Two things. First, if a vanishingly small number of people hold a particular opinion, reporting on that opinion in mainstream journalism distorts the perception

Two things. First, if a vanishingly small number of people hold a particular opinion, reporting on that opinion in mainstream journalism distorts the perception of how marginal that view is. Standard journalistic practice is to get "both sides" of a story. So, if there is a story on climate change, the standard practice would be to find someone to say "it's not a problem". The problem with that is the reader gets the impression that there is more disagreement in the scientific community than there actually is. This practice makes the article inaccurate. That's what they're trying to fix. Second, the data shows that non-experts in a subject are not that rational about their views in the subject: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/06/upshot/when-beliefs-and-facts-collide.html?ref=science&_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/06/upshot/when-beliefs-and-fa...