I just read and article (more a press release) stating that because farmed fish eat meal that contains processed cows we should not eat farmed fish because they may spread Mad Cow Disease. The primary quote being “We have not proven that it’s possible for fish to transmit the disease to humans. Still, we believe that out of reasonable caution for public health, the practice of feeding rendered cows to fish should be prohibited,” Friedland said. “Fish do very well in the seas without eating cows,” he added.
Those of us who have studied aquaculture will agree that fish, in the wild, do very well without eating cows. However, we also recognize that fish is THE MAIN SOURCE OF PROTEIN for much of the developing world. Furthermore, it is through the responsible farming of fish that many people even have access to an affordable source of protein. Can we do better, yes. Should we investigate if Mad Cow Disease can pass from cow to fish to human? Yes. Should we allow Scientists to make broad-ranging, fear insighting statements? You decide.
If we’re mad scientists, yes.
Should we allow Scientists to make broad-ranging, fear insighting statements?
No, leave that to the journalists.
What do you mean, allow?
So, Sir Richard, are you proposing that we fight the urge of reason and unleash our abilities to stir-up the masses with fear and anxiety? Can I get a quote from you about this?
If this is the game we are proposing than I would like to open up a contest. .
What, based on your field of practice, would be the seemingly most inflammatory statement you could make (that contains some truth to it)?
If this sounds like a fun game (it does to me) let me know and I will create a new post for it.
What, and let you steal all my comments??
No – I will make entries anonymous and just post when I have a few. I will put the post up for the game soon(ish).
Game on!
I occasionally argue that what is needed as a counterpoint to scientists making idiotic statements is a “rapid rebuttal” unit somewhere – see my last extended ramble over at Stephen Curry’s post on Freedom of Error.
Sorry, vaguely serious comment. The game sounds good, though. Perhaps we could steal it as an exercise for our next graduate student Communication Skills workshop.…
An extension of the game, for classroom, could be to look at published articles and write your own inflammatory headline based on what you read in the article.
@Austin – there is already a kind of rapid rebuttal unit, with the NHS service
Behind the headlines . This is limited to biomedical stories, but those are often the most contentious.
Thanks, Frank, I had forgotten NHS Behind the Headlines -they are very good.
I do think sometimes it would help if there were more of the Scientific Great ‘n’ Good who were prepared to do what David Colquhoun does and be prepared to front up for journalists and the TV.
A more prevalent reaction would be that of an FRS I once discussed these kind of inflated pubic claims with. S/he sighed and said: “Pff… It’s all just grant talk – you just have to ignore it.”
The problem is that, unlike scientists, the punters don’t have the software to filter out the noise.
I wonder if the additional emphasis given by the Research Councils to Impact of research will have an inflationary effect on this kind of exaggerated claim?
Frank – Now that I have a Creative Commons Licence for the game “Inflammatory Statements- The Game” I hope to try and sue anyone who plays this game, for fun or profit. So, if you see anyone in the press performing this action please let me know and I will send in the lawyers.
That ding dong currently going on over Richard Horton (is that the name? Not the Lancet ed but a policeman) is quite interesting in this regard. RH had a blog (anonymously) and posted lots of details about his job. He won the Orwell blog award. He decided to try for a book deal for his blog (either before or after, not sure). The Times discovered his name but were not allowed to publish it. (Mr Justice Eady was involved). The Times appealed and won, so wrote up the story. One aspect of it was that some individuals could be identified in RH’s blog posts, which could have affected their court cases. Cue shock horror in (1) the Guardian (there is a quite hysterical article there today by the Orwell chair of judges) and (2) the blogosphere. The Times carries a very good response by Daniel Finkelstein on the paper’s Comment Central blog, also today. (DF is the paper’s chief leader writer, but was not the journalist who wrote the story – that was someone Foster I think).
This case raises many interesting dilemmas about freedom of information, in both directions. It’s also inflammatory in several ways too.
I should have perhaps mentioned that some outrage was caused by RH having been reprimanded by his employers once his identity was known. Also his blog is now down, apparently – I don’t know if the primary reason was the book deal or the employer.
I really must add The Guardian to my daily news browsing.
Maxine, there is crime fiction potential in that story :)
Guardian (there is a quite hysterical article
surprise- -
Re. Maxine’s comments on the NightJack case, I think Danny Finkelstein is struggling to defend the indefensible. As you can probably guess, I am no fan of Mr Justice Eady, but I think the real opprobium here belongs with the Times. There was little legitimate journalistic reason to unmask the blogger, and plenty of good reasons not to – mainly that it will decrease anonymous blogging from the frontlines of the public sector, which to me has been a clear public good.
If you go and read the comments after Finkelstein’s apologia you will see that the Times is, erm, not getting an easy ride from the commenters, many of whom are both eloquent and angry.
There is another good post by Daniel Finkelstein on the Times blog since the above, and another article by Oliver Kamm on his Times blog, also pro the Times actions (with full disclosure).
I think we’ll just have to disagree on this one, Austin.
Also, re the commenters, I have long since learnt the hard way that a long stream of impassioned commenters is neither here nor there in the general rightness and wrongness of things – particularly when it comes to bloggers on the topic of the freemasonry of blogging!
giggle @Maxine.
Well, I don’t find it desperately surprising that the Times’ bloggers and commentators support the Times line Maxine, no matter what Oliver Kamm says about the two things being unrelated.
the Times took an editorial and journalistic decision to “out” a person who in effect functioned as a confidential source of information for the public, giving insight into a key public service and how it really worked.
Meanwhile, the same newspapers will be publishing endless anonymous lobby briefings from politicians, despite their knowing exactly who said what about whom. To me the disparity is rather stark.
Incidentally, the second most common line among the commenters was “I shall not be buying the Times again because of this”.
In terms of the “freemasonry of blogging”, it is actually fairly simple to work out who about 80-90% of all “anonymous” bloggers are. The freemasonry, if any, lies in the idea that there is a vast difference between this and publicly “outing” people, especially in the full glare of national media.
If I had a penny for everyone who had written into Nature saying they were cancelling their subscription over some leader we wrote about George W. Bush and/or climate change, I’d be a zillionaire by now – and I have not noticed any dent in Nature’s circulation over the years.
My point about Oliver Kamm’s disclosure was that it was full- he said he was not neutral and ran through his various jobs in the private and public sector.
I like to judge an argument, and it is good to know where the person who is making it is coming from, but it does not follow that I will discount the argument if the person has declared an interest. I hope that my intellect is capable of judging an argument on its own merit.
a person who in effect functioned as a confidential source of information for the public, giving insight into a key public service and how it really worked.
That’s your opinion, Austin, but it would be correct to state that this person was employed by the “key public service” and had signed a contract with his employer. You or he or I or anyone might not like that, but it is a fact.
Agreed about the contractual legal issue, but the danger inherent in this is obvious.
Modern public service managers are, I would say, deeply paranoid about having the lid taken off what they do, so that the reality behind the anodyne press-release PR Newspeak becomes visible. With restrictive and all-encompassing, but vaguely worded, contracts of employment, the net effect is that anyone who talks out of turn can be both silenced and/or sacked. The examples from the last decade in the health service of whistle-blowers, or boat-rockers, being sacked on nit-picking disciplinary pretexts are myriad.
Now, if newspapers are not going to take broadly the side of “the public’s right to know” in this debate, then who on earth is? And in this context, I did not personally find the Times’ arguments about the public interest in knowing precisely who Night Jack was at all convincing. That he really was a detective constable of more than a decade’s service in the police, perhaps. But his name and where he worked? I don’t buy it.
Not to get in the way of Maxine and Austin’s debate.. ..
I just saw this posting about quotes and Science Journalism. I hope to get a chance to dig into in the near future.
If anyone is still reading, the Guardian’s “digital content director” (sic) comments on the Night Jack case today. There is also an editorial from last Thursday here, and a Guardian media blog today here.
Yes, I noticed the barrage of Guardian articles!