Highlighting good science journalism would contribute to improving coverage, according to Ed Yong, writing for Discover Magazine’s Not Exactly Rocket Science blog.
Photo by Alex Barth via Flickr
He writes that a lack of accountability fuels frustration with poor science journalism, as it does in the case of a story in the UK’s Observer newspaper that was critiqued by the Guardian’s Ben Goldacre and has now been removed from the Web site.
The episode has triggered a number of pieces about whether such critiques are helpful or whether science journalists are unfairly criticized, including “an opinion piece from the Independent’s health editor Jeremy Laurence criticising Goldacre, a response from Goldacre criticising Laurance, and a defence of Laurance from Fiona Fox of the Science Media Centre.”
Yong also points readers to an amusing – and angry – post by Martin Robbins at the Lay Scientist, who says, “Robust criticism is a vital part of science, and it should be a vital part of journalism.”
Robbins also points out, in more colorful language, that journalists who don’t do simple fact checking are making themselves irrelevant.
