4 ms·

> I know I'm not going to trust the Lancet or the NEJM ever again. It's all political now. Who can you trust these days?

raphlinus 6y ago
This may have been asked rhetorically, but I will answer it seriously. First, there are some really good science reporters out there, doing excellent work. I recommend Ed Yong at the Atlantic, Helen Branswell of STAT News, Jon Cohen at Science, Amy Maxmen at Nature. There are others (it's a team effort and those are all great publications), but if you just read all of the articles under their bylines, you will get a good overview of what's going on. They will not let you down. If you have a little bit more time and energy for this stuff (as I do), then there are many experts on Twitter who freely share their analysis, and among them are some excellent communicators. When controversial stuff comes out, you can get a good sense very quickly what the flaws are and what seems to be the consensus. If you want to dip your toes into these waters, I recommend Angela Rasmussen, Trevor Bedford, and Marc Lipsitch. For critical analysis of bullshit published by seemingly reputable academics, I highly recommend Carl Bergstrom (his takedowns are highly entertaining as well as informative). It's frustrating for me to see such pearls of knowledge and expertise so freely available, yet the vast majority of people snarfing down huge quantities of information swill.
scottlocklin 6y ago
Named editors. Peer review is recent, and has mostly proved itself a bad idea. Editors who have a personal reputation to maintain will do a better job, just as they did back in the day when, you know, guys like Einstein walked the earth.
snowwrestler 6y ago
Personally I do not think of trust as binary. If I ruled out every journal, publisher, or news property that published something that turned out to be wrong, I would read nothing at all and wallow in blissful ignorance. Actually that sounds kind of nice right now...

raphlinus 6y ago

This may have been asked rhetorically, but I will answer it seriously. First, there are some really good science reporters out there, doing excellent work. I recommend Ed Yong at the Atlantic, Helen Branswell of STAT News, Jon Cohen at Science, Amy Maxmen at Nature. There are others (it's a team effort and those are all great publications), but if you just read all of the articles under their bylines, you will get a good overview of what's going on. They will not let you down. If you have a little bit more time and energy for this stuff (as I do), then there are many experts on Twitter who freely share their analysis, and among them are some excellent communicators. When controversial stuff comes out, you can get a good sense very quickly what the flaws are and what seems to be the consensus. If you want to dip your toes into these waters, I recommend Angela Rasmussen, Trevor Bedford, and Marc Lipsitch. For critical analysis of bullshit published by seemingly reputable academics, I highly recommend Carl Bergstrom (his takedowns are highly entertaining as well as informative). It's frustrating for me to see such pearls of knowledge and expertise so freely available, yet the vast majority of people snarfing down huge quantities of information swill.

scottlocklin 6y ago

Named editors. Peer review is recent, and has mostly proved itself a bad idea. Editors who have a personal reputation to maintain will do a better job, just as they did back in the day when, you know, guys like Einstein walked the earth.

snowwrestler 6y ago

Personally I do not think of trust as binary. If I ruled out every journal, publisher, or news property that published something that turned out to be wrong, I would read nothing at all and wallow in blissful ignorance. Actually that sounds kind of nice right now...