Journalists should be skeptical of all sources including scientists • Hacker News Board

Re: Journalists should be skeptical of all sources including scientists

#261

Post by rgrieselhuber » Sat, Jul 22, 2023, 3:35 AM UTC

ke88y wrote: post #10

Big question: HOW? Most journalists in the USA receive basically zero scientific education. At university I majored in two STEM subjects but also took 10 courses in Philosophy, Art, History, Journalism, and Economics. Almost no one majoring in any of those fields except Econ took more than 2-3 STEM courses, and even then there a dedicated watered down courses to ensure those people could graduate (Algebra instead of…

This is a false barrier to critique of the scientific establishment. Many foundational questions can always be asked about the claims that scientists make, such as, how is research funded, where are the moral hazards, who benefits from certain conclusions, is the data open sourced, how are dissenting opinions treated, has repeatability been demonstrated, why is fraud not a concern, etc.

Simple and rational questions can go a long way here.

Re: Journalists should be skeptical of all sources including scientists

#262

Post by smohare » Sat, Jul 22, 2023, 3:37 AM UTC

dbsmith83 wrote: post #224

ke88y wrote: post #10

Big question: HOW? Most journalists in the USA receive basically zero scientific education. At university I majored in two STEM subjects but also took 10 courses in Philosophy, Art, History, Journalism, and Economics. Almost no one majoring in any of those fields except Econ took more than 2-3 STEM courses, and even then there a dedicated watered down courses to ensure those people could graduate (Algebra instead of…

Thinking out loud here and this might be a terrible idea, and maybe at the risk of snubbing journalism majors, but what if the dependency was inverted? As in, what if, instead of having journalists who take a few classes here and there in various subjects, we instead had people who majored in subjects who also took some journalism classes, so they could write on subjects within the field? What I mean is, instead of h…

[dead]

Re: Journalists should be skeptical of all sources including scientists

#263

Post by biophysboy » Sat, Jul 22, 2023, 3:44 AM UTC

krisoft wrote: post #48

biophysboy wrote: post #13

One thing that dulls my interest in this debate is my doubt that it will ever get “resolved”. We dont have sequence samples at the time of covids origin. China is never going to cooperate on giving more circumstantial evidence. So we cant really do any phylogenetic or epidemiological analysis at the level of spatial precision that this would require. The data is extremely fuzzy where it needs to be sharp. In my opini…

> China is never going to cooperate on giving more circumstantial evidence > In my opinion, this is the real thing stalling this debate, not politics. But isn’t that politics? (International politics to be precise.)

Yeah I guess I contradicted myself somewhat. Im specifically referring to the domestic politics that Nate Silver is talking about, not Chinese politics.

Re: Journalists should be skeptical of all sources including scientists

#264

Post by fallingknife » Sat, Jul 22, 2023, 3:45 AM UTC

solardev wrote: post #248

dbsmith83 wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thinking out loud here and this might be a terrible idea, and maybe at the risk of snubbing journalism majors, but what if the dependency was inverted? As in, what if, instead of having journalists who take a few classes here and there in various subjects, we instead had people who majored in subjects who also took some journalism classes, so they could write on subjects within the field? What I mean is, instead of h…

I was an environmental science and sustainability major in college, along with a journalism minor. I enjoyed journalism but prior year classmates who worked the local beats would always share their nightmare career stories. Terrible pay, zero respect, long hours, poor benefits, constant downsizing, writing on deadline... for how important a job it is, it's terrible how they treat their writers. Who's going to want to…

> It may be decades before you pay off student loans

Easy fix there. Stop requiring degrees. Carl Bernstein failed out of college.

Re: Journalists should be skeptical of all sources including scientists

#265

Post by solardev » Sat, Jul 22, 2023, 3:46 AM UTC

mycall wrote: post #251

solardev wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was an environmental science and sustainability major in college, along with a journalism minor. I enjoyed journalism but prior year classmates who worked the local beats would always share their nightmare career stories. Terrible pay, zero respect, long hours, poor benefits, constant downsizing, writing on deadline... for how important a job it is, it's terrible how they treat their writers. Who's going to want to…

> It's a very exploitative industry dominated by soulless conglomerates. Sounds like a good reason to do a worker cooperative where money is important but stability of the whole is key component, so their decisions are often to keep united.

I think the industry as a whole isn't in a great spot. It was in a death spiral before Trump brought some temporary relief (through endless controversies), but I'm not sure if they were able to keep that momentum going.

Nobody pays for news anymore, and that was before GPT. Even worker coops need a source of income. At this rate I'd be surprised if the industry survives at all...

Re: Journalists should be skeptical of all sources including scientists

#266

Post by biophysboy » Sat, Jul 22, 2023, 3:48 AM UTC

gunapologist99 wrote: post #144

biophysboy wrote: post #13

One thing that dulls my interest in this debate is my doubt that it will ever get “resolved”. We dont have sequence samples at the time of covids origin. China is never going to cooperate on giving more circumstantial evidence. So we cant really do any phylogenetic or epidemiological analysis at the level of spatial precision that this would require. The data is extremely fuzzy where it needs to be sharp. In my opini…

Then why didn't the scientists simply say 'we lack the data to conclusively resolve'? There was a specific reason why they didn't -- and in fact promoted a specific theory, and it had more to do with politics and funding than science.

I mean the answer is obvious to me: reputational “skin in the game”. Lab leak is an extremely specific assertion that someone else could easily criticize.

Re: Journalists should be skeptical of all sources including scientists

#267

Post by smohare » Sat, Jul 22, 2023, 3:50 AM UTC

MostlyStable wrote: post #17

ke88y wrote: post #10

Big question: HOW? Most journalists in the USA receive basically zero scientific education. At university I majored in two STEM subjects but also took 10 courses in Philosophy, Art, History, Journalism, and Economics. Almost no one majoring in any of those fields except Econ took more than 2-3 STEM courses, and even then there a dedicated watered down courses to ensure those people could graduate (Algebra instead of…

In the past, wasn't it normal for journalists to have a particular specialization (even if that's not the _only_ thing they did), like "science reporter" or something? It is obviously impossible for every reporter to become an expert on every single topic that they might ever cover, but it is not unreasonable at all to get enough of a background on a topic that you cover regularly to be able to ask intelligent questi…

[dead]

Re: Journalists should be skeptical of all sources including scientists

#268

Post by solardev » Sat, Jul 22, 2023, 3:54 AM UTC

fallingknife wrote: post #264

solardev wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was an environmental science and sustainability major in college, along with a journalism minor. I enjoyed journalism but prior year classmates who worked the local beats would always share their nightmare career stories. Terrible pay, zero respect, long hours, poor benefits, constant downsizing, writing on deadline... for how important a job it is, it's terrible how they treat their writers. Who's going to want to…

> It may be decades before you pay off student loans Easy fix there. Stop requiring degrees. Carl Bernstein failed out of college.

Science reporting is one of those things that I think a formal education could actually help with. Especially since much of the job is dealing with academics and interpreting their jargon and unspoken assumptions for the public. Those are three very different cultures (academic sciences, journalism, mainstream) and it's not trivial to flow between them. Most readers don't have even a rudimentary grasp of scientific methods or statistics.

A large part of our curriculum was looking at the challenges of science communications (especially in regards to climate, but also cultural conflicts, land use, blah blah). The background context in the field was super helpful as a news reader. I can't imagine trying to write good stories with sensible context without that sort of understanding.

Could someone self-learn it? Probably. But I think the risk there is blindly falling into some tribe or another and becoming another controversial screaming head (and some would use the same argument against formal academia).

The more I learned about the field, the more I saw it as a no-win scenario. :/

Re: Journalists should be skeptical of all sources including scientists

#269

Post by fallingknife » Sat, Jul 22, 2023, 3:56 AM UTC

andromeduck wrote: post #111

golergka wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There isn't enough money in journalism anymore to sustain this.

Colleges really need to upgrade STEM requirements for liberal arts. At my alma, science/engineering required 18 arts credits while arts required only 6 science/math credits.

They can't. Liberal arts classes are taught at such a massively lower level that this requirement would mean STEM courses would have to be dumbed down or liberal arts majors couldn't pass. Lots of failed STEM majors in history class, but did you ever run into a failed liberal arts major in diff eq?

Re: Journalists should be skeptical of all sources including scientists

#270

Post by skybrian » Sat, Jul 22, 2023, 4:10 AM UTC

rgrieselhuber wrote: post #261

ke88y wrote: post #10

Big question: HOW? Most journalists in the USA receive basically zero scientific education. At university I majored in two STEM subjects but also took 10 courses in Philosophy, Art, History, Journalism, and Economics. Almost no one majoring in any of those fields except Econ took more than 2-3 STEM courses, and even then there a dedicated watered down courses to ensure those people could graduate (Algebra instead of…

This is a false barrier to critique of the scientific establishment. Many foundational questions can always be asked about the claims that scientists make, such as, how is research funded, where are the moral hazards, who benefits from certain conclusions, is the data open sourced, how are dissenting opinions treated, has repeatability been demonstrated, why is fraud not a concern, etc. Simple and rational questions…

Those aren't foundational questions, though, they're circumstantial evidence. They don't get at whether the scientists did a good job or not. "Why is fraud not a concern" is kinda useless in proving fraud.

Maybe they help you feel a bit more or less confident?

I think reading a paper and asking "okay, what did they actually do, and how could it go wrong" might be a good start, or better yet asking some other scientist who know the field about that?