An eager reporter once came to Albert Einstein, took out his notepad, uncapped his pen, and shot him a question:
"What's new in science, professor?" Einstein, somewhat shaken, replied with a question of his own: "And did you already write all about the old science?" As usual, Einstein focused his answer on the real question, on which the actual question asked was based. In this case, Einstein touched upon the basic nature of current journalistic reporting of science news, the foundation on which journalists operate and go on to ask questions such as the above.
"What's new in science?" is the question asked of the scientific reporter at the editorial offices of his paper, whenever he musters enough courage to step inside. "Wait!" he wants to cry, "I still haven't told you all there is in the old science!" But the train of pages must leave on time, and whoever is late in boarding remains on the platform.
The newspaper--from the nature of its creation--is intended to run and tell the gang, as quickly as possible, all that's happening. What the Deputy Minister told the senior official, who cheated, who was sentenced, who bought what, why and for how much, what agreement is being talked between which countries, what new punishment the Treasury is cooking for us. Everything (fit to print). And yesterday's news, as has been noted, serves to wrap today's fish. Yesterday is dead, forgotten, unimportant. This principle (which, naturally, has exceptions) holds to a large extent for areas of activity in which "zigzags" can happen very fast. The political reporter can inform us today that a certain Knesset member expressed a certain position, and tomorrow he will report that coalition and/or opposition pressures made him change his mind. The financial reporter may write today about a deal signed to buy a block of shares in a given bank, and tomorrow he may have to report that a moment before the signature, the whole deal fell through. When reporting on scientific news, this kind of thing almost never takes place (and the explanation will be forthcoming).
The reporter on agricultural matters, or the police reporter, may get hold of a fragment of information and from it, based on his expertise, he may draw conclusions that will enable him to publish an exclusive story, interesting, important and correct. The scientific journalist (even if his knowledge in his specific field is not inferior to that of his colleagues in theirs), can never imitate this procedure.
Why? In what way is he different from other journalists? What kind of pride is this? These questions stand at the core of the book "Journalists and Scientists" (published by Free Press, New York, USA). The book documents a symposium that took place at the annual meeting of scientific journalists in the United States, with the addition of several articles and editorial notes (here, we could hold such a symposium within a very narrow cell, but this is another subject). It turns out that scientific reporters the world over face the same difficulties and the same dilemmas, and they are forced to overcome the same incomprehension on the part of their colleagues and, sometimes, their superiors.
The main difference between the scientific journalist and his colleagues arises from the uniqueness of his sources of information--the scientists. To put it mildly, we can say that these are intelligent, particularly critical people. Apart from specializing in their field, they specialize in writing papers. Every research report goes through repeated editing before being published. The scientist spends much of his time writing. This is why the scientific journalist is, perhaps, the best "scientist" among journalists, but (even if he is very gifted) he is far from being the best writer among scientists.
For scientists, life and death are held by the written word. Let me give an example: a senior researcher (a biologist), obtained 10 percent correlation in a certain experiment, which means a negative result. In his research report, he wrote that he obtained "very low" correlation (which also means a negative result). This person is today looking for work. His boss, the senior researcher in his field in the world, was charged with administrative responsibility for an act of scientific dishonesty committed by his assistant. The comparison with similar or more serious cases that take place in the world of journalism can be made by any journalist. Another example: A senior Israeli scientist, who also fulfilled important management functions, once exposed to journalists some of his ideas. It was a lecture, not an official article. The man got carried away by the impulse of his imagination and mixed together the actual and the ideal. Slowly, thin smiles appeared on the faces of those sitting in the hall. The man lost his management position and today he works in a low-standing sideline of his profession. We can understand from this, that the thin smile, expressive of condescension (not even contempt), is the scientist's terror. This is their "Room 101." A scientist who evokes such a smile has simply come to the end of the line.
We can see that a journalist who publishes inexact information (who writes, for example, "very little" instead of "10 percent"), puts his source in danger. Here we can ask, of course, who is paying the journalist his salary, the source or the editors? Since the answer is clear, we can then conclude that the journalist must place the interests of the editors ("prompt information") above the interests of the source ("exact information"). However, the truth is that it is possible to satisfy both. Furthermore, it is obvious that the editors as well should be interested in information being as correct as it can be. Nobody likes to deal with "explanations" and apologies.
The bridge between these two interests rests on an understanding that only at very infrequent intervals are there scientific news "of the day". Scientific research often lasts years. Preparing the reports on them, and on the findings, may take months. Writing, editing, proof-reading, objective criticism, and again the whole round. Only after this, the report is received for publication (as an article) in a scientific journal. If the discovery described is sufficiently exciting, there are good chances that after the scientific journal has come out, it will be quoted by the press agencies. Here the fun begins. At this moment, a "news item" is born. "The television networks report such and such discovery", the editor tells his scientific reporter. "Run and get me a full report, more interesting and exact than that of our competitors. You got exactly three hours to do it. Go!".
Certainly, under these conditions, it is rather difficult to avoid falling into the thin-smile trap. In the field of science, a nuclear scientist who is worth his salt will not express an opinion on research dealing with the physics of elementary particles. A neurobiologist investigating the nerve system connected with the sense of sight will not be interested even in listening to a question relating to exchange of materials in the brain. Should he be tempted to do so by the journalist, he might find himself trapped by the same thin-smile syndrome. Sometimes, the "item" quoted by the news agencies is the tip of the iceberg of long-term research projects that, in order to understand their background, people (who are not fools) invest many years of their lives. Even if we assume that a scientific reporter should be capable of quickly thrashing out huge quantities of chaff to find the grain, it is not clear whether he could or should react to such complex investigations on the basis of a hurried phone call. Sometimes, in order to be able to simplify a given topic, the scientific journalist must wade through scores of pages of not easy material, he must execute some mental connections based on his previous experience and knowledge and, after that, he must conduct some explanatory conversations. Sometimes, for each word that he writes in his newspaper, the scientific reporter must learn and understand a hundred words bearing a complex and concise message. This is no figure of speech, and no hyperbole. And any way we look at it, the process requires time. There is very little similitude and parallel between this work and reporting, for instance, on the statement of so-and-so about such-and-such, which can be obtained even in real time, by live transmission.
The truth is that dealing with "news" in this or that research is meaningless. It would be easy to write about some research and its findings many weeks before it comes to the news agencies and, by the same token, it does not become less relevant several weeks thereafter (in contrast with, for example, politicians' declarations, what goes on at the stock exchange, street demonstrations, security events, or changes in the rate of the value-added tax, which are of immediate relevance). In other words, perhaps reporting scientific developments should find its place in the inside pages of the paper, or in the weekly magazines. There, it is possible to publish (before or after the subject came to be "news") extensive articles, well designed, revised, that will pay due respect to the research quoted, and also, that will be better understood by those who really want to understand.
Here, the scientific journalist may have to face another hurdle, placed on his path by the most "sexist" word now circulating in editorial corridors: "magazinic". "They all want simple songs, on two chords", bemoaned a well-known Israeli songwriter. If he had been a journalist, he would have complained of being required to write "magazinic material". Magazinic is light, simple, colorful, sparkling, tickling, equal for all. An important scientific research can rise to the level of "magazinic" if it relates to a "good" human story, or if it "solves the mystery of the universe" and can sustain a headline proclaiming it to be the "discovery of the century", or if it promises medical salvation for a widespread and horrible disease. Without any of the above, the important scientific research may be regarded as trivial (!) or esoteric, or just "too difficult." The appearance of a marginal theater group (including the cosmic angst of a 20-year-old actress) can fill a two-page spread in the weekly supplement, or at least half a page plus picture in the daily inner pages. But an article on trailblazing research about co-evolution of two species will be printed, if at all, only if somebody struggles mightily to get it in.
However, "magazinic" also means the widest possible selection, or supply. A magazine is like a hunting shotgun: Instead of a single bullet, it shoots many tiny pellets that cover a wide area and can hit more individuals. Each such pellet, or article, can hit another target (a reader interested in another field). Obviously, no one reader is interested in all articles in the paper, or in the magazine. Whoever reads faithfully the sports pages perhaps is not interested in literary criticism, or in the fashion section. The person who reads the small print in the economics department perhaps will have no interest in historical reviews or legal analyses, or the tourist high spots of New Zealand. Therefore, it can be assumed that there is also a certain demand for articles dealing with science. Perhaps these readers, too, are entitled to a section "of their own" in the paper (which, of course, will be happy to play host also to "natural" readers from other departments. Guests, however, as everybody knows, do not rearrange the furniture in the host's home). All this, of course, provided that every intelligent person who reads the article attentively and carefully (not superficially) may in fact understand it. We do not talk to the reader in Chinese.
What is the extent of the demand? This is the million-word question. Each newspaper can measure this demand or estimate it among its readers, and afterwards allocate scientific matters the corresponding space in the paper's columns. The current (and universal) opinion, that readers want simple articles, and that there is no demand for more complicated ones, has not been examined so far by professional pollsters (and, according to the laws of statistics, it is clearly mistaken). It is possible that demand for such material is low, but it is not reasonable to assume it doesn't exist at all. Possibly, this derives from the fact that most journalists and editors studied and were interested in films/history/political science. People interested in physics, biology, chemistry and astronomy, almost do not arrive at newspaper offices. It is not clear why this is so, but it is so.
The current excuse for rejecting an article on scientific subjects is that it is "too difficult". Too difficult for whom? Honestly now, how many editors and journalists are capable of understanding an article that analyzes a certain taxation problem, printed in the economic section? How many understand academic literary criticism? How many skip the entire sports section? And yet these materials are printed because some "freaks" like them and look forward to them, and the paper wants to give them what they want. If this is true, perhaps it is only natural that there are some editors who have difficulty with science and are not interested in it, but this should not affect the rights of the reader who is interested in science. If the scientific reporter addresses his article to the editor who, to give an example, is a student of the cinema or a former sportswriter, he will lose his potential "natural" reader, who expects articles on scientific subjects (and who will not be satisfied by a laconic note in the news pages or by "magazinic material", colorful but lacking in substance). You cannot drink and whistle at the same time, or serve all editors and all readers with a single stroke of the pen.
Yivsam Azgad recently left his long-time position as science editor of Haaretz, a national daily published in Israel, to become spokesman and editor of Hebrew publications at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovoth, Israel.