Exposing The Impact of Bad Science!
In the past, many accepted science as a reliable guide to what we ought to believe. But in recent decades, money and industry power have brought us to the point where the obligation to trust science has never been more imposing. It’s gone from debate to a concept that can determine whether or not our fundamental rights are withheld or granted to us, based on how well we adhere to it.
What Is Science?
Perhaps one of the best explanations of the original scientific approach is offered by science philosopher Karl Popper.
For him, science proceeds by means of what he calls “conjectures and refutations”. A scientist might propose an idea or hypothesis based on observations or experiments. Popper says scientists then do their best to refute this conjecture, or prove it wrong, only to be replaced by a better one. It also will be tested, and eventually replaced by another, until after due diligence it becomes a theory. In this way science progresses in a slow way.
The core of the scientific method then is the attempt to refute or disprove theories, which Popper called the “falsification principle”. Then, after much more work and peer review, it can be established as a principle. Even then, some principles will still eventually crash and burn. But if scientists, despite their best efforts, have been unable to refute a theory over a long period of time, then in Popper’s terminology the theory has been “corroborated”.
The Scientific Morass
Why is it that scientists can’t seem to agree on anything. Nutritional science is especially frustrating as one week, meat consumption is to be reduced; the next, it’s perfectly fine. Eggs are good, then bad and the same goes for other staples of nutrition. It’s little wonder then that a disturbing gulf emerged between scientists and the lay public. Here are some examples of science gone awry:
1. Low-Quality Studies
Have you ever noticed how the scientific literature is totally flooded with these weak, uninformative papers? If a scientist rounds up ten people, puts them on some diet, and only checks in on their nutrition a few times a year, his study can still get published. This despite no control groups, not enough participants, and short follow-ups. Even though these types of studies are totally unreliable, there are over 28,000 scientific journals out there, so someone somewhere will publish this nonsense.
2. Uncontrolled Variables
Imagine this. Scientists are trying to figure out if eating meat causes cancer. To do this, they follow two groups of people - with one group eating meat and one abstaining. Both groups have about the same number of people, and they all eat pretty much the same diet. But inexplicably, the scientists didn't check if the meat was the same quality for both groups. You see, meat that's raised on a farm is different from meat that's raised in a factory with all sorts of chemicals, steroids, hormones, antibiotics, and other nasty ingredients that can contribute to cancer. So, without controlling for every other variable between the two groups, it's hard to say if eating meat really causes cancer. That's why this study isn't really worth much.
3. Fudged Rigour
It turns out that some scientists can also be a bit sneaky. They might keep trying and testing until they get the results they want, and then stop. Using only that one positive finding and leaving out the ones that didn’t work or were ambiguous in results is like making up a story. Unfortunately, this kind of thing happens when scientists are being funded by corporations that look for specific outcomes. And that can make it hard for scientists to stay honest.
4. Exploratory Research
A study looking for an outcome measure on cancer (e.g. death, a particular cancer rate, pulmonary function) could also turn up results for diabetes, It's called exploratory research, not definite knowledge, and can help design future studies to tackle a potential association. Though these type of studies should not be sold as conclusive, they often are.
5. Greed
Sometimes a big company pays for a study on nutrition (i.e. to see if sugar is healthy or not) just to sell more soda to people. If the corporation is in charge of study design and how numbers are crunched, then you should be very skeptical of results. Unfortunately, this happens because university scientists are increasingly collaborating with industry partners, making financial independence from vested interests extremely difficult to achieve. Always look for the “disclosure” section of a paper, which should reveal whether or not the funding source had a hand in analyzing the results. If it did, don’t be surprised if the findings agree with its business interests.
6. Fraud
Sometimes scientists cheat in their quest to get published. If the results of a study are unconvincing, they may be fraudulently alter results through plagiarism, ghostwriting, distorting findings, or making stuff up entirely. This can make the study appear to be a game changer that gets published in a major journal. The last three years of Covid-19 have exposed some outrageous scientific misconduct and fraudulent medical results, causing untold health implications for millions of people.
7. Hyped Findings
Sometimes a study has a nominal, positive outcome that may be embellished, set on the international stage, and further amplified in strength and reach through a heavily hyped press release. (bmj.com) Journalist then use exaggerated results in headlines like: “Is eating meat really as dangerous as smoking cigarettes?” Hype therefore is the inevitable outcome in a culture of click baits and exaggeration.
Also, many studies that make the news are done in cells or in rodents, which are good stepping scientific stones but rarely applicable in humans. These pre-clinical studies, which often can’t be replicated in humans, often shine in the media spotlight, while the mice themselves are left on the cutting room floor.
8. Disagreement + Confusion
Science can be pretty complex, so sometimes scientists don't all agree on what's found. Maybe the effect being looking at is pretty weak, or maybe it’s just missing some key details. Other times, the right tools or knowledge to find the answer might not exist yet (as in nutrition research), so what’s left is debate and bickering.
Having a better understanding of how a study is conducted can help the layperson understand its advantages and limitations, preventing confusion. Here is a rundown of some of the most common types of research studies, from observational studies to experimental trials. — FredHutch.org
At the end of the day, science is just some humans trying to aspire to rigour with a bunch of tools they’ve been perfecting for centuries to better understand the world around them. Yet we should still demand scientific due diligence and nuance.
It is frustrating though when results of poorly done or selectively reported studies, of hype, and sometimes of interest groups creating fake controversies begin to sow grave doubt.
Worst of all, science can be frightening when used as a cudgel. The deeper phenomenon at work is is the number of media who covered science during Covid-19, forgetting they’re supposed to be professional skeptics investigating competing interests, claims, and billion-dollar funding streams. Instead they took their cues—including their facts and their seemingly unflappable certainties—from biased peer-reviewed publications.
Boiled down, “the science” on a given issue was often conclusively reduced to whatever these journals published. These pandemic-related studies smacked of questionable motives and political and corporate interests, with the result being that over 400,000 Americans are now dead, twice as many as any other country. We have witnessed historic negligence and “a colossal failure at every level of government,” all due to scientific fraud, outright lies, obfuscation of facts and a deepening moral morass.
Tabletmag.com points out that on issues where science, money, power and crisis collide, these four horsemen of enlightened corruption more dramatically than anything else during the pandemic, showcased scientific treason.
So can we continue to accept science as a reliable guide to what we ought to believe? My conclusion is negative! Perhaps we can exist in an uneasy relationship with it, but now that scientific fraud has been let out of the bottle en masse - overpowering reason and logic with a mass bully pulpit - we can never go back to complete trust! That ship has sailed!