I look at it as a series of mis-aligned incentives. Only so much funding is available, and that defines the size and scope of the experiments that can be done.

I look at it as a series of mis-aligned incentives. Only so much funding is available, and that defines the size and scope of the experiments that can be done. This, in turn, limits the study design (and by implication the downstream breadth of the conclusions that can be drawn). Researchers, by and large, do the research they can afford to do. Once that research is done, career and future funding potential comes from how much publicity and notoriety a study can get. Credit in many research communities goes to the authors of the papers that get the most citations, and you get citations by producing popular papers. Novel conclusions breed popularity. In the hands of a pop science journalist/communicator, traffic/audience engagement are often used as criteria for success/career advancement/job security. Thus, there isn't proper, unbiased funding for the serious evaluation and consolidation of the conclusions that can be drawn from a new research paper. This is why we get the Buzzfeed-worthy "They compared honey to corn syrup, and you'll never guess which one was healthier" headlines instead of the boring-but-accurate "No variation reported in limited time-series study of sugar intake" that might better represent the data.