Collide-a-scape

I’m going to nitpick this lament by James Fallows:

One of the basic functions of journalism is to say: This is true, and that is false. There are other functions, but establishing bedrock “world is round / sun rises in the east / 1+ 1 = 2″ verities is a big one.

In today’s political environment, when so many simple facts are disputed, journalists can feel abashed about stating plainly what is true. With an anticipatory cringe about the angry letters they will receive or the hostile blog posts that will appear, they instead cover themselves by writing, “according to most scientists, the sun rises in the east, although critics say….”

I assume that Fallows is referring to newspaper journalism, where attribution (in news stories) is embedded in the reporter’s DNA. He knows this but for some reason gives the impression that reporters rely on “false balance” attribution to avoid accusations of bias from angry readers or bloggers.

However, there is a recent example of newspaper journalism where the reporters were not at all “abashed about stating plainly what is true,” and they were hammered–by fellow journalists in prominent perches.

I’m referring to this December 8 story in The Chicago Tribune by Patricia Callahan and Trine Tsouderoson. It’s an unabashed takedown of the so-called “chronic lyme disease” diagnosis and its advocates. So unabashed, in fact, that science journalist Paul Raeburn found it wanting for lack of attribution. Pamela Weintraub, features editor at Discover magazine (and author of this related book), was similarly critical of the article. (That whole comment thread at Science Tracker is worth a read.)

Personally, I’m still a little taken aback by the fierce reaction to the Chicago Tribune piece from Raeburn and Weintraub. I don’t think their criticism (or dismissive tone) is warranted. As Orac notes in his own response to Raeburn and Weintraub:

The bottom line is that Weintraub’s complaint is primarily also about how Callahan and Tsouderos didn’t fall for the “tell both sides” mantra that all too many journalists fall prey to when writing about dubious medicine and pseudoscience.

I think it’s more complicated than that. The Chicago Tribune story was not written in the dry, boilerplate style that characterizes most newspaper stories. If it had appeared instead in a magazine (such as The Atlantic), where writers can write with more gumption and can stake out a position, I wonder if it would have been perceived differently.

Well, definitely not by Weintraub, who, in a comment to Orac, writes:

I don’t want to respond much on the science because to me, this is an issue of journalism, pure and simple: Any story done in this fashion, no matter what the topic, would have the same journalistic flaws and would violate the kind of journalistic practice we require at Discover and most other quality national magazines.

I’d be curious to learn what other science journalists think of this dust-up. And am I correct in thinking that the venue a story appears in perhaps colors the perception of it? Or is this just an unusual exception to the rule, in which, as Orac says, the criticism by some science journalists of the Chicago Tribune article amounts to

the opposite of what we skeptics, scientists, and supporters of science-based medicine complain about all the time about journalists, namely that Callahan and Tsouderos did not fall into the trap of false balance, did not give undue credence to pseudoscience, and did not “tell both sides” as though they had equal or roughly equal credence.

Obviously, this also has much relevance to discussion about climate change journalism.

UPDATE: A reader has made me aware of some excellent commentary on the kerfuffle over the Chicago Tribune article. Which, as another reader points out, prompted this response from Weintraub.

The crusading, hydra-headed anti-vaccine movement deserves more consistent coverage in the media. Here’s the title of today’s press release from the American Academy of Pediatrics:

How the anti-vaccine movement threatens America’s children

Paul Offit, a pediatrician and the author of “Autism’s False Prophets,” (who didn’t tour bookstores because of death threats he received from the anti-vaccine community) will be the plenary speaker today at the American Academy of Pediatrics conference in San Francisco. According to the press release, here are the themes he will touch on:

• The origins of religious and philosophical exemptions to vaccines in the U.S.;
• The impact of those exemptions on vaccine rates and the spread of vaccine-preventable diseases;
• The delicate balance between individual freedoms and societal good.

Says Offit:

Parents are bombarded with false stories about the dangers of vaccines, and the result is that some are backing away from vaccinating their children. This is tragic, because it leaves children vulnerable to deadly diseases, and it lowers the immunity of the entire community.

Offit is the subject of an excellent 2009 story in Wired magazine by Amy Wallace.  Shortly after the piece was published last Fall, Wallace got slimed with all manner of vitriol from vaccine opponents and sued by a charismatic leader of the anti-vaccine movement. The suit was later dismissed.

At an NYU event last Thursday, I heard Wallace talk about the jarring experience. She seems to have taken it in stride and good humor. (It probably helps that Conde Nast–Wired’s corporate parent–was highly supportive and paid all her legal bills.) As this event was geared towards journalists covering science, much of the discussion (which was moderated by Robert Lee Hotz, a WSJ science columnist), focused on how Wallace went about reporting and writing the story.

Wallace’s meta description of the interrelated themes explored in her piece strikes me as fertile territory for editors who want to follow up:

I see this as about a movement in our culture, about people afraid to vaccinate their kids, and about distrust of experts.

At one point, Hotz asked Wallace: “How do you continue the journalistic discussion” of this story? In response, she said that “deluging people with data” on the safety of vaccines wouldn’t work. Instead, she suggested that narrative story-telling was the only thing likely to cut through all the misinformation and distrust of science.

But that means editors and writers have to be creative and dogged in pursuing those stories.

I’m not surprised that Romm goes bananas over this front-page article in today’s NYT by Elisabeth Rosenthal, because it prominently quotes Roger Pielke, Jr. Any high profile story with a Pielke makes Romm all frothy. (I do, however, think the piece leaned too heavily on Roger and that it should have mentioned that he is a frequent critic of the IPCC.)

What surprises me is the over the top reaction that Romm elicits from Robert Brulle, a communications expert at Drexel University. He tells Romm in an email that the story is the “the worst, one sided reporting I have ever seen.”  Hmm, that makes me wonder how much reporting he’s actually read. (Worse than many of the MSM stories leading up to the Iraq war?) But wait, it gets better–er, I mean worse. Because this morning, according to Romm, Brulle lards it on during a phone conversation:

In this article, the New York Times has become an echo-chamber for the climate disinformation movement.

Now that’s a mouthful.

Just to be clear: this is not a perfect story, by any stretch (how many are?). I have my own beefs, namely that the writer didn’t deliver all the goods. Rosenthal writes, for example, that

the climate panel has found itself in the political cross hairs, its judgments provoking passions normally reserved for issues like abortion and guns.

So how about an example of those culture war passions? She doesn’t offer any, though the blogosphere is ablaze with them.

I also don’t understand why Rosenthal didn’t mention the larger implications of the IPCC controversies, in terms of the impact to public opinion. It’s not like there aren’t polls to reference. Even liberal bloggers like Kevin Drum are wondering what the effect of all the bad news is.

These quibbles aside, I thought that the story was a fair (but narrow) representation of the IPCC’s (and it’s chairman’s) recent troubles. Rosenthal didn’t overplay all the accusations (she even downplayed the latest ones as “half-truths) and she gave Pachauri and his supporters equal space for rebuttal.

Was it necessary to let Monckton tag-team on Pachauri over the  conflicts of interest issue? No. It wasn’t even necessary to use Monckton. I suspect his presence in the story–in addition to Pielke’s– is what gets Romm and Brulle all riled up. Monckton represents the bonkers wing of the skeptic universe. He’s just not a credible critic of climate science, much less the IPCC. If the point of Rosenthal’s story was to highlight how the IPCC’s recent troubles is reinforcing Morano’s manufactured narrative, then Monckton is your man. But if the point is to suss out the legitimate criticism of the IPCC from the exaggerated–and where to go from there– then why not use a credible source, such as a Mike Hulme?

Still, does Monckton’s presence and the extra dose of Pielke really add up, in Brulle’s words, to an “echo-chamber for the climate disinformation movement”? I don’t see it. If any of my less partisan readers disagree, please set me straight.

UPDATE: Tom Yulsman over at CEJ poses a different set of questions related to the Times story, most provocatively,

Has the IPCC outlived its usefulness?

UPDATE 2: Mathew Nisbet at Framing Science has an interesting take:

Critics on the left are alleging bias in the story, but if there is bias, it is simply journalists’ orientation to pay attention to and report on possible wrong-doing by those in positions of influence and to follow perceived conflict.

I’m overly sensitive to the term “bias,” but Nisbet is right about this journalistic tendency to cover the controversy or some perceived trangression. In this case, however, I think the story was warranted, given it was preceded by weeks of widespread reporting of numerous IPCC issues.

In case you missed the big news about the Lancet retraction, Daniel Drezner has the best meta post. He hints at the parallels between the anti-vaccine nuts, GMO opponents and climate change skeptics (strange bedfellows, aye?).

I see it too, but I believe irrationality underlies the anti-vaccine movement while ideology drives the other two. Regardless, Drezner doesn’t see the forces of reason winning out anytime soon, especially with the anti-vaccine crowd. He notes the response to the Lancet retraction in a New York Times article:

the retraction may do little to tarnish Dr. Wakefield’s reputation among parents’ groups in the United States. Despite a wealth of scientific studies that have failed to find any link between vaccines and autism, the parents fervently believe that their children’s mental problems resulted from vaccinations….

Jim Moody, a director of SafeMinds, a parents’ group that advances the notion the vaccines cause autism, said the retraction would strengthen Dr. Wakefield’s credibility with many parents.

“Attacking scientists and attacking doctors is dangerous,” he said. “This is about suppressing research, and it will fuel the controversy by bringing it all up again.”

On this, here’s Drezner, in a brilliant and acerbic observation:

Activists will argue that this is an example of Big Science suppressing counterintuitive research.  And in a public battle between the Jenny McCarthy/Oprah media-industrial complex and a bunch of science nerds, I’m putting my money on Mustard Girl.

In my prior research, I’ve seen this kind of dynamic play out in the debates over genetically modified foods, and we’re still seeing it play out in the debate over climate change.  Furthermore, because scientists are not perfect, it’s becoming easier to point out flaws that don’t necessarily compromise the basic science but do tarnish the image of scientists as neutral arbiters of fact.

In a separate vein, Orac thrashes the broadcast media for its coverage of the Lancet retraction. Climate advocates will surely feel his pain. I’d be curious to hear what Science Journalism Tracker and CJR’s The Observatory think of the press coverage of this huge story. So far, neither outlet has weighed in.

UPDATE: Drezner’s post concludes with another trenchant observation and a provocative question that deserves equal attention:

To be fair, it’s true that individual scientists aren’t really completely neutral — especially when it comes to politicized debates.  The scientific method, on the other hand, is about as neutral as you can get.  But that’s not as sexy a sell to the public.

Question to readers:  is there a way to make scientific consensus more acceptable to a public that doesn’t want to hear the results?

That’s really worth mulling over. But the problem is that no amount of sexing up of science will work with subcultures that are religiously, ideologically, or irrationally predisposed to disregard scientific consensus on certain issues of importance to them. That means that creationists,  anti-vaccine activists, GMO opponents, and hardcore climate change skeptics, to name just a few groups that have fixed, unalterable views,  cannot be persuaded by reason, no matter how it’s packaged.

UPDATE 2: Charlie Petit over at Science Journalism Tracker acknowledges my prod and puts up a real nice round-up of press coverage. Definitely worth checking out. It’s fair to speculate that this story will one day take on very tragic proportions, given how many thousands of parents have not vaccinated their children since that 1998 Lancet study was published.

Now, if Curtis Brainard over at CJR’s The Observatory also takes my prod, he might write a post similar to the excellent one he recently did on the recent IPCC media coverage (or lack thereof) in the U.S. He thus would sniff out all the potential autism/science angles just waiting to be covered, such as this one, from a parent of an autistic child, who commented on the Lancet retraction news at a blog site:

Because of my firm belief in the science of vaccines not causing ASD I am ostracized and treated with pity, like I am just too naive to know the truth.

At the same blog, another commenter writes:

I know what you mean–I went through some of this with my youngest child’s health issues and was completely ostracized by my new-agey community for taking the “pharma” path with my child. Many of the people who post here are scientists and have not faced this in the same way an average mother might.

Damn, I hope this wasn’t Boulder.

Dwight Garner in today’s NYT:

I put down Rebecca Skloot’s first book, “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” more than once. Ten times, probably. Once to poke the fire. Once to silence a pinging BlackBerry. And eight times to chase my wife and assorted visitors around the house, to tell them I was holding one of the most graceful and moving nonfiction books I’ve read in a very long time.

Science journalism at its finest, is what I’m hearing about this highly anticipated book.

I love it. The blogger who goes on endlessly in blog posts inveighs against tweeting:

Journalists simply shouldn’t be twittering on science or other subjects that require more than 140 characters to discuss intelligently, which is pretty much every topic.

It makes total sense: it often takes Romm thousands of words to make the same point that others can distill in two sentences. If I was him, I’d feel threatened by Twitter too.

This is not the Donald Duck I grew up with! Oh, lordy, Carl Zimmer peels back the curtain on freaky duck sex. And not just the evolutionary scoop. He’s got slow motion video, too. All set up by this killer lede:

There comes a time in every science writer’s career when one must write about glass duck vaginas and explosive duck penises.

Great, next time I’m in the Magic Kingdom, I’m keeping Donald and Daisy away from the kids.

The most immediate one is the vigorous debate Climategate has engendered between individuals of all political, ideological, and scientific stripes. Judith Curry from the Georgia Institute of Technology deserves much of the credit for kickstarting this, first in speaking directly to Steven McIntyre’s audience at Climate Audit, and then shortly after that with another essay posted over at Climate Progress.

Following this, Andy Revkin at Dot Earth generated a lively exhange by also highlighting Curry, as well as Mike Hulme, another distinguished climate scientist. Unlike the majority of their peers, Curry and Hulme have not downplayed the significance of the CRU email controversy. On this note, I’m disappointed that William Connolley has failed to use his influential corner of the climate blogosphere to foster a healthy discussion of the salient issues, be it the integrity of the peer review process, FOIA evasion, CRU data storage, or the “tribalism” that Curry notes. Connolley appears to be taking a nothing to see here, move along attitude.

That seems to be the position taken by many environmental and science journalists as well. (Notable exceptions include George Monbiot and Tom Yulsman.) Incredibly, nobody at Columbia University’s The Observatory has yet commented on Climategate. The journalism site’s motto is: “A lens on the science press.” I guess their “lens” has found nothing noteworthy (or lacking) about the media coverage thus far.

More typical are the shrugs exhibited by Kevin Drum (“As near as I can tell, ClimateGate is almost entirely a tempest in a teacup”) and David Roberts, who can’t be bothered to see what all the fuss is about:

I haven’t read the emails. I’ll leave it to others to determine whether a few scientists or a few papers deserve a newly critical eye.

Contrast this willful ignorance with Megan McArdle’s serious grappling of the affair. After exploring the most serious charges (some of which, McArdle acknowledges, merit further investigation), she concludes:

I see an indirect problem, which is that these scientists allowed themselves to become politicized and hostile to outsiders in a way that may have compromised the quality of their work.

As near as I can tell, liberal pundits like Drum and important voices like Connelley and Roberts are wearing blinders, while press watchdogs like The Observatory have gone MIA on the biggest global warming story of the year.

As for a larger upside to the scandal, Will Wilkinson provides a good guess here:

I predict that the overall response from the scientific community will be healthy and invigorating. Climate science will become more transparent and more rigorously by-the-book because climate scientists are becoming more fully aware that the impulse to jealously protect a public perception of consensus can undermine itself by producing questionable science and a justifiably skeptical public.

Well, if that happens, it won’t be because of the role played by liberal journalists or (with the notable execption of Revkin and a few others), the science media.

UPDATE 1: Mike Hulme has an absolute must-read op-ed in WSJ Europe.

UPDATE 2: Bud Ward wrote a prescient post on the then emerging controversy on November 22, in which he said:

Take those who see this event as the end of days when it comes to anthropogenic climate change with a huge grain of salt. And take those dismissing it as much ado about nothing with an equal dose.

UPDATE 3: Curtis Brainard at The Observatory has posted a lengthy article analyzing coverage of Climategate.

Carl Zimmer calls outs Blogging Heads and, to a lesser extent, The Huffington Post, for trafficking in anti-science “quackery.” Zimmer is arguably the best ambassador for science journalism, and I admire the stand he has taken (in ending his participation in Blogging Heads).

But the larger implications of his argument leaves me uneasy. He basically says that if a theory is willfully anti-science, then it shouldn’t be debated (or aired) in a serious forum. Here’s the problem with that: vaccine hysteria doesn’t go away if you ban Jim Carrey from The Huffington Post. (Just don’t give him a free pass; provide a counter.) Millions of people don’t stop believing in Adam & Eve if you ban creationists from Blogging Heads. (Just challenge them vigorously, especially about a 6,000 year old earth.)

I’m not suggesting there be equal opportunity for every fringe theory. Blogging Heads need not have a serious discussion on Bigfoot or UFO abductions. But if millions of god-fearing Americans take the bible literally and millions of MMR-fearing parents don’t innoculate their children, then I’m all for engaging their representatives in the media. How else are you going to reach some of these people?

I’m starting to wonder if there’s a disproportionate concern being expressed for the future of investigative reporting.

Here’s the latest, splashiest launch, which the Huffington Post is spearheading. (More coverage here and here.)

Don’t get me wrong: I’m a big believer in investigative journalism. Let a thousand more Pro Publica’s bloom, and, in fact, a bunch are, albeit on a much smaller, localized level.

But this newest initiative by the Huffington Post got me wondering: why isn’t anyone rushing forward to fund new web vehicles for science journalism? Given the enormously complex issues that demand our attention, such as climate change and stem cell research, where are the bold, innovative proposals to keep top-notch (and increasingly unenemployed) science journalists on the beat?

As best as I can tell,  CJR’s The Observatory and Knight’s Science Journalism Tracker represent the main web endeavors being underwritten with institutional support. But each focuses on existing coverage, which is growing thinner by the day. I closely follow and value both sites, but the crisis in science journalism cries out for more creative, well funded web-based enterprises.

Is Knight doing anything on this score? It’s a big sponsor of academic chairs and fellowships, both of which are important. But it’s not nearly enough.

Regarding those nine-month long fellowships: at the risk of biting the hand that feeds me (I’m currently a recipient, on the Scripps dime, at CU’s Center for Environmental Journalism), perhaps its time to rethink their purpose in these fast-changing times.  Admirably, Stanford University’s Knight Fellowship program is showing the way.

Still, I’m not seeing anything in the way of innovative new partnerships on par with the new Huffington Post initiative, which Jeff Jarvis appraises:

This, I’ve long held, is where foundation and public support will enter into the new ecosystem of journalism: not by taking over newspapers but by funding investigations and other slices of a new journalistic pie.

Science journalists know a lot about ecosystems. It’s time they put their heads together and figured out what their role is going to be in today’s “new ecosystem of journalism.”