Scientists Little Secrets
Ever since the pandemic started, science has been under fire. First, there’s a need for all of us to understand what may happen if we’re infected with COVID-19. Also, we want to know how we can protect ourselves from it. With this public interest and the need for news organizations to provide quick information, sometimes the facts are lost in translation. Add to that the rapidity by which research has been conducted, and you might find that missed or incomplete information is coming from scientists to the general public.
I’ve mentioned before that my doctorate is in microbiology, and I did biomedical research for about seven years. Much like any other profession, there are things that scientists do and language that they use that are unique to the field of science. Scientists rarely have to explain or defend their work to non-scientists. The challenges in defining professional conventions of science can also result in miscommunication.
In this blog post, I explain what scientists do, how they think and communicate with one another, and how to go about fact-checking science-based statements made in the news. In essence, I hope to educate others about the conventions of science, thereby rebuilding some of the eroding trust between scientists and the public.
What scientists do
First, we must establish that science is “knowledge about or the study of the natural world based on facts learned through experiments and observation.” Scientists gather facts. They perform experiments, observe events, analyze data, and construct explanations based upon that data. The practices of science explained in the Next Generation Science Standards are what scientists do every day.
In schools, students engage in the practices of science in well-controlled environments. Science labs are often used to demonstrate a concept being taught in class, like identifying a known constant in physics, isolating a particular compound in chemistry, or confirming the incidence of traits in a fruit fly population. Labs are generally set up so that the “correct” answer is known in advance and obtained from an experiment. This is not the case in real research science. Scientists stumble through experiments blindly, not truly knowing what the outcome is going to be. This is how scientists discover new things about the natural world every day - experiment, observe, analyze data, and construct explanations.
Speaking of discoveries, one of my favorites quotes about science comes from Isaac Asimov: “The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not ‘Eureka!’ but ‘That’s funny…’” Scientists may suspect what could happen when engaging in an experiment, but we often don’t know what may happen. For example, the scientists on the Manhattan Project were unsure whether the atomic bomb would vaporize the Earth! They performed many calculations, set up as many safety procedures as possible, and ultimately tried it. Fortunately, they were correct, and the Earth did not vaporize!
“You wander a lot more paths that are dead ends than not… and that’s how it’s supposed to be.”
Equal to discovering the “that’s funny” moments is finding the “well, that didn’t work” moments. As my scientist friend, Tim Loboshefski, put it, “You wander a lot more paths that are dead ends than not… and that’s how it’s supposed to be!” Scientists conduct many experiments that do not work, but knowing what doesn’t work is often just as important as knowing what does work. I knew a scientist who, for many years, was trying to identify whether an infectious agent could cause multiple sclerosis (MS). This person researched various bacteria and viruses, looking for a correlation, but to no avail. There remains no known cause for MS, but we at least are pretty sure it’s not an infectious agent.
What John Dewey said about education is true for science: “Failure is instructive. The person who really thinks learns quite as much from his failures as from his successes.” Scientists are building new knowledge day-in and day-out, whether from the successful “that’s funny” moments or the “well, that didn’t work” moments. If we as a society want more scientists, we need to help our students embrace failure.
How scientists think
Scientists generate new knowledge through experimentation and observation. But then they must see how that new knowledge fits with existing knowledge - this is the practice of “constructing explanations” or drawing conclusions. When scientists construct explanations, they take into account ALL available expertise or information. If a piece of information does not fit the explanation, then either the conclusion is wrong or the information is false.
This idea of using ALL available information is a critical part of science. I like to contrast this practice of science with the law. A lawyer must first conclude that their client is innocent and then pick the evidence that supports that conclusion while trying to disregard any evidence to the contrary. (“If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit” ~ Johnnie Cochran, a defense lawyer in the OJ Simpson trial). Scientists don’t pick and choose the evidence that fits an explanation; instead, they fit the explanation to the evidence.
When new knowledge is discovered that does not fit an explanation, it may be that the answer is incorrect. This happens rarely, and there must be quite a bit of evidence. One great example is the history of the model of the atom. As new technologies allowed us to probe matter, our understanding of the structure of atoms changed. As the new evidence did not fit the old model, we had to change the model.
Most of the time, if a new piece of knowledge doesn’t fit an explanation, then the new knowledge is not correct. Not too long after the pandemic started, there was talk of using the anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) as a possible treatment for COVID-19, either alone or in conjunction with the antibiotic azithromycin. A close derivative of HCQ, chloroquine, prevented the spread of coronavirus – in cell culture – so it seemed promising. Anecdotal evidence seemed to say it worked. However, well-controlled studies demonstrated that HCQ was NOT effective for treating COVID-19 infection or as a preventative. In truth, it would be great if HCQ worked, but we cannot disregard the mounds of evidence to the contrary, including the clinical trials withdrawn or stopped because there was no practical benefit to using the drug.
How scientists communicate
When scientists can add new knowledge to what is already known, they write a formal research article. Articles are submitted to hundreds of research journals, where they are sent to other scientists to review and determine if the article should be published. This is how scientists primarily communicate with one another through published, formal research articles.
Every article in almost every journal is indexed in an extensive database called PubMed. PubMed is the go-to resource for science information - and it is freely accessible to anyone. If you search for “COVID-19 vaccine,” you will find a few thousand articles, all written since 2020. Narrowing the search to “clinical trials,” there are over 60 articles to date for all the different vaccines. While you rarely can read the full articles because of copyright laws, you can at least read the abstract and see the information on the safety and effectiveness of the vaccine for yourself.
Scientists write in a formal manner to represent specific objects, procedures, or concepts. It’s a challenge for non-science (and in truth for some scientists) to read and fully comprehend scientific articles. Science in the Classroom is trying to change that with annotated articles that make the research available to high school and college students. Even still, there may be words and phrases that are unfamiliar. That is where Google and Wikipedia can be helpful to learn definitions of unfamiliar topics.
When I read news articles about science, I look for clues that can help me search the PubMed database. I then try to find the primary source and determine the truth of the information. If I can’t find the source or if the information in the primary source is not faithfully and fully represented, then I know that the news is likely an opinion piece.
I challenge all of you to do the same. Before sharing a piece of news, particularly regarding COVID-19, examine the source and determine how the information fits with existing knowledge. Let the info inform your conclusion rather than letting a conclusion filter the information.
It is our duty as educators to educate our students and the general public on essential concepts. With science coming under fire in the wake of the pandemic, this blog post is an attempt to educate others on what scientists do, to stop talking about the rhetoric, and instead focus on the scientifically obtained facts about COVID-19.
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