstream political reporting and commentary is doing all of us a grave disservice by not examining the truth behind partisan spin machines on both sides of an issue.
Right now even the "legitimate" press is mired in muck by partisan hackery that just serve to focus and amplify the often empty, dishonest arguments made by their respective "sides". These hacks are so plentiful that politicians can cherrypick interviews with sympathetic hosts and push their self-serving crap to a wide and sympathetic audience.
Nowhere in, "blue said, red said" pseudo-debate TV is there room for factual analysis. You couldn't hear it over smirks, the zingers, and the general din on those shows anyway.
Intellectually honest, well-defended arguments just don't make for good ratings, even on news networks. In the ratings game, flashy soundbites beat buttoned-up substance *every* *single* time.
And it does hurt us. It makes us dumber, as you exemplify, and it turns the "watchdog" press into the lapdog press.
Plainly, Stewart's point to the Crossfire gang was, "You're not helping, but you could and you should."
He's right, I'm right and you're a moron.
Does anyone really take that Crichton essay seriously? i love how he attempts to dispute decades of intensive research in Global Warming by a lot of hand-waving and mumbo-jumbo. I think he doesn't understand what true skepticism is.
And anyone that confuses "intensive research" with "conclusions" doesn't know what science is.
You do seem to know, however, what "hand-waving" and "mumbo-jumbo" mean.
Journalism is enertainment for profit No, Journalism is used (and subverted) for entertainment and profit, particularly in the USA.
2. The North Vietnamese were 'terrorists'? They were a fucking country you dope. Only under Bush are all enemies 'terrorists'.
3. You're posting on Slashdot, you're a Slashdotter too.
You're lack of thinking is living proof of Orwell's thoughts on language.
"And yet the media tried it's hardest to even go so far as to forge documents to attack old National Guard Service. And yet people give CBSNews a pass to this day for it"
CBS did not forge documents, they did get duped and did not follow through. What is sad though is that they have people who claimed that the "sentiments expressed were accurate" and yet others cannot accept that part of it because of what they saw. People can give CBS a partial pass because they realize even a stopped clock or liberal or conservative can be right twice a day. They see things as they are, in shades of grey rather than how you seem to, as they might be in black and white.
"if FoxNews had done that to Kerry, everyonen would be chewing their heads off."
Look CBS got raked over the coals for their terrible handling of the story. What more can be done? I mean a senate and house hearing, a cover on Time and severe parody everywhere else. As an aside, if the White House had simply said "our boy served fully and completely", "these letters are fake" AND not distributed them AND gotten the secratary and other witnesses to support them, who could say boo? Problem is they couldn't get the principals to lie for them so they did the next best thing, spread it out and then blow it up.
"News editors instructed their journalists to refer to the Swift Boat Vets as "unsubstantiated claims"
Better than calling them liars. "I served with John Kerry" means to most people you were with him in his unit perhaps even in direct combat, not just in the same war. Next we will be defining the word "is."
"and yet the Kerry campaign was forced to acknowledge that Kerry wasn't in Cambodia on Christmas"
Forced by who, the media? Oh darn there goes at least some of your argument. Also it has never been disproven that our troops or even Kerry was never in Cambodia around that time. Also to be fair if he thought he was there over the border than he can say it. This is just like the President and all his men saying "Iraq has weapons of mass destruction and poses an immediate threat to America."
" and that he may have earned a Purple Heart due to self-inflicted wounds."
Wait "may have" well that supposition clears everything up. Also if even some of those scratches were caused by the situations they were awarded another inch to the left or right could have ended Kerry's life.
"And yet the mainstream media buried that story and continued to claim the Swift Boat Vets were "exaggerating.""
When the extreme is either Kerry is claimed to be a Shit Bag or the Swift Boat Vets are Lying Shit Bags, "exaggerating" is a nice middle ground. Be glad "equal time" is gone so you can surround yourself with like minded people and get comfort in the banality of it all.
"the discrepancy between the Lancet estimate and the aggregated press reports is not as large as it seems at first. The Lancet figure implies that 60,000 people have been killed by violence, including insurgents, while the aggregated press reports give a figure of 15,000, counting only civilians. Nonetheless, Dr Roberts points out that press reports are a "passive-surveillance system". Reporters do not actively go out to many random areas and see if anyone has been killed in a violent attack, but wait for reports to come in. And, Dr Roberts says, passive-surveillance systems tend to undercount mortality. For instance, when he was head of health policy for the International Rescue Committee in the Congo, in 2001, he found that only 7% of meningitis deaths in an outbreak were recorded by the IRC's passive system. The study is not perfect. But then it does not claim to be. The way forward is to duplicate the Lancet study independently, and at a larger scale."
"The centre of its estimated range of death tolls--the most probable number according to the data collected and the statistics used--is almost 100,000. And even though the limits of that range are very wide, from 8,000 to 194,000, the study concludes with 90% certainty that more than 40,000 Iraqis have died. This is an extraordinary claim, and so requires extraordinary evidence. Is the methodology used... sound enough for reliable conclusions to be drawn from it?"
"Dr Roberts used a technique called clustering, which has been employed extensively in other situations where census data are lacking, such as studying infectious disease in poor countries... They interviewed a total of 7,868 people in 988 households. But the relevant sample size for many purposes--for instance, measuring the uncertainty of the analysis--is 33, the number of clusters. "...the data from individuals within a given cluster are highly correlated. Statistically, 33 is a relatively small sample (though it is the best that could be obtained by a small number of investigators in a country at war). That is the reason for the large range around the central value of 98,000, and is one reason why that figure might be wrong. (Though if this is the case, the true value is as likely to be larger than 98,000 as it is to be smaller.) It does not, however, mean, as some commentators have argued in response to this study, that figures of 8,000 or 194,000 are as likely as one of 98,000. Quite the contrary. The farther one goes from 98,000, the less likely the figure is."
"The second reason the figure might be wrong is if there are mistakes in the analysis, and the whole exercise is thus unreliable. Nan Laird, a professor of biostatistics at the Harvard School of Public Health, who was not involved with the study, says that she believes both the analysis and the data-gathering techniques used by Dr Roberts to be sound. She points out the possibility of "recall bias"--people may have reported more deaths more recently because they did not recall earlier ones. However, because most people do not forget about the death of a family member, she thinks that this effect, if present, would be small. Arthur Dempster, also a professor of statistics at Harvard, though in a different department from Dr Laird, agrees that the methodology in both design and analysis is at the standard professional level. However, he raises the concern that because violence can be very localised, a sample of 33 clusters really might be too small to be representative."
"This concern is highlighted by the case of
The existence of frauds isn't sufficient to indict scientists as a whole as fraudulent. The examples you cite actually support the claim that science is self-correcting, since the frauds were in fact found out.
This is a nasty, unsupported statement. Journalists are trained to assimilate information fast, and to write well and fast. They aren't trained to be experts on all subjects, and they suffer from a changing landscape in which they must be more generalists. How many newspapers have dedicated science reporters these days? Not many. And those that do tend to have a single science reporter, as opposed to a team of reporters with expertise in different areas of science.
Scientists, on the other hand, focus on their own subject. I would be shocked if any layperson could "learn up hard" about astronomy and catch me up on any serious errors in my understanding of much of the field (I freely admit up front I don't do hardcore magnetohydrodynamic simulations).
And actually, if so many scientists have so many ideas that "go against what is blindingly obvious" then why must someone even "learn up hard" to realize this?
Professor of Astronomy, Author of Spider Star & Star Dragon (Tor)
I didn't say that scientists aren't frought with human frailties. I cleared stated they are, so why do you claim otherwise? Why lie about what I said just a few lines above?
I claimed that SCIENCE as an establishment is self-correcting and, in the long-term, unbiased. The media hyped up cold fusion, which is one of the things the linked article is all about, and the scientists themselves used a press conference to announce their results rather than a peer-reviewed journal. The vast majority of scientists didn't believe the claims and awaited experimental verification. That's how and why science works.
Over the long-haul, mountains of observational data will crush weak, but politically supported, scientific positions.
Are fradulent claims bad for science? Sure. Are they common? No way. Do they get smacked down when they can't be supported? Yes.
Professor of Astronomy, Author of Spider Star & Star Dragon (Tor)
Exactly. And the bigger problem is science is highly politicized. So it would be great if journalists put some effort into debunking bad science, but then most journalists are just as biased and in the same way.
Oh, really? That would explained how the mainstream media has allowed the Bush administration, and campaign, to blithely lie about so many things. But don't take my word for it, take Dick Cheney's (corrected) word: http://www.factcheck.org/
Yeah, Kerry's campaign did it too (though not as much). But these are things the press in the U.S. are just not reporting, and it favors whoever's in office at the time, not "liberals" or "conservatives." Indeed, the way the press has almost coddled this administration speaks volumes against your point.
And no one has done more coddling than Fox News, who would like us to believe that they're just balancing out the rest of the press.
But it's just not true. A truly balanced would be scarcely useful, because all they could do is report what the two "sides" in a debate are saying, without being allowed to do their own searching for the truth, which would immediately be pounced upon by the side (or both of them!) who is found lacking.
The only time they present opposing views is to either ridicule them or create some sense of conflict to sex up their story. Neither scientists or journalists are very interested in searching for the Truth if it collides with their politics.
Don't you see some sort of irony in your words?
Mark this ladies and geeks, mark what I'm about to say because it's becoming obvious that it's going to become more and more relevant in the coming years:
The people who speak out about a bias in the media and sciences do so by reacting to the percieved bias, thus making themselves guilty of the thing they complain about, whether their compaints were valid or not.
Lets look at the Science game for a moment. Just who are those grant providers you speak of? Major universities and government agencies like the NSF, staffed with academics from the university world.
And, you know, big corporations that do a lot of funding and are increasingly using universities as a sort fo extended job training that doesn't actually promise a job at the end of it.
If you haven't figured out yet that universities are 0wn3d by the left/socialists/progressives/whatever they call themselves this week you probably are one of the ones who think the Red states are filled with idiots and want to leave for Canada.
Doesn't it seem at all strange that so many universities, places of Higher Freaking Learning, have so many people there who subscribe to a worldview opposed to your own? Doesn't this at least cause you to examine your own beliefs?
Part of the journey to getting a doctorate degree is to defend your beliefs, or your thesis anyway, against attack. I've done a hell of a lot of self-belief examining in my life, but I'm not at all sure I've done enough. I think every damn human who lives on this damn world needs to. My question to you is, do you?
As for the red states -- many of them are not *that* red, there were a lot of close calls across the country, and Bush won by only 3% of the vote, which means that if 1.5% had voted the other way, it would have been a popular tie. And you don't have to be an elite-Jewish-doctor-commie to think that this country is going to get a lot loonier during those additional 1,461 days.
So there are no 'respectable' scientists who hold opposing views on politicized scientific issues because by definition you can't BE a 'respectable' scientist since the people who decide who gets to be a scientist won't allow those with opposing views to stay in the club.
Are you arguing this because you've found actual bias, or are you arguing it because it has to be argued in order to preserve the moral superiority of your beliefs?
Kinda like why you don't find many pro life
I tend to agree with "Scientists don't change their minds, they just die." There is a certain percentage of scientists who get locked-on certain ideas and never change them despite new evidence, and later generations don't have a problem. That would seem to set the long-term upper limit at something like 35 years, the typically length of a scientific career. Still, they tend to be brushed aside long before they die and provide some friction, rather than a wall, to advancement.
I'd still claim that science moves a lot faster than politics or philosophy, and certainly some fields of science move lightning fast.
In my specialty, astronomy, we're to a great extent technology limited. Every major new advance in detector or instrument technology can mean dramatic new results. For instance, in the last ten years we've learned of over a hundred extrasolar planets when before we knew of none. We also learned that the universal expansion is accelerating, most likely the result of "dark energy" which we didn't even know existed. We've learned not only how to detect black holes in other galaxies, we've been able to measure their masses. And there are lots of other things as well, perhaps not so important, but that could become important.
How exactly has our understaning of philosophy or politics advanced in the last ten years>
Professor of Astronomy, Author of Spider Star & Star Dragon (Tor)
I've been thinking hard, but indeed Western Europe doesn't qualify, neither does Canada, New Zealand, nor Australia. Russia doesn't have free press (nor does Italy), Brazil and the rest of South American nation as so far they have a free press seem to be more left-wing than Europe. Eastern Europe loves their new-found freedom but are still very socialist. Which leaves Africa, the Arab countries, Japan, Persia, India and China who probably view CNN as an American propaganda machine.
Thus, as far as I can see, the US media landscape is globally seen as a complete right-wing outlier.
Sure, you're right--science takes time. Self-correction in science takes time. But there are two things meant by self-correcting here. First, that fraud is uncovered. This occurs on the timescale of current research. Verification is fast, and attempts to build on another researcher's falsified work will (generally) quickly identify those falsehoods so that they can be excised from the accepted body of evidence describing a scientific problem. Of course, even here, fast is actually pretty slow to the public eye, which sees very little to none of the science behind some newspaper article giving a precis of it.
Second, self-correction also means changing the accepted interpretation of a scientific problem as new evidence comes to light. This, of course, takes time (c.f. flat earth-->round earth). Discoveries and new ideas take time to surface, but we're getting better at it, largely because science operates largely on a hypothesis-driven research model. Despite his appeal to our Horatio Alger self-made-man ideal in the US, the garage tinkerer who looks to just happen upon some interesting discovery is pretty ineffective.
Also, your comparison of the timescale of science's successes to the timescale of the betterment of the 'general human condition' was a joke, right? Look at the advancements in medicine, in materials science, in communication, in {insert damn-near any cool aspect of modern living here} and tell me that one again. 'Science' (as we're talking about it here) has been a dominant paridigm of discovery for, say, a few hundred years (of course somebody will argue with this, but I'll toss it out there anyway). In that time, look at what it has given us.
Knowledge is power. Power corrupts. Study hard, be evil.
Global warming is mostly in dispute because it is (a) not an immediate consequence of Newtonian laws, the only stuff regarded as being completely true, and (b) politically highly inconvenient, as no-one likes this. The theory of global warming is one century old, it has been predicted, and it is measured. It's now one degree warmer than a century ago. It is merely highly inconvenient for current governments, hence lots of funding goes to efforts to disprove it, to no avail. The political bias in science you mention is not for global warming, it's against it. Lots of funding has gone to dispel the global warming hypothesis, all to no avail, the evidence is on the side of the global warming hypothesis.
Just to put it bluntly: if you see an avenue to divorce the measured global warming from the consequences of human action, I'm sure your current government will be eager to fund you. So on whose side is the political bias here?
And science/engineering related majors should be required to minor in sociology/psychology. Otherwise they are a social hazard. Yes, it's always the other professions that need regulating, isn't it?
http://www.rootstrikers.org/
Lets look at the Science game for a moment. Just who are those grant providers you speak of? Major universities and government agencies like the NSF, staffed with academics from the university world. If you haven't figured out yet that universities are 0wn3d by the left/socialists/progressives/whatever they call themselves this week you probably are one of the ones who think the Red states are filled with idiots and want to leave for Canada.
This is kind of foolish. For the most part, the political views of scientists are not know even to the administrators of the university where they work. Most scientists publish scientific papers, not political tracts. I work in a scientific department, and I couldn't tell you where most of my immediate colleagues stand on the political spectrum. I would imagine that on average they are more liberal than the general population, but that's only playing the odds--highly educated people tend, statistically, to be more liberal than average.
Similarly, the granting agencies that fund my research are unlikely to have any idea of what my political views are. I've sat on NIH Study Sections, and I'm hard put just to read all of the grant proposals that I am responsible for--I certainly don't have time to research the politics of the applicants. I have never heard political issues raised in a Study Session discussion. Yes, there are fashions in science, and if you are trying to get support for a proposal that challenges the generally accepted view, you need more compelling evidence than if your work fits with the generally accepted view. But in most cases, that is appropriate--a particular view becomes accepted because there is strong evidence to support it.
In the case of global warming, there's no particular vested interest that wants global warming to be true. Global warming or not, climate modeling and weather prediction is important enough that it will attract research support regardless. On the other hand, there are powerful economic interests that will be hurt by the measures that would be required to control CO2
Most brand name scientists of teh past century were all too eager to sign onto socialist utopian and fascist schemes because they promised a world governed by reason and science, i.e. themselves.
Most scientists, today as in the past, are not interested in running things--if they were, they would have gone into politics or government rather than science. Most are pretty focused on their own research interests, and are primarily concerned with being able to continue their research.
The thing about SCIENCE, as opposed to scientists, is that it is apolitical. It's self-correcting.
True, of course, but this sorta misses the same point that so many of your critics are also missing: The original article wasn't about science at all; it was about the media's "balanced" misreporting of scientific news.
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
Having worked in the research branch of a Federal science installation, I would have to say that you have a point. When the global warming theory started becoming a big issue in the late 80s, there was an effort to make sure that it was documented that any new or current projects had something to do with it or the more general term "Global Change". Why? Funding. It helped open up different funding channels that otherwise weren't available. It didn't matter if the actual work really had anything directly to do with it or not. As long as the proposal made the case that your project would help advance research in that topic in some way, shape or form, the easier it was to get it approved. IMHO, it was still valid work that needed to be done, but it helped make the pols higher up in the food chain feel happy that they were doing something about the problem.
If you think about it, scientists that are using this avenue to get funding AREN'T going to say it's not a problem because if they do, their funding disappears.
the good ground has been paved over by suicidal maniacs
The biggest problem with science and journalism is the same problem scientists have with science. We mistake scientific theories for fact! Science is a process of examining a set of facts, presenting a THEORY, testing a THEORY and then revising a THEORY. The final step is to look where the THeory doesn't match the facts and start over.
Theories are nothing more than descriptive models of the universe. Thus a geocentric universe was an adequate theory untill instruments became sensitive enough to make the theory unworkable. At that point, a better theory was embraced. With limited accuracy, both theories were useful for predicting the position of the planets. The heliocentric model held untill we realized the universe was bigger than we thought. Now we find that it too was flawed and needed improvement (replaced with spiral galaxies, local clusters etc).
Fifteen years ago, the medical community thought Prions were junk science. Now it is the leading theory describing Mad cow desease. New data, better model.
Do not procalim scientific fact to loudly. You will eventuall be proven wrong. Instead, proclaim that the best available model says... Then admit that it may change in the future.
Just last week, I was at a banquet for the 2004 International Meeting of the Institute of Human Virology -- a meeting where most of the top scientists in HIV research (as well as in tumor biology and virology) congregate and discuss results. One of the speakers was a science journalist by the name of Jon Franklin. He gave a speech entitled "The End of Science Writing" and it is sort of eery that today's slashdot post is so reminiscent of its tone and words. If you have the time, and especially if you're a scientist, please read it. Here's a little excerpt:
As for me, I saw the handwriting on the wall but thought I could be of some value educating the next generation of science writers. In 1989 I took a job as head of the science journalism department at Oregon State University. OSU is Oregon's premier science campus, and its journalism department was the only undergraduate science journalism department in the country. There are several graduate institutions that teach science journalism, but most journalists do not have advanced degrees.
In any event, shortly after I arrived the voters of Oregon approved a tax-cutting measure that fell heavily on higher education. OSU decided science journalism was expendable. I knew the news industry wasn't going to support the program, but I thought science might. The critical player was OSU's dean of sciences. I went to him, hat in hand. I'll never forget his response.
"That's your problem," he said. "We don't need you."
I left the university, of course. Shortly thereafter they closed down science journalism. It looked for a while like they might also close the ballroom dance program. But they found money to keep that. Also, that year, the university undertook a multimillion dollar renovation of its football stadium.
--Jon Franklin
Linux at home
The author makes a good case for micro-evolution (the fact that single-celled organisms change over time, not requiring the addition of information), but takes a sudden leap of logic to claim this proves macro-evolution and the formation of complex organisms out of simpler ones.
The notion that there is such a thing as "macro" evolution, which is distinct from "micro" evolution is much beloved of creationists. Of course, they can't tell you how to distinguish between microevolution and macroevolution, because they look exactly the same at the DNA level--the same kinds of sequence changes, duplications, and rearragnements. Basically, it is just a dodge; any evolution demonstrated in laboratory studies is dismissed as microevolution, while everything else is macroevolution and the result of "intelligent design." William of Occam would spin in his grave.
Whether or not you believe the facts point to evolution, National Geographic is not the place to look for scientific, peer-reviewed information. Then again, they have the guts to commit to a single point of view, don't they?
However, when it comes to evolution, they are saying the same thing that you'll read in the peer-reviewed journals. I don't know if it takes that much guts, though, just elementary knowledge of science--to biologists, "Darwin was right," is about as controversial as "Copernicus was right" is to astronomers.
It's taken me forty minutes to write all this out. Why do I do this to myself?
Mine:
The people who speak out about a bias in the media and sciences do so by reacting to the percieved bias, thus making themselves guilty of the thing they complain about, whether their compaints were valid or not.
Yours:
Not at all. I claim bias in the media because they state as settled fact things very much in dispute, like Global Warming, they report the claims of left leaning groups as fact and the claims of the right as "claims from the right wing thinktank.....". And so on and so on.
Everything is in dispute. I can spuriously dispute anything you, or anyone else, says just because I don't like it. Dispute is cheap, even the dispute of think tanks. It is true, of course, that I can invent spurious theories. Research is expensive however, and the people who believe global warming is real tend to have fewer vested interests than those who think it is not.
I was speaking in general there, for starters. That is a trend that provides a lot of the right's energy, the perception that they are somehow discriminated against unfairly. But their reactions to it are often filled with the same kind of discrimination. That's the core process that fuels Fox News, and other like-minded groups and sources.
Global warming is a difficult matter to make conclusive arguments about, since of course we have only one planet and cannot infalliably see into the future. But it *is* possible to look at the composition of our atmosphere, and compare it to measurements taken some time ago, and see that there's quite a bit more carbon dioxide in it now than previously, check here.
The biggest area of debate these days, or at least the one I hear the most about, is the Evolution vs. Intelligent Design argument, which is very bitterly-fought these days, and has the most junk science proping it up.
Further, there are more and more junk studies out there, produced to confuse the issue, usually without sufficent scientific backing and funded by heavy polluters. This tactic is being used more often, and these studies tend to be pounced upon, disproportionately, by the current U.S. administration against all other evidence.
But here's what I consider to be most telling: What is it that makes global warming a controversial issue? What is the connecting logic that equates increased CO2 emmisions to a left-wing agenda? There is a lot of support for global warming, and although it is not *completely* proven, there are many more scientists who think it is wisely cautious to reduce emissions levels than those who think, damn the tiller, full speed ahead.
Mine:
Doesn't this at least cause you to examine your own beliefs?
Yours:
Not a bit. What do clostered ivory tower intellectuals know about the real world?
Your words are telling. I was saying that *everyone* needs to examine their own views, and was hoping to spark something of that in yourself by saying it. Self-examination is, in this age, just about the only route to truth that could be considered remotely objective.
Also, your word "cloistered" implies an ivy wall, but in fact I don't see much reason to assume they are all that separate from "real" people. Getting a job in academia, especially these days, isn't all that different form getting a job elsewhere, and that's the only way I can see someone thinking them separate from the rest of the world. They still have the same television news shows to choose from, the same newspapers to pick from, the same websites to browse. Old cliches about them being away and apart haven't been true for a long time, not since the creation of mass media at least.
Yours:
And I don't trust their paid for research anymore than I buy into the NSF's when it is on a political subject. Both are pushing a political agenda and trying to gain respectabil
the fact that single-celled organisms change over time, not requiring the addition of information
DEATH adds information!
Random change over time plus the death of those that are less fit (or even merely equally fit) adds information in the surviving decendants - that new information is that this new stuff is better (or at least equally good). That is a rather signifigant addition of information.
A billion monkeys pounding away on a billion typewriters for a billion years aren't going to produce so much as the first page of Hamlet, but a single monkey *will* produce Hamlet in a matter of days if you add information by deleting each incorrect letter he types.
As for only seeing "micro", we have seen just as much as we would expect to see considering that we have only been looking on the order of a hundred years compared to the 4+ billion years it took to get here. You just do not turn an ordinary flying bird into a fully adapted penguin in a matter of decades. And in many cases any signifigant newly discovered adaption in nature would most likely be assumed to be previously overlooked, rather than a new development.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
Fact of the matter is most university types were educated far beyond their intelligence, and only the ones who couldn't succeed in the real world tend to make careers in academia.
Wow. What a "fact." Success in academic science is actually much harder than success in the "real world." I'll actually support my statement. Every year of my academic career, I've seen graduate students and post-docs forced out of science because they can't cut it intellectually, lack the necessary work ethic, or just can't find very-hard-to-get academic positions. Now, any given year I only know about a couple of cases personally, but over the last 10-15 years I've seen it many times.
And you know what? Pretty much every time these people go into the "real world" and find high-paying technical jobs quickly. I'm talking scientists now, people with physics/astronomy backgrounds.
Furthermore, few in science go into the "real world," fail, and come rushing back to "easier" academia. Pretty much the only new grad students from the "real world" coming back from advanced degrees are ones who have been very successful. Non-successful "real worlders" can't even get into decent grad schools.
You sometimes say some things that make sense, that I can agree with, then you go and make some outlandish statements that betray real hatred and a misunderstandingor ignorance of the subject at hand.
P.S. The ivory tower isn't so cloistered. It's just a different jungle.
Professor of Astronomy, Author of Spider Star & Star Dragon (Tor)