http://ksjtracker.mit.edu/

But why should we be surprised at any of this? Is contemporary mainstream news anything more than an extension of what the old National Enquirer used to be, combined with an advertising mouthpiece for whatever lies the government chooses to shove into the sheeples’ brainless skulls?

There are no journalists today, only brainless repeaters.

Nevertheless, insult remains a questionable tactic for use in the effort to persuade.

I think it is safe to assume that meaning WILL change as the science story is passed around among people.

I’m surprised that people are surprised ideas change as they interact with our physiologies (which are complex, limited, and prone to error).

How about sticking a little closer to the sources?

I have to admit I thought Wakefield was incompetent. I didn’t realise he was fraudulent.

The work was done, peer reviewed, and published by Science. THEN there was a press conference. After the press conference, there was some pretty serious criticism (primarily on the web), but the paper is still published and the authors are still behind the work. The discussion criticizing the work are theoretical as no one else has done work with the microbe to determine more of what’s happening.

Other work mentioned in this post has in fact been proven wrong – Gliese 581 g and Cold Fusion, etc. Arsenic Life has not. The authors of the paper are going through criticisms of the work now (compiled by Science) and are getting responses together. Blog posts and news articles on the web simply do not discredit science. More work and more thought is all that will help get to the bottom of what’s going on with GFAJ-1.

But fundamentally the history with Arsenic Life is paper in Science then press conference. If the press conference hadn’t happened, do you think the web would have had the same response? I really don’t think so. And if that’s the case, I think everyone should consider whether their treatment of this is warranted.

1. They are people, not “sheeple”, you asshat.

2. People are NOT “brainless” – that’s simply YOUR value judgment, asshat.

3. People are not reducible to their physicality – they are far more than “skulls” or “bodies” – except in the eyes of a criminal.

4. Do you really expect to insult people into agreeing with your political views? Or are you actually working for your putative “opposition”, at an emotive level?

IMHO, that last question contains the germ of the truth.

Seriously.

I’d posit that in contemporary journalism (this includes the online medium) the first part of this statement is true, but the latter has no bearing on the vast majority of information peddlers and handlers. In fact, this isn’t a new at all in human history let alone US history, but since we’ve become an information society post-dubya-dubya-two and the advent of marketing news as an impartial information dispenser has been waning in to the nth degree.

Again this isn’t something new, see Yellow Journalism, and the media does occasionally honor its largely ignored code of ethics and produce a story of such magnitude and impact that we’re left in awe by these David versus Goliath revelations. Honesty, sincerity, neutrality and morality take a distant backseat to entertainment, ad revenue and public opinion.

If I’m not mistaken, in the US isn’t extremely difficult — if not impossible — to hold an information medium accountable for misinformation no matter how flagrant except in cases of liable. Also, I unfortunately can’t remember the particular case (sorry), didn’t a US court of law determine that News programs can’t be held accountable for their news reporting in the classic since of journalism because they are considered entertainment. My two cents.

Ms. James, perhaps the topic is more complex or nuanced than your journalism here reflects. ^_^

Personally, I agree with Daemon (except I’d probably remove the doubled “time” and the “mainstream” qualifier from his comment).

I’ve gotten to know some journalists, and of course there are a few brilliant ones, and the majority are a bunch of fucking mediocre hacks.

Hoped to find the time to, as I said, but it was an outdoor day for me. I started looking for refs, but the BoingBoing & Wikipedia articles rapidly buried the results for the phrase… making it that much harder to research.

Looks like you and another editor have been at it today, so I took the “original research” and lack of refs tags off.

@Jonathan Badger #33

“I’m not sure why we would expect “pre-web” citations to this given that it is a modern phenomenon”

I’m not sure it’s so modern, considering all the 19th century engineering magazines I’ve been reading. I’m suspicious of “many bloggers” using a term being free of manipulation. Did you follow my link about the nonsense-word that replaced “gender equality” for six months? Bloggers were picking up on it as kewl, but it deliberately obscured actual discussion. Personally discovering a source of disinformation on the site and watching its speed and effectiveness was pretty sobering.

@Beezlebuddy #35

Plus, it’s ironic when someone makes a passive-agressive accusation passive-aggressively. As for myself, I was just being plain old aggressive.

Your laundry list of Wikipedia’s troubles only scratches the surface of the reasons I cut back editing there so much.

But I thought that I was on-topic for a post about going to press before you had done your research. They used to say “show your work” in math class. Not “wait for a stranger to show your work”. It’s still a good idea; references are what make Wikipedia at all useful, imho.

…

Happy 10th Anniversary, Wikipedians!

Yes, as anyone who has ever played “telephone” could tell you.