Bad Science Your Responsibility

Bad Science Your Responsibility

Great article by Tim Longwell in response to Mark Traphagen's Sciency post.

#science  

Originally shared by Tim Longwell (Longwell Art)

Sharing Bad Science, Who really is to blame?
Where does it begin?

No doubt all of us have seen instances where a so called "computer virus" 'crashed the internet and infected all the computers on the internet' e-mails in our past.
Then they began to appear in Social Media (SM). Oddly enough it was the same email from modem connection to internet days. Only now it was "more official" because it was in a graphic on FaceBook, MySpace, Twitter and others.

I mean really? Seriously?

If the one making the post/email had given it ten seconds of thought, the person that posted or forward emailed the warning, would have realized that it could not possibly be true. They had just used the internet to receive the email/SM posting. The internet was there to forward the email/share the post. So how could it possibly be crashed and stopping their computer from working, much less the internet?

And the same goes regarding valid science as well.

Let's look at some simple things the cause for bad science a.k.a. sciencyness, a term coined by +Ben Thomas. http://goo.gl/l7GfSH

We can start off with Hollywood. That's right Movies and Television News Media, and now unintentionally, YouTube, Vimeo and other video hosting sites.

Look at the near Earth orbiting objects as one example. The surface of comets on a collision course with earth.
It wasn't until the last few years man had ever managed to place a camera on the surface of a comet and monitor what happens as it rotates through space.

Yet Hollywood has fed their market with visions of sharp shards of ice reaching into space with deep crevices left behind, caused by boiling temperatures on the sun side blowing large volumes of gas into space instantly dissolving the comet surface. 
Yet we see from real science, when NASA orbited Comet Lovejoy, ESA landed a probe on Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, via their Rosetta project, that the surface is almost smooth, and has dust on the surface. The off-gassing is barely decernable, and it becomes part of the gaseous tail of the comet.
And yet if asked, the majority of people will still describe the comet surface as shown in movies like Armageddon http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120591/ or Deep Impact. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120647/
Here is the catch, Hollywood will be the first to tell you, these ideas are persented, not as fact, rather entertainment.

Then there is the ever recurring myth that the planet Mars will be so close to earth in orbital opposition, that Mars will appear as large as Earth's moon in the sky. And not just any moon size mind you, rather the moon as seen via the optical allusion at moon rise. Almost as big as Earth in the sky! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_hoax

I have been doing amatuer astronomy for most of my life in one form or another, conducted many a public viewing through a telescope for others to look at Mars during these "super close" periods and have yet to see Mars even as large as our moon at the smallest size we see the moon.

Then there is the problem with what a Theory actually is and what it has become in general understanding. 

Theory is defines as:
1) an idea or set of ideas that is intended to explain facts or events
2) an idea that is suggested or presented as possibly true but that is not known or proven to be true
3) the general principles or ideas that relate to a particular subject

So basically a theory is an idea or ideas intended as a starting point that might be true, to explain our world around us. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/theory

Then there is Scientific Theory - a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world that is acquired through the scientific method and repeatedly tested and confirmed through observation and experimentation. As in Einstien's  "Theory of relativity." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_theory

One can blame sciencyness http://goo.gl/l7GfSH on SM, Hollywood or News Media yet it is the individual that is really to blame. Each individual needs to accept part of the blame.

Consider this about spreading bad science:
1) How much effort did one spend verifying whatever sciencyness was propounded?
2) Did one bother to check for possible hoaxes being resurfaced in a newer verbage?
3) Did the original author provide references for the stated position or offered information?
4) Was the source of the provided reference knowledgable and known to be acurate?
5) Why did one really decide to share the information?
6) What was the motive of the original post?
7) What is our motive for further sharing the information?

Low and behold, all the afore mentioned touchpoints, boils down to the Trustworthyness of the original post or email. As +Ben Thomas points out in his article, the individual 'needs to take ten seconds to run a search, determine whether the story is legitimate, untrue, or just plain blown out of all proportion to the actual evidence. http://goo.gl/l7GfSH

Ultimately, responsibility for bad science a.k.a. sciencyness always comes back around to one person, ourself.
It falls to each and every one of us to accept our responsiblity to be honest and verify our information before we hit the post/share button.
In the end, sciencyness just makes us look foolish rather than knowledgable.
Decide now to no longer promote bad science and sciencyness.

H/T Mark Traphagen for Ben Thomas' article that inspired the ideas for this post