This article highlights a problem at the science-mass media boundary: it ends with refutals from other scientists studying space debris, and a short reply to th

This article highlights a problem at the science-mass media boundary: it ends with refutals from other scientists studying space debris, and a short reply to the refutals. Having people in the field argue against a paper is expected, and the whole point of peer reviewing. That's how they (hopefully) converge on a model everyone agrees on. However, if you're not actively researching space debris, the better stance in the matter would be "oh, shit, we should probably tread carefully until we know more." I think the fundamental problem is that the ending makes it polarized, instead of curious, and makes no attempt to explain what the precautionary path would be. I'm sure even the refuters would like to know if this is true or not. For me, not in the field, this writing style feels dismissive. I'm no wiser if this is a problem or not, but I guess it doesn't matter, because it's three refuters against two believers. Were they cherry-picked to have three refuters by some journalistic formula, or are there actually more opponents than proponents? It's not helped by the fact that it is (only) a proponent (Lawler) who says "we need more studies," not an opponent. (If I knew how to write, I would be writing science news, not complaining about it.)