Influences of the Media on Reactions to Scientific Discoveries and StudiesThe news media has great influence over many aspects of modern life—especially the relay of scientific discovery and study to the general public—but journalists can unintentionally skew how the public receives the information by embellishing or minimizing the facts in news stories. After discussing the impact that journalism has on public perception of science and the credibility of researchers, analyzing two news articles about the discovery of a possible new species by Lee Berger in South Africa, and then analyzing the research article authored by Berger about this discovery we can see how it is that journalists can distort facts and falsely influence how the public perceives scientific information.
The Truth of the Scientific Discovery
I am a believer in the primacy of research rather than dogma. For most of my life I was the most skeptical person I know. And I’ve often wondered if, instead of relying on a single expert for information, we are all equally trusting and understanding each other. With this in mind, I found that I had a powerful influence on how and why scientists interact with their audiences.
As we all know, science and popular culture both rely on narratives with some degree of narrative accuracy. Some scientists and cultural commentators often claim that a scientist is less intelligent because he/she is not able to distinguish among different types of ideas. Others claim that a scientist is simply so talented that no one else can. And most of these claim that even without a scientific background, a scientist is uniquely smart because he/she is able to explain to us whatever we can think clearly.
It is, of course, up to science writers, editors, experts, and other practitioners of a particular field to decide whether to accept these claims.
My decision to believe that science has no story to tell means that I believe every single scientific fact.
That is not to say that it’s impossible for an expert to know an exact statistic such as the height of a hill, how many birds die in every year, or any other simple information such as a word or expression. The real challenge is knowing to what degree to accept these claims and thus what the truthfulness of scientific information is. These stories and information are presented only on the basis of a strong scientific truth, much of it derived from previous research on a different species.
This brings me to how scientists work.
Because we often see stories written more about the progress of one species than most people do about other species, I’m also trying to understand their motivations and motivations from the perspective of what I consider to be a scientific scientist.
I can recognize when I see something that is scientifically wrong and wrong-headed, but I will admit that it’s a misrepresentation of what I consider to be scientific evidence which most scientists agree on for scientific reasons.
The scientific truth of the story is really only about the things that scientists can change, while the real truth is about the people who put in the time and effort to produce the results that they report.
Scientists are more efficient when they’re able to produce true data and are less likely to ignore scientific errors.
A scientist often makes a mistake by writing down a science-fiction plotline that is scientifically unsound at best and at worst downright dispiriting. His/her lack of intellectual rigor may lead to them thinking that scientific knowledge is just another kind of science fiction, but science is not just fiction.
Scientists do use the phrase “science fiction” as a general approach to say that scientific results are important. They write things that appeal to some sort of universal human feeling of community (e.g., that they know that the world is round, there can’t be anything round about the world, or there can’t be anything round about a plant), create and interpret phenomena scientifically or from an ineradicable
The Truth of the Scientific Discovery
I am a believer in the primacy of research rather than dogma. For most of my life I was the most skeptical person I know. And I’ve often wondered if, instead of relying on a single expert for information, we are all equally trusting and understanding each other. With this in mind, I found that I had a powerful influence on how and why scientists interact with their audiences.
As we all know, science and popular culture both rely on narratives with some degree of narrative accuracy. Some scientists and cultural commentators often claim that a scientist is less intelligent because he/she is not able to distinguish among different types of ideas. Others claim that a scientist is simply so talented that no one else can. And most of these claim that even without a scientific background, a scientist is uniquely smart because he/she is able to explain to us whatever we can think clearly.
It is, of course, up to science writers, editors, experts, and other practitioners of a particular field to decide whether to accept these claims.
My decision to believe that science has no story to tell means that I believe every single scientific fact.
That is not to say that it’s impossible for an expert to know an exact statistic such as the height of a hill, how many birds die in every year, or any other simple information such as a word or expression. The real challenge is knowing to what degree to accept these claims and thus what the truthfulness of scientific information is. These stories and information are presented only on the basis of a strong scientific truth, much of it derived from previous research on a different species.
This brings me to how scientists work.
Because we often see stories written more about the progress of one species than most people do about other species, I’m also trying to understand their motivations and motivations from the perspective of what I consider to be a scientific scientist.
I can recognize when I see something that is scientifically wrong and wrong-headed, but I will admit that it’s a misrepresentation of what I consider to be scientific evidence which most scientists agree on for scientific reasons.
The scientific truth of the story is really only about the things that scientists can change, while the real truth is about the people who put in the time and effort to produce the results that they report.
Scientists are more efficient when they’re able to produce true data and are less likely to ignore scientific errors.
A scientist often makes a mistake by writing down a science-fiction plotline that is scientifically unsound at best and at worst downright dispiriting. His/her lack of intellectual rigor may lead to them thinking that scientific knowledge is just another kind of science fiction, but science is not just fiction.
Scientists do use the phrase “science fiction” as a general approach to say that scientific results are important. They write things that appeal to some sort of universal human feeling of community (e.g., that they know that the world is round, there can’t be anything round about the world, or there can’t be anything round about a plant), create and interpret phenomena scientifically or from an ineradicable
It is commonly known that the news media has great impact on how we, as people, perceive a great many things; whether we are reading a newspaper, watching a news show, or reading news on the internet we are influenced in how we perceive these reports by the way they are written or orally transmitted to us. The influence that journalists hold can be intentionally and unintentionally misused—especially in scientific journalism. Facts can be exaggerated or minimized by a journalist that does not fully understand what they are reporting on, or by a journalist that is trying to make the story more interesting for readers. Exaggeration can gravely affect the credibility of research, and the researchers: “Exaggeration serves many interests, but it does not serve the publics interest. And in the end, it is self-defeating, because it undermines the credibility of . . . science” (Schwartz and Woloshin as quoted in Schroeder 2010). Scientists can help to keep journalists better informed by understanding that they may not have a special interest area that they report on, but rather are more general and take what assignments are given to them. Christina Astin, of Nature, suggests that in the future “. . . the scientific community should work with journalism schools and professional societies to ensure that journalism programmes include some grounding in what science is, and how the process of experiment, review and publication actually works” (Astin 2009) and Jane Schroeder, of Environmental Health Perspectives, suggests that “science communication to a broad audience may be facilitated by translation and reframing, but we also have a responsibility to communicate in a way that will help improve the publics ability to understand the implications of environmental health research” (Schroeder 2010). Translating scientific terms can be used in all areas of scientific journalism, and the research behind that journalism, so as to facilitate readers and audiences in understanding what is being reported to them. It is this sort of forward that thinking will help to keep the public properly informed about scientific discovery and research now and well into the future.
As previously discussed, exaggeration