An interesting article however I will definitely knock NPR a few points for being so... I don't know, sensationalist about it? It's very important to note for those outside of the community that...
An interesting article however I will definitely knock NPR a few points for being so... I don't know, sensationalist about it? It's very important to note for those outside of the community that scientists, anthropologists, and archeologists are all aware that the "origins" of humans is a very complicated thing. So much information of what happened when and where is absolutely non existent because of the climate it all happened in. It's likely we may never find a physical bone or anything to link to these once existent ancestors but that how it be fam. NPR doesn't do particularly well when it comes to disseminating more scientific of anthropological information. I'll try to see if I can find a better suce.
This new discovery (and the associated hypotheses related to it), if reported on poorly, will also likely be used to further propagate "scientific racism" and other racist ideologies as well,...
This new discovery (and the associated theories hypotheses related to it), if reported on poorly, will also likely be used to further propagate "scientific racism" and other racist ideologies as well, which worries me. And NPR doesn't exactly have a great track record when it comes to accurate conveyance of the important nuances required for fully understanding something scientific that they are reporting on, IMO. Although to be fair, not many publications meant for the general public really do.
Definitely a very valid point when worrying about how nuanced it should be. It's a very interesting topic and exciting to see all the new information we can get, but there is the concern of people...
Definitely a very valid point when worrying about how nuanced it should be. It's a very interesting topic and exciting to see all the new information we can get, but there is the concern of people using that information to further misinformation or pseudoscience if not properly reported on. I think proper disimination of information is the biggest thing most news sites fall short on which is unfortunate considering that's what they're supposed to do.
I think the biggest problem with scientific reporting, in popular media in particular, is the fact that many news organizations fail to portray just how many unknowns are still surrounding any new...
I think the biggest problem with scientific reporting, in popular media in particular, is the fact that many news organizations fail to portray just how many unknowns are still surrounding any new discovery, failing to accurately convey how probabilistic and limited the scopes of most studies' conclusions actually are, and instead making everything scientific seem as if it's universally applicable, a guaranteed outcome, and/or incontrovertible. When the reality is that the scientific method, while instrumental to our progress, and generally able to produce consistent, trustworthy outcomes, is imperfect at times and frequently results in conflicting information and replication problems, due to initially inadequate tools, sampling errors, biases, mistakes, etc.
And because of all this seemingly conflicting, yet incontrovertibly framed, information being put out there to the public, in large part thanks to news reports framing it all as such, it can unfortunately lead to people who don't fully understand the process eventually mistrusting and/or discounting it entirely (e.g. "first they said eggs were bad for you, now they say they are good? WTF science is useless!")... when in fact they should be seeing that iterative aspect of it as a strength, since is shows how science is generally self-correcting; As new information comes to light, errors are detected, or new methodology is discovered, it helps us to reassess our older, potentially inaccurate conclusions, or define their scope more accurately.
An interesting article however I will definitely knock NPR a few points for being so... I don't know, sensationalist about it? It's very important to note for those outside of the community that scientists, anthropologists, and archeologists are all aware that the "origins" of humans is a very complicated thing. So much information of what happened when and where is absolutely non existent because of the climate it all happened in. It's likely we may never find a physical bone or anything to link to these once existent ancestors but that how it be fam. NPR doesn't do particularly well when it comes to disseminating more scientific of anthropological information. I'll try to see if I can find a better suce.
Edit: the NYT did a better job I think
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2020/02/12/science/west-africa-ancient-humans.amp.html
Also the journam sauce for those who can parse it:
https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/6/7/eaax5097
This new discovery (and the associated
theorieshypotheses related to it), if reported on poorly, will also likely be used to further propagate "scientific racism" and other racist ideologies as well, which worries me. And NPR doesn't exactly have a great track record when it comes to accurate conveyance of the important nuances required for fully understanding something scientific that they are reporting on, IMO. Although to be fair, not many publications meant for the general public really do.Definitely a very valid point when worrying about how nuanced it should be. It's a very interesting topic and exciting to see all the new information we can get, but there is the concern of people using that information to further misinformation or pseudoscience if not properly reported on. I think proper disimination of information is the biggest thing most news sites fall short on which is unfortunate considering that's what they're supposed to do.
I think the biggest problem with scientific reporting, in popular media in particular, is the fact that many news organizations fail to portray just how many unknowns are still surrounding any new discovery, failing to accurately convey how probabilistic and limited the scopes of most studies' conclusions actually are, and instead making everything scientific seem as if it's universally applicable, a guaranteed outcome, and/or incontrovertible. When the reality is that the scientific method, while instrumental to our progress, and generally able to produce consistent, trustworthy outcomes, is imperfect at times and frequently results in conflicting information and replication problems, due to initially inadequate tools, sampling errors, biases, mistakes, etc.
And because of all this seemingly conflicting, yet incontrovertibly framed, information being put out there to the public, in large part thanks to news reports framing it all as such, it can unfortunately lead to people who don't fully understand the process eventually mistrusting and/or discounting it entirely (e.g. "first they said eggs were bad for you, now they say they are good? WTF science is useless!")... when in fact they should be seeing that iterative aspect of it as a strength, since is shows how science is generally self-correcting; As new information comes to light, errors are detected, or new methodology is discovered, it helps us to reassess our older, potentially inaccurate conclusions, or define their scope more accurately.