Science when hyped loses credibility. Two separate incidents in a span of three weeks show how scientists who hype up and sensationalise their work end up diluting the significance of their discovery. In a paper published online in the Science journal in the first week of December (“A bacterium that can grow by using arsenic instead of phosphorus” by Felisa Wolfe-Simon, et al), authors from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and other institutions report that a particular bacterium isolated from California's Mono Lake was capable of substituting arsenic for a small percentage of phosphorus and still sustain its growth. This is a most surprising finding considering that arsenic is a toxic element and is not one of the six elements — carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, sulphur, and phosphorus — that make up most of the organic molecules in living matter. Days before publication of the paper, the worldwide web went wild with speculation about extra-terrestrial life. The reason: a media advisory sent out by NASA on a press briefing “to discuss an astrobiology finding that will impact the search for extra-terrestrial life.” In consequence, most media reports following the publication of the paper dwelt on the issue of extra-terrestrial life. It turned out that the paper did not discuss the possibility of life outside Earth; nor did the accompanying news item published in the journal propose anything of the kind.
The second instance of hyping up science relates to a press release from Tel Aviv University. According to this, the earliest evidence of existence of modern humans has been found in Israel, predating evidence found in Africa by about 200,000 years. The conclusion contradicts the prevailing view of human evolution and migration out of Africa. What followed was sensationalist media coverage of an otherwise stodgy work of purely academic interest. The paper, which reports the morphological analysis of human teeth recovered from Israel's Qesem Cave, was recently published online in The American Journal of Physical Anthropology (“Middle Pleistocene dental remains from Qesem Cave [Israel]” by Israel Hershkovitz et al). The paper says the teeth cannot be conclusively identified as belonging to modern humans (Homo sapiens) or to Neanderthals or to other human species. While the journalists can be faulted for oversimplifying and hyping up the findings of science, the deliberate misleading of the media and the public by some scientists and their institutions must be condemned. Such acts by a few take a heavy toll on the credibility of science.
Keywords: bacterial growth, arsenic
There has always been a sociological debate on the purpose of science since the time of Scietific Revolution of the Renaissance period in Europe. In regards to the new phenomenon of science being hyped, I feel the larger question is what science stands for. As the marxist writers argue that science evolved out of the societal needs, the case is not that simple as they always fail to draw the exact demrkation between pure scientific adventure and applied technological consequences. Without being radical,it is always pure science, be it the genius of Einstein's relativity or Darwin's evolution theory that will mark the intellectual progress of the race.Neither the market oriented technological implementations nor the mere hyping up of a small discovery have any business in determing mankind's success in the longer run.
One more excellent editorial from the Hindu. Certainly as many of the readers have observed, the current trend of 'publicising' their results by some scientists is rather sad. History repeats itself and many brilliant and promising investigators saw a premature end to their career because of this. Added to this, the agencies which hire scientists also should be held responsible. As a famous scientist once said, 'everything nowadays is either kit-oriented' or 'poor-man' oriented research with no hard science to back up either of these claims'. Finally, it is only up to the scientists themselves to stand up to the pressure of publishing, publishing 'tweeked' or fudged data and stay true to science.
'Hyping up science' is a fitting artcle on the emerging trends of sensationalization and exaggeration of small improvements.Scientists are lonely people who work in labs for hours, days, weeks, months and even years to come up with new innovation or beakthrough discovery. Alexander Fleming came up with discovery of Pencillin out of shear Serendipity. If reputed journals like Nature,Science start publishing findings without sound logic and backup then its a very sad state of affairs for Science in the modern era of Computers and Technology .
Scientific reports undergoes peer review process.One can clearly sense the misdeeds of media from this entire story. I believe that evidence based speculation is a basic requirement for the betterment of science and mankind. But whatsoever speculation is made that is proved with tough-experiments, reviewed by peers and then published. Further, scientists in general, believe in the great details and confirmations. So it appear quite unconvincing to believe that scientists hype their work.
The editorial content 'Hyping up science' (Jan. 13) is very misleading. Scientific works are evidence based and they cannot be hyped. They go through vigorous evaluation in the hands of peers. If some works are sham (for example, stem cell controversies in recent years), they are weeded out in due course by scientific methods. If a science-related story is hyped, it is the work of news hungry popular media, which are fervent to find something and sensationalize it. Scientists/academia have no control on media people. Credibility of science is based on peer-reviewed research papers, not on popular media articles. It is disgrace that a non-peer-reviewed editorial is pointing fingers at scientists/academia for the flaw of media.
I wanted to add that most scientific work goes through rigorous peer review, often by anonymous reviewers. Compare that with today's newspapers and TV channels, perhaps the only reviewers of a news item are co-workers of a journalist, who often have the same vested interest in increasing the viewership.
Well, the 2 cases mentioned in the Editorial above are those in which it could be clearly established that there was only a deliberate hype and that they were out-rightly fake. But consider those cases where it cannot be conclusively proved that they are fake at the first instance -- in such instances, dubious people can make lot of money and undermine genuine people until the time they are clearly proved to the people that they are fake. This analogy can be mapped to present day media stories which are manufactured to suit their particular selfish cause which has got nothing to do with national welfare.
As a scientist, I agree with the caution about scientists and institutions who hype. It is true that suggestive and extrapolative hyping of results appear more often in recent years in contrast to rather humble understatements of the merits of their profound discoveries by the doyens of science in the last century. Competition, publicity craze and added to this, certainly media prompting lead to such aberrations. Only a small percentage of scientists can be truly said to practise science for the shear excitement of understanding nature in this era of 'science as a (commercial)profession' and hence such hype is not surprising. Yet, such hype undermines the pride of true scientific pursuits and have to be vigilantly checked by the scientific community.
Media is more about competition nowadays. Every news channel and newspaper is racing against others to report an item first and claim the credit. They do not even bother to authenticate the news and at times try to sensationalize with their own inputs or assumptions. Misinterpretation and twisting of facts has become the norm in media. Responsible journalism has disappeared unfortunately.
Media these days don't bother to cross-check or verify facts - to the extent that anything, said by any person, is made public regardless of whether it deserves that kind of media publicity or attention or not. Shoudn't it be the media that's to be held responsible or do you still feel that it is the poor scientists - who are being accused of 'hyping up' their work ?
There might be a few scientists and institutions that might hype their results occasionally. However, I have no doubt in mind that it is often the media--and not the academia--which has the habit of hyping anything up that might increase their circulation. 'Peepli Live' is a good reflection of what the media and the journalists care about.
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