> Even better vaguely word it so it resonates with main stream media
This explanation doesn’t resonate with me. Research most often has incremental results that need to be carefully qualified. Isn’t the far bigger problem that mainstream media takes subtle research results and “simplifies” them for the public by adding certainty and often mis-interpreting the results completely?
Political agendas have been recently systematically trying to erode trust in science. (Because science and truth does threaten some politicians.) The idea that science can’t be trusted as the high-level summary is exactly what some people want, and it seems to be working. But what is the alternative? We have nothing better. The point of science is to try to protect against motivation and agenda, and it does work sometimes. Even when people are motivated, when the methods are reproducible and the results are peer-reviewed, that does help filter out some of the badness. And if it’s not enough: what should we do to improve it?
Media distortion is definitely a problem too, but it's not the only problem.
Solar geoengineering is the hobbyhorse I usually use as an example of this. It's an open secret (see e.g. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-01243-0) that most scientists in the field won't research it, partly due to safety concerns but partly because they think that decarbonization is the right policy and they don't want to risk "detracting from efforts to rein in greenhouse-gas emissions". Maybe that's the right judgment, but it's hardly free from motivation and agenda.
This explanation doesn’t resonate with me. Research most often has incremental results that need to be carefully qualified. Isn’t the far bigger problem that mainstream media takes subtle research results and “simplifies” them for the public by adding certainty and often mis-interpreting the results completely?
Political agendas have been recently systematically trying to erode trust in science. (Because science and truth does threaten some politicians.) The idea that science can’t be trusted as the high-level summary is exactly what some people want, and it seems to be working. But what is the alternative? We have nothing better. The point of science is to try to protect against motivation and agenda, and it does work sometimes. Even when people are motivated, when the methods are reproducible and the results are peer-reviewed, that does help filter out some of the badness. And if it’s not enough: what should we do to improve it?