Marc Legare is a philosopher and motorcycle adventurist.
He has travelled extensively, worked and lived in Australia, US, and across Canada.
He has a varied working career including: Firefighter, Lawyer, Navy, Motorcycle Importer, plus others.
He chose to return to southern Saskatchewan because of his family's deep roots here.
The opening line "A New Study Shows....." is sung each and every day by media outlets around the world. These new, 'new studies' often tell us of something shocking and warn us of impending doom. After all, if it wasn't disturbing, it would hardly be worth mentioning.
New studies that scare us to death have a great deal of dollar value attached and commercial sellers-of-fear benefit from them. Not only do media groups gain financial reward, many others reap monetary and additional benefits from troubling results.
One reason there is such a volume of nail bitingly important, revealing, and alarming results is best understood by how research is funded in the first instance. Scientific studies are generally funded by various groups; government and university grants are two main sources. As would be expected, when money becomes part of the mix, pure of heart intentions can get a little dicey.
Competition for research money is fierce. Many scientists are vying for the limited funding dollar. In order to secure a grant a few things are imperative. Firstly, the study must be of some importance and the more dramatically important or currently relevant, the more likely the grant will be awarded. Another criteria is past studies. If an applicant has a long history of amazing findings or has a well known reputation, the more likely funding will come their way. And therein lies the rub.
Unremarkable results do not get attention. No attention means less likely grant money will be awarded and those with a long list of uninteresting or insignificant results are not considered a top contender for future consideration. As a result, there is a powerful incentive to find something attention getting, and a troubling finding fits that bill.
We are regularly told that an ever looming catastrophe is just around the corner and a "new study" proves this. These catastrophic claims are due, in part, to the non-scientific financial incentives to find unsettling results. There is also an ego element to it. Some scientists are not personally pleased with a lacklustre result because it does not shine a light on themselves or their work.
The sad reality is that scientists have a bias incentive and sometimes they act on it. It is unfortunately true that some see what they want to see, or worse, intentionally skew results to make them more distressing. The scientific community is aware of this problem and the ever lengthening list of discarded studies proven to be junk science is testament to that.
There is a line in a series about Chernobyl that is salient to this topic. "Science is strong, but a test is only as good as the men carrying it out." Carl Sagan, a world-renowned scientist and strong supporter of the scientific method, once said, "Science is not perfect. It can be misused."
The next time we hear of the latest and often frightening 'new study' it would be wise for us to remember the backdrop of those studies and a grain of skepticism would not be unwarranted.
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the position of this publication.
