Media

Readers may recall that unusually thoughtful science writer John Horgan recently told “Skeptics” Scientific American to do something useful with their lives. (Bash Bigfoot less, pop science more.) The Skeptics, of course, protested that soft targets are fun. (The multiverse can be science even if unfalsifiable…) The exchange identified the issue clearly. The Skeptical science communicators are mainly looking for confirmation of their theories from science; Horgan wants them to report on actual science. In Nature (which owns Scientific American), Chris Woolston writes, Horgan wrote that for sceptics to really have an impact, they need to tackle the “dubious and even harmful claims promoted by major scientists and institutions”. For example, Horgan argues that sceptics should expose the harm that Read More ›

At Ars Technica, John Timmer says what we all know about science journalism: Riffing off a John Oliver rant. On Monday, all these science journalism problems were driven home yet again. The University of Gothenburg issued a press release suggesting that hunger influences our decision-making processes. This finding shouldn’t be a huge surprise; anything that distracts us seems to influence our ability to make decisions. But the release itself is a perfect example of many of the problems Oliver pointed out. To begin with, the study was done with rats, not humans. But the very first line of the release—”Never make a decision when you are hungry”—implies that the results clearly apply to us. The other problem is that the Read More ›

Here’s a link to an article from American Thinker that details how, in Ohio, the Univ. of Cincinnati did a three year study on the effects of oil-well “fracking,” the results of which demonstrate no contamination of ground water had occurred because of “fracking.” And then the study was quashed. Read More ›

Vincent Torley wrote about the Canadian national mag’s effort here: To give credit where credit is due, Professor Bart Ehrman, in his recent scholarly attack on the reliability of the New Testament, at least took the trouble to draw upon the latest scientific research relating to the fallibility of human memory, even though he overlooked equally impressive research demonstrating the reliability of memory, both within a community and within the mind of an eyewitness, over the course of time. However, Brian Bethune’s hatchet job on Jesus attempts to cast doubt on His very existence, citing the work of one historian (Richard Carrier) who is not recognized as a New Testament scholar, and whose methodology is highly dubious. I am forced Read More ›

Canadian weekly Maclean’s recently featured an article by Brian Bethune titled, Did Jesus really exist? The article, which drew upon a book recently published by New Testament scholar Bart Ehrman, titled, Jesus Before the Gospels: How the Earliest Christians Remembered, Changed, and Invented Their Stories of the Savior, argues that the Gospel accounts of Jesus are largely based on unreliable memories and a highly distorted oral tradition. But Bethune does not stop there: citing the work of New Atheist Richard Carrier, he goes beyond Ehrman and maintains that Jesus may never have even existed at all. The issues raised by Professor Ehrman in his book are of immense philosophical significance, for they pertain to the trustworthiness of human testimony. If Read More ›

Ever since Voltaire mythologized the Galileo Affair, Hume’s Philo demolished Cleanthes, and Gibbon blamed pretty much everything on the Christians, evolutionary thinking has had an unbeatable template: The Warfare Thesis. Anyone who opposes or even questions evolution is automatically branded as having religious motives. Religion is at war with science. That claim has failed the test of historiography over and over, but so what? Who cares about history? Certainly not journalists, policy makers, federal judges, textbook authors, and anyone else who matters. But now there is an entirely different, empirical, falsification of the Warfare Thesis, and evolutionists are in full-panic.  Read more

But Simon Oxenham did, at Prime Mind: Let’s begin by looking at the most widely-read news website—Mail Online, which provides a perfect demonstration of what we’ll call the seesaw effect. Almost every week, the Mail publishes news stories illustrating scientific findings that—apparently—turn our understanding of the world upside down. If you believed everything you read in the Mail about cancer, for example, you’d have to believe that everything from taking aspirin to drinking beer both causes and prevents cancer. That’s according to The Daily Mail Ontological Oncology project, a tongue-in-cheek attempt to track “the Daily Mail’s ongoing effort to classify every inanimate object into those that cause cancer and those that prevent it.” But it’s not just the Mail that’s Read More ›

From New Scientist: … That brings to the fore areas that are not part of the canon of evolutionary theory: epigenetics, for example, which studies how organisms are affected by changes in the ways in which genes are expressed, rather than in the genes themselves. Attempts to incorporate such elements into evolutionary theory have not always been welcomed, however. That is understandable, given how successful the theory has been without them. Occam’s razor applies: do not add complications unless they are absolutely necessary. But another motivating factor is undoubtedly the fear that if scientists themselves are seen to suggest that even small details of the theory of evolution could be improved upon, its detractors will seize upon them with avidity. Read More ›

But then we would need to replace a lot of science journalists. From Michael Schulson at Pacific Standard: Last May, when This American Life acknowledged that it had run a 23-minute-long segment premised on a fraudulent scientific study, America’s most respected radio journalists did something strange: They declined to apologize for the error. “Our original story was based on what was known at the time,” host Ira Glass explained in a blog post. “Obviously the facts have changed.” It was a funny admission. Journalists typically don’t say that “facts change”; it is a journalist’s job to define and publicize facts. When a reporter gets hoodwinked by a source, she does not imply that something in the fabric of reality has Read More ›

Remember, from last Saturday, “A lot of science writers are tweeting about duck sex now, so that’s a plus.” Now, from Digg: On balance, Neil deGrasse Tyson has done an immense amount of work raising the public’s awareness around science. But peel back the veneer of his good fight against anti-science and you’re left with something that isn’t exactly pro-science. Starting a feud with B.o.B. over why the Earth isn’t flat doesn’t promote science, nor does it “convert” non-believers. Endlessly tweeting about scientifically incorrect things in ‘Star Wars’ isn’t getting anyone to thumb through a research paper. More. Gosh, Digg’s Cool score is pretty high. So is Tyson going to join Dawkins on the C list of retro science stars? Read More ›

From O’Leary for News’ other blog, Connecting… Apple vs. FBI: Free internet is at stake. Few analysts agree with the FBI that it would end with just this one case. It can’t. Online medical information: Help, hype, or harm? A new coinage, “cyberchondria,” refers to the worry some people experience from overdosing on medical information online Controlling trolls helps keep social media free. But there’s a risk in making trolls more important than we need to. Privacy crunch: Apple vs. the FBI How much do we value privacy vs. government’s stated desire to protect us? Are blogs really out of date? Competition from anybody with an internet connection makes new media different from old media. Robotic surgery: Paging Dr. Carebot? Read More ›

O’Leary’s new media blog Social media can strengthen families They can help people stay in touch better than any other device invented by human ingenuity. For better or worse. The internet: Privacy fights back It’s worse than we thought. But is Privategrity the answer? Do you know who your teens meet on social media? Maybe they don’t either. Maybe you should both find out. From Forbes: Is the internet losing freedom of speech? It’s as if your telephone company were your judge and jury, not the court system. Ethics for the citizen journalist If you write for online publications today, you are a citizen journalist Could the internet outlive humanity? That seems like a strange question, but there is a Read More ›

O’Leary for News’ blog on new media Tweet!: Canadian cleared of harassment charges Many people today have a self-image of victimhood that is both impervious to and unrelated to shared facts. Print media are now officially a coffee table item Old media rarely die out altogether. They survive as period pieces and collectors’ items. Could Google sway an election? If so, how? American psychologist Robert Epstein explains how search engine rankings can be manipulated. Killed in Mexico’s drug wars: Honest reporting When media are afraid to report the news, there’s another casualty: Informed decision-making and voting. New media may help in the long run for a structural reason: They feature no “gatekeeper” role such as held by the veteran journalist Read More ›

(A friend advises, this ran a decade ago.  No one who matters in Canada would have the guts to say it today, not if they are boffins or part of legacy media. National Post was  freer then, as I remember. ) From a no-byline article in Canada’s National Post, 2005: … the theory of intelligent design holds that there are tell-tale features of living systems and the universe that are best explained by an intelligent cause. The theory does not challenge the idea of evolution defined as change over time, or even common ancestry, but it does dispute Darwin’s idea that the cause of biological change is wholly blind and undirected. Either life arose as the result of purely undirected material Read More ›

From O’Leary for News’s night job: Twitter vs. religious conservatives? Enforcing rules against hate speech selectively is worse than not enforcing them at all. Astroturf: Fake social media consensus harms politics A surge of popularity or concern may in reality be manufactured at a few terminals for pay or promotion. Decision time for Facebook: Censor or no? But on whose behalf does the social media giant censor? Latest toy fad: Baby Snitch The doll at least talks and listens to the kid. But who else does? Dating apps: A date with HIV? It’s making a comeback due to the online hookup culture. MOOCs: Is free higher ed help, hype, or havoc? The galloping cost of university is thought to be Read More ›