If you regularly read about science in the news, it’s easy to end up misinformed. Whether it’s a newspaper article whipping up a health scare (or promoting a miracle cure) on the basis of a shoddy study, or a fabulously exciting “breakthrough” that you never hear of again, we’ve all ended up disappointed by science news.
Last year was no exception. Every month brought with it a science story that was subject to hype, overstatement, or just plain incorrect reporting – often aided and abetted by scientists themselves.
But every time things go wrong, we can try to learn a lesson. So the following are five scientific new year’s resolutions: five ways to ensure that we aren’t misled by reading about science in 2023.
1. Take “breakthroughs” with a pinch of salt
Science works slowly. Each new study is usually a small brick in a very big wall, adding a little piece to our knowledge on some topic. Genuine breakthroughs – discoveries that revolutionise an area of science – are few and far between.
So what should we make of the regular headlines that describe massive, Earth-shattering scientific discoveries? Sometimes they’re just exaggerations – as we’ll see below. But sometimes they just need a little bit of perspective.
For example, in November the front page of the BBC’s website described a trial of a new drug for Alzheimer’s disease, lecanemab, as a “momentous breakthrough”. On the one hand, this was hyperbole: the study showed that the drug slowed the advance of the disease by about 27 per cent on one specific dementia screening test. A researcher quoted in the BBC story even said the results were “not dramatic” – but the headline remained regardless. The drug also had some worrisome side effects; clearly a lot more development is needed. On the other hand, though, it was a real advance in a context where every past attempt at designing drugs for Alzheimer’s has failed.
Something similar can be said for December’s “major breakthrough” in nuclear fusion energy. Again, in the context of the extreme difficulty of making fusion work, and decades of disappointment and false dawns, it really was progress: scientists in the US made a fusion reactor produce more energy than they put in. But as many physicists pointed out, it’ll still be a very long time before we can produce a viable fusion power plant, due, alongside many scientific challenges, to the enormous costs of the materials involved.
So let’s resolve, in 2023, to take a deep breath upon hearing news of a scientific “breakthrough”, and read up on the context before getting too excited.
2. Trust no one
Media headlines always have the potential to overrate scientific studies. But often, hype about science comes not from journalists, but from the scientists themselves.
Take, for instance, a study from April about using psychedelic drugs to treat depression. The authors put out a press release claiming that psilocybin, the chemical found in magic mushrooms, “rewires the brain for depressed people”, “freeing them up” from their “rumination and excessive self-focus” (or as they put it in the study itself, “liberating” their brains). But the study was very preliminary, involved only 43 people, and focused on taking images of the brain in an MRI scanner.
Any actual effects on depression symptoms were looked at in separate research – which is subject to many problems of its own. The research was a long way from being ready for prime-time but the authors decided to broadcast it to the media anyway.
Or take another neuroscientific study, this time from January 2022. A blockbuster New York Times headline told us that giving no-strings-attached cash gifts to parents changed their babies’ brains. But this was a study that tried to run before it could walk: the scientists had shown effects on electrical brain activity measured from the infants’ scalps, but hadn’t even checked for any impact on their behaviour or development.
Again, these were tentative findings, which could have been interesting with much more follow-up. And again, that didn’t dissuade the researchers from putting out an overhyped press release. The media – understandably, given how positive and hopeful the results were – just couldn’t resist.
Scientists are interested in discovering truths about the world. But some are also interested in advancing their careers, in drawing the attention of funders, and even in fame and notoriety. So another 2023 resolution is to remember that scientists might not always represent their own research accurately – and apply extra scepticism when they seem to be hyping up the importance of their latest study.
3. No, seriously: trust no one
It’s not just hype. Although we all hope scientists do their work with the greatest integrity, 2022 brought with it a sad procession of stories of scientific fraud.
For example, in October, the New York Times published an article on science’s “nasty photoshop problem”: thousands of biology papers, it noted, are published with photos from microscopes, petri dishes, or the like that are digitally manipulated in an inappropriate, potentially fraudulent way. Scientists duplicate, stretch, crop, recolour, or otherwise fiddle with their images in ways that make their results look stronger – even if it substantially distorts the truth of what they found. Peer-reviewers, supposed to be the eagle-eyed checkers of all scientific results, often completely fail to notice.
And potentially, it goes right to the top: in November, the president of Stanford University, usually considered among the best universities in the US, was accused of having manipulated images in some of his previous work as a neuroscientist. His studies were under investigation by his own staff but the Stanford Board of Trustees said in early December that he was innocent of scientific misconduct. One of the winners of the 2019 Nobel Prize in Medicine or Physiology had to have four of his studies retracted in September for the same reason.
These high-profile instances of possible research misconduct remind us that even the highest-flying scientists are human, and that, if proven, even professors from the most prestigious universities can be brought low by very human failings. Our third 2023 resolution should be that even the biggest-deal scientists should have their claims subjected to the most rigorous checking. After all, isn’t that what science is all about?
4. Avoid contrarianism
Perhaps the points above all sound rather negative about mainstream science. But I come to improve science, not to bury it. Last year also taught us what can happen when scepticism about science goes too far.
Last year began with a surge in anti-vaccine rhetoric. An ex-scientist, Robert Malone, had appeared on the hugely popular Joe Rogan Experience podcast, making numerous false claims about Covid vaccines. It led to months of controversy, backlash, and mealy-mouthed apologies.
The anti-vaccine claims spread through the world of online “gurus”, where loquacious, charismatic figures impress their YouTube and podcast followers with outrageous statements, drifting further and further away from rationality. From there, spurious complaints about the dangers of mRNA shots broke through into some parts of the mainstream media, both in the UK and elsewhere. In all cases, the media figures built up their audience by constantly alleging that “they” – meaning the government, public health officials, scientists, and the pharmaceutical industry – are engaged in a grand, sinister conspiracy.
It’s an object lesson in how not to think about science. We saw above that constant questioning is necessary. But the point is to follow the evidence, not to pick up any old scraps of argument and throw them at the mainstream consensus. And the point is to question everything – including your own side. Let’s resolve to avoid becoming kneejerk contrarians in 2023.
5. Be (cautiously) optimistic
With war, economic downturn, and all the rest, 2022 often felt pretty gloomy. The scientific missteps listed above won’t exactly cheer you up. But forewarned is forearmed: knowing more about all the ways science (and science reporting) can go wrong can help us steer clear of false hope.
But science in 2022 did provide us with reasons for genuine optimism. Perhaps the most exciting among them was progress on a vaccine for malaria. Despite a slow rollout, the vaccine is making its way to the countries that are most badly-hit by the disease, where it could prevent tens of thousands of children from dying each year. And it’s not the only area of treatment we should be watching with interest: important advances were made in 2022 towards “universal” flu vaccines and even vaccines against cancer.
Not only that – among much else, 2022 brought jaw-dropping images of far-off galaxies from the James Webb Telescope that help deepen our understanding of the universe. It brought trials of weight-loss drugs that really seem to work. And it brought advances in battery technology that could mean faster-charging, smaller power sources for electric vehicles.
There’s much more on the way for 2023. So our final New Year’s resolution should be to stay cautiously optimistic. Despite its many flaws, we should never lose sight of the fact that science is the best method we have to make the world a better place.
