Shameful science journalism…

There is a new way to sell science catching on and frankly, it stinks.

Anyone who’s been watching the Science versus Creationism debates of the past decade will know that various scientific theories, not just Darwinian evolution, are not well esteemed in the eyes of many (i.e. most Americans.) The UK has similar problems if not to the same extent and there isn’t really a part of the world where the problem hasn’t taken root to some extent.

There is a lot of disinformation out there, so a major challenge to anyone communicating science is getting honest information to people who have bunkered down for the battle against modernity. Or at least to those that have been mislead by the disinformation into a less antagonistic kind of anti-science paranoia.

Up until now, there seems to have been a continuum of approaches ranging between in-your-face scientific promotion and softly-softly.

Now there is a new approach. Take that piece of scientific information you want to pitch, then wrap it up in screed directed against those that have pissed off your target audience.

Inspired, perhaps. A bit like the way HIV and influenza use a viral envelope to dupe the body into allowing them safe passage to insert and have their genetic payload replicated at little cost.

Aside from the obvious drawback of having one’s science journalism being compared to HIV or influenza viruses, it’s patently intellectually dishonest.

The recent chatter on the Internet surrounding Unscientific America (2009) has been near-damning for authors Chris Mooney and Sheril Kirshenbaum. For the sake of context, Mooney authored The Republican War on Science (2006). Which while raising genuine modus operandi of political tampering with science by Republicans, seemed to lack an equally extensive critique of the way Democrats have done the same thing (e.g. studies of the human genome with potential medial application being bloody-mindedly misconstrued as being racist.)

Tumbleweeds and cicadas chirping come to mind when I think of Mooney’s critique of the unscientific part of America’s liberal-left. But then I guess that it wouldn’t be the Republican war then.

Not all the criticisms of Mooney’s 2006 book were fair, which is to be expected. This saw Mooney receive support from the likes of PZ Myers of Pharyngula notoriety, and more broadly from the American scientific community.

Unscientific America sees Mooney setting out to tackle obstacles to science and science education. Nothing wrong with that.

However, there is supposedly a section of the book dedicated to attacking the (sigh) “New Atheists”. If a Jewish journalist came out and started wailing about how moderate-Zionists or post-Zionists were detracting from academia on the grounds of an alleged ultra-Zionism, there would be an outcry. That Mooney, an atheist, has got on the whining-about-”New Atheists” bandwagon, it’s a sign that one should be especially careful when reading the book. It alludes to a political axe grinding somewhere out back.

While I’m not seeking to support (nor refute) Myers’ counter accusation of bigotry against “New Atheists”, Mooney and Kirshenbaum response seems lacking.

“This is a baseless accusation. Chris is an atheist, and he is not bigoted against himself, his mother (an outspoken secular humanist), or any other atheists. Sheril is Jewish an agnostic, and not bigoted against Chris or any other atheists, either.”

(Mooney and Kirshenbaum, 2009)

Does Chris identify as a “New Atheist”? Does his mother? Does Sheril? If the term used by Mooney and Kirshenbaum to identify an out-group is “New Atheist”, then pointing out that you aren’t bigoted against atheists is a bit like saying “I’m not an anti-Semite, some of my best friends are human beings!” One group (the out-group) is a subset of another and none of the exceptions belong to the subset.

Review copies have gone out (and the book is now out), and allegedly things are not good.

Mooney and Kirshenbaum have been called out on a number of distortions – namely of the “Crackergate” scandal and in making false generalisms about the philosophical position of the “New Atheists.” Apparently, there is no mention of why PZ Myers desecrated a communion wafer (to take the heat off of a student that had accidentally taken a communion wafer from mass and then received a stream of harassment and death threats). Nor the lengths Myers went to to mediate prior to the desecration of the wafer (asking for a condemnation by the church involved, of the death threats and harassment). Nor the subsequent, disturbing torrent of hate mail and death threats recieved by Myers.

That’s a fairly one-sided account of affairs.

Try finding the other side of the story from Mooney and Kirshenbaum’s blog. Try finding it in their Newsweek article where they lambast “New Atheists” in broad strokes. You can’t. If Unscientific America is this one-eyed on the topic, presenting a conflict entirely out of context, then it stretches my imagination to breaking point just trying to work out how the book can be trusted.

Then there’s the alleged straw-man of “New Atheists” jumping directly from methodological materialism to philosophical naturalism. According to PZ Myers, the portion of the book in question singles out Dawkins for collapsing the distinction between methodological and philosophical naturalism, which is simply untrue.

No, I change my position on Myers’ accusation of bigotry. I suspect he may be right. To Mooney and Kirshenbaum, the “New Atheists” are an out-group, not an in-group. Moreover, they empirically demonstrate out-group homogeneity bias by treating “New Atheists” as an undifferentiated group. Taking “Crackergate” out of context is just the icing on the cake.

Of course, Myers’ could still be wrong about the bigotry. Mooney and Kirshenbaum could just be very Machiavellian in exploiting other people’s bigotry. Which is the whole point of my viral envelope analogy.

Unintentional bigotry against “New Atheists” would seem to me, to be less damning. With a little honest introspection, it could be remedied – not so the Machiavellian approach.

At any rate, I’m not looking forward to reading Unscientific America.

Then there’s the sad state of affairs that has been popping up at New Scientist for a while.

Look, Ma! It’s not just creationists that can exaggerate exceptions to early Darwinian theory!
(Source: New Scientist – January 2009)

So what was the monumental discovery that felled Darwin’s metaphorical tree of life? In short, for those that don’t have a copy lying around and don’t have the membership to read the full on-line article, the (not in any way new) “discovery” was that the early, simple life (prokaryotes) on Earth didn’t have the discrete germ lines that relatively speaking, animals and plants do – they swapped genetic material. Which is to say that the roots of Darwin’s tree were a bit more tangled than Darwin predicted.

There is nothing new or contentious about this. Any evolutionary biologist worth their salt and indeed, any competent undergrad biology student knows that metaphors in general have limits and that Darwin’s metaphors in particular have limits in as far as genetics is concerned. And even then, the claim that Darwin’s tree has been cut down,  is still an extreme exaggeration. Even when considering other challenges to the metaphor (there are cases of lateral gene transfer between the germ lines of eukaryote species, although not with the same degree of infidelity as prokaryotes.)

At a high-school level understanding of evolution, which given the level of understanding in the non-scientific community at large, teaching the general theory as described by Darwin is fine, exceptional cases constituting extension material, early undergrad material or material for popular science books for more interested members of the general public. Dwelling on the anomalies at the fringes, while fertile ground for research, isn’t what the general public need to get their heads around at this point. Exaggerating the anomalies is worse!

It doesn’t take a belief in God to have a motive for these kinds of claims. The first person (or people – if at all it’d take a project to accomplish) to successfully down Darwin will be much celebrated in the future history of science. It doesn’t take a genius to realise why some people could be prone to fits of overstated accomplishment, like some homeopath trying their hardest to get Randi’s money.

Of course, the creationists lapped this distortion up. Barbara Cargill of the Texas State Board of Education tried to get the science curriculum overhauled in light of the meme that this New Scientist hyperbole set in motion. Then there was the Casey Luskin fiasco!

Casey Luskin of the Discovery Institute went on Fox News, amongst other things, peddling the tree of life disinformation that the New Scientist cover alluded to, in support of the anti-evolution campaign in Texas. YouTube user DonExodus2 was on to this, and pretty much nailed it in the same way (albeit in more detail) that I did.

In return, the Discovery Institute filed a false DMCA claim to suspend DonExodus2’s critique, and now the Don plans to railroad them on purgury charges. Go you good thing! And on the topic, check this video out.

All of this as enabled by the kind of hyperbole New Scientist has sold.

Maybe New Scientist thought that appealing to the prejudice of religious fundamentalists who loathe Darwin, would grant them access to an otherwise barred audience. These two examples of contortion of science (Cargill and Luskin) should show the hazard inherent in trying to sell the truth through acts of intellectual dishonesty. Confirmation bias will have them up and away with the palatable notions, mutating it in all sorts of comforting ways.

And now from New Scientist, we have Fern Elsdon-Baker, selling her ideas and new book The Selfish Genius – a play on The Selfish Gene – a book that presses the charge that Richard Dawkins has appropriated and contorted Darwin’s legacy through his gene-centric view of evolution.

So what does Fern Elsdon-Baker have to tell us about in ‘The Dawkins Dogma‘?

“The Selfish Gene’s message was that evolution is about the natural selection of genes, and genes alone.”

(Elsdon-Baker, 2009)

Ummm…

“But do we have to go to distant worlds to find other kinds of replicator and other, consequent, kinds of of evolution? I think that a new kind of replicator has recently emerged on this very planet. It is staring us in the face…

We need a name for the new replicator, a noun that conveys the idea of a unit of cultural transmission, or a unit of imitation. ‘Mimeme’ comes from a suitable Greek root, but I want a monosyllable that sounds a bit like ‘gene’. I hope my classicist friends will forgive me if I abbreviate mimeme to meme.”

(Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene, 1976)

“Genes alone” indeed! But I’m being pedantic. Let’s be charitable and assume that she meant “replicators alone.”

What Elsdon-Baker is really on about though, is Dawkins’ assertive use of metaphor.

“For reasons to do with how science is communicated, a human love of simple narratives, and Dawkins’s energetic advocacy of these metaphors, the public has been left with a view of evolution and Darwinism which does not truly reflect thinking among evolutionary biologists. This view also perpetuates the existence of “opposing camps” when there is no need. Worse, it skews popular notions of Darwinism.”

(Elsdon-Baker, 2009)

That is one bold accusation! It’s also a problematic one. Since when did the public get a view from popular science, the same view held by evolutionary biologists. You simply can’t teach the nuance of university level evolutionary biology through the popular media. You can’t fairly hold any author of popular science to this standard, including Richard Dawkins. As for the “opposing camps” part of the accusation, if one reads the article end to end, they are left wanting at least some evidence.

If anything, spurious accusations are a source of “opposing camps” amongst scientists and Elsdon-Baker need only look back to that issue of New Scientist from January of this year to get an example of poorly conveyed piece of dog-whistle narrative!

The effect of the environment upon the expression of genes is of course, as Elsdon-Baker tells us, of evolutionary influence. But it’s a pretty uncharitable interpretation of the gene-centric (or “replicator-centric”) view to imply that environment was ever left necessarily out of the equation, although one has to ask, does Elsdon-Baker mean expression down the germ-line when she cites Waddington or McClintock? Hmmm?

This simple narrative Elsdon-Baker is weaving makes it look like Waddington and McClintock are in “opposing camps” to Dawkins – perhaps she could give us a little more of that nuance she keeps alluding to!

There’s a rather brief mention of transgenerational epigenetic effects. Why is it, that when Elsdon-Baker criticises Dawkins for simplification, it’s still okay for her to drop jargon with little technical detail, leaving the reading layperson hanging? Without checking, do you know what a transgenerational epigenetic effect is?

A transgenerational epigenetic effect is a change in the phenotype of a cell or cells without a corresponding change in the genotype, that persists through cell division and ultimately passes on through to the offspring of an organism (and possibly on through further generations.) This can include for example, the passing on of non-mutagenic, but otherwise toxic, heavy metals down the maternal line, that alter the phenotype of the organism effected.

Did that clear your confusion? Would you like me to flesh this blog post out by a couple of thousand words explaining issues (or relative non-issues) this raises for a gene-centric view of evolution?

That’d be doing Elsdon-Baker’s job for her, but even then one can see the problems it raises for those in the business of popular science. Elsdon-Baker wisely opted out. New Scientist probably didn’t afford her the wordcount.

Why can’t we extend the same courtesy to Dawkins when he writes a simple article for the press or when chatting it up on the radio?

Elsdon-Baker goes on at length about lateral gene transfer, which while a challenge to explain in terms of a gene-centric view of evolution, isn’t impossible to be reconciled (as thankfully, Elsdon-Baker recognises.) A challenge to a popular metaphor is one thing, but to expect this kind of nuance on something like breakfast television, or public radio, is unrealistic considering the average lay-person’s background on the topic – it would take a series of lectures to get people up to this level, but then you’ve lost a large part of the public.

Reading her article, it seems Elsdon-Baker is unwilling to provide evidence to back up her rather unfair allegations and moreover, is unwilling to live up to the same standard she expects of Richard Dawkins.

It’s terribly disingenuous to suggest that Dawkins couldn’t write a new book, updating (perhaps “qualifying” is a better work) the selfish gene and extended phenotype concepts in light of any genetic and non-genetic anomalies that have since been discovered. I’d be very interested to read such a book, although I wouldn’t expect much change would be necessary from the original concepts – just some trimming of the verge.

It’s terribly disingenuous to suggest that those who have the time to learn a bit more about evolution, read Dawkins in isolation.

It’s terrible disingenuous to make a baseless assertion that Dawkins is somehow unappreciative of the limits of his own metaphor.

Indeed, Dawkins repeatedly shows an explicit appreciation through his Necker cube analogy used in The Extended Phenotype, The God Delusion and the preface to the second edition of The Selfish Gene – “Rather than focus on the individual organism, it takes a gene’s-eye view of nature. It is a different way of seeing, not a different theory… This is a two dimensional pattern of ink on paper, but it is perceived as a transparent, three dimensional cube. Stare at it for a few seconds and it will change to face a different direction… Neither is more correct that the other.” – Not exactly the language of dogma.

It’s terribly disingenuous (and outright unfair) to suggest that Dawkins can’t spend his time on other projects (i.e. biography of Darwin, The God Delusion, The Oxford Book of Modern Science Writing) in the meantime, even while selling science to the masses. Indeed, reading Dawkins’ notes in The Oxford Book of Modern Science Writing (sadly I don’t own a copy of my own), one is left feeling that Dawkins has a profound respect for scientists he has deep disagreements with (e.g. Paul Davies), in total contradiction to the “opposing camps” allegation.

It’s terribly disingenuous to suggest that Dawkins is simplifying science to serve some selfish, dogmatic ends when the limits of popular science impose precisely the same simplification.

And it’s terribly convenient to wrap up your information in a coating palatable to the prejudice of your target audience, like some intrusive virus. What it isn’t, is good science journalism. Nor honest – which should be intellectually terminal in a field that is supposed to value truth.

I hope things improve. If only so I can increase the size of my New Scientist pile without feeling like I’ve been duped.

~ Bruce