OcelotWhat is a topic you know a lot about that the media often gets terribly wrong?
Chemistry, and science in a broader sense. When you hear ‘woah a new medicine has been found that could cure cancer’ it’s most likely 'we have developed a new gadolinium based compound that has shown efficiency in penetrating cancer cells and could be used to deliver drugs to these areas, however it has not been tested in humans because it kills rats faster that it cures cancer"
Almost every science headline was written by someone who never understood science. They just translate some foreign languagedinto words that suits them.
PopSci is tricky because on one hand, it’s great that there’s a lot of interest in learning about science and it should be promoted, but on the other, the vast majority of research is so complex that you literally cannot explain it to the layman without making it wrong in some way.
That’s why Bill Nye, Neil DeGrasse Tyson, etc are such treasures. They know science, but also are able to explain shit to laypeople. Scientific breakthroughs need to do press releases that the scientists themselves sign off on. Unfortunately, the misunderstood sensationalism gets clicks which makes money, so there’s absolutely zero incentive for these journalists to get the story straight since they’re profit motivated.
The same Bill Nye that aired the episode “My Sex Junk”? Yeah, please no.
Bill Nye was a mechanical engineer, then a comedian, then a TV presenter. Unlike (say) Carl Sagan or Neil DeGrasse Tyson, he was never a research scientist.
Captain AggravatedPerfectly suited to explain basic science concepts to children.
LillyPipBill Nye has lost my respect recently, but Professor Dave FTW.
Both of those people have fallen off hard. Tyson’s head is so far up his own ass that he will talk over you to explain why its actually healthier that way.
You’re not wrong in general, but in the specific case of “X against Y”, it’s simply bad journalism. Every half decent journalist should be able to tell that the original research article might be of relevance for the field, but not the public.
Especially adding anything cancer-related to the headline is just pure evil. They knew exactly, that it will get many people’s hope up and they’ll click.