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Posted on 10/05/2003 7:39:44 AM PDT by aculeus
The Royal Society today (2 October 2003) attacked ‘The Guardian’ newspaper for putting its own commercial interests ahead of the public good by publishing a speculative article about the contents of scientific papers due to appear in one of the Society’s journals.
In response to publication of the front-page story ‘GM crops fail key trials amid environment fear’, Stephen Cox, Executive Secretary of the Royal Society, said: “Last week’s report on the GM public debate stressed that the public wants “confidence in the independence and integrity of information about GM - the assurance that it does not reflect the influence of any group with a special interest for or against GM”. We believe that the information in this speculative article, which ‘The Guardian’ describes as “a serious setback to the GM lobby”, flies in the face of this plea from the public.
“The eight scientific papers describing the results of the GM farm scale evaluations, which are due to be published in ‘Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society: Biological Sciences’ on 16 October, contain a lot of information. The journal is aware of the wide interest in these papers and is preparing them for publication on its website where they will be freely available to all. We encourage all interested parties to consider the full contents of the papers once they are published and to engage in a debate about their implications.
“This attempt by ‘The Guardian’ to summarise in a soundbite the entire contents of the eight scientific papers has not been checked for accuracy by either the authors of the papers, who carried out the farm scale evaluations, or the journal. In fact, it does little more than repeat much of the content of a similarly speculative article that appeared in ‘The Independent’ newspaper on 2 August.
“The article in ‘The Guardian’ is wrong about the publication date of the scientific papers, even though that information was made public three weeks ago, and misrepresents the journal’s reasons for rejecting a ninth paper about the farm scale evaluations. You can draw your own conclusions about how accurate the rest of the article is likely to be.”
“Media reports like this, which are purportedly based on leaked information, will inevitably provide a misleading and inaccurate impression of the full contents of the scientific papers. Indeed such reports are likely to be biased by spin applied by the alleged sources of the leaks to further their own interests.
“We understand the commercial pressures under which ‘The Guardian’ and other media outlets are placed, and that an exclusive story based on a leak may boost numbers of readers, viewers or listeners. Nevertheless, we believe such commercial interests should not outweigh the public interest in the provision of an accurate account of the full contents of the eight scientific papers.
“We appeal to editors in the print and broadcast media to ensure that reports about the eight scientific papers are based accurately on their full published contents and not on speculation that cannot be checked for reliability.”
NOTES FOR EDITORS
1. The Royal Society is an independent academy promoting the natural and applied sciences. Founded in 1660, the Society has three roles, as the UK academy of science, as a learned Society, and as a funding agency. It responds to individual demand with selection by merit, not by field. The Society’s objectives are to:
- strengthen UK science by providing support to excellent individuals
- fund excellent research to push back the frontiers of knowledge
- attract and retain the best scientists
- ensure the UK engages with the best science around the world
- support science communication and education; and communicate and encourage dialogue with the public
- provide the best independent advice nationally and internationally
- promote scholarship and encourage research into the history of science
For further information contact: Bob Ward, Press and Public Relations, The Royal Society, London Tel: 020 7451 2516 or 07811 320346 Email: press@royalsoc.ac.uk
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Excellent!
Bump for the criticism of speculative science(examples of which, shall for the moment, remain unnamed).
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