Difficult to say exactly what is going on here without more information, but it seems that the issue here is less about the mistake made, but more along the lin

Difficult to say exactly what is going on here without more information, but it seems that the issue here is less about the mistake made, but more along the lines of how the mistake was made. In other words, the mistake happened in such a way to call into question these scientist's competence in the eyes of their colleagues. There is a subtle difference. It's one thing to get something wrong, it's another thing to get something wrong by what appears to be "a rookie mistake". We cannot forget that science is still a human process, one that relies so much on trust.