Misunderstanding
Why most of what we think we know about biology is wrong
We all know the mass media relies entirely on sensationalism to drive revenues, and the rational conclusion is therefore that the mass media cannot be trusted as a source of information.
While occasionally the facts may be correct, the intentional lack of appropriate context renders even facts misleading. Most of the time we’re simply unaware of this phenomenon and so we go from one scare story to the next. We live in a world of instant fear and near-instantaneous forgetting. Yesterday’s big story is eclipsed by today’s sensation; the past is pasted over with today’s transient screaming headline.
While the political results are disastrous, our understanding of the world around us in general is equally damaged. The mass media, when not endlessly creating fear over whatever happens to be the sensation du jour, loves to report “scientific” findings. Only, of course, what’s reported is as far from the truth as it’s possible to get while avoiding mention of fairies and goblins.
To see why this is, let’s perform a thought experiment.
Let’s imagine that for fifteen years a team of researchers has been investigating a strain of fungus that seems to have some inhibitory effect on one aspect of the mechanisms by which animal cells manage the process of cell…
