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John Oliver on "Bullshit Masquerading as Science"

posted by martyb on Wednesday May 11 2016, @04:55PM   Printer-friendly
from the just-the-facts,-ma'am dept.

butthurt writes:

The Washington Post reports on a video from the television series Last Week Tonight with John Oliver regarding flaws in science and in reporting about science.

Topics touched upon by Mr. Oliver include p-hacking, exploratory studies vs. confirmational studies, press releases, the "telephone" effect, animal testing, oversimplification, industry funding, sample sizes, and TED talks.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 12 2016, @07:59AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 12 2016, @07:59AM (#345119)

    I like the topics he covers but he is a comedy show. At least 10% of the stuff he says I notice is wrong in detail. Thats pretty bad the actual rate must be much worse.

    So... there are entire "news" channels dedicated to pushing a (mostly fictional) narrative. CNN fired it's entire investigative journalism department [cc.com] (a segment done by... John Oliver, when he was at the Daily Show). There is no more news, only "infotainment".

    ... and you have a problem with what is primarily a comedy program having "only" 80-90% accuracy rating. I long for the days when serious news shows had such high standards.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 12 2016, @04:05PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 12 2016, @04:05PM (#345278)

    Not just infotainment, but sponsored infotainment imagine yourself in a BMW that is indistinguishable Emirates cares from actual the American beer content.

    • (Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Thursday May 12 2016, @04:24PM

      by Joe Desertrat (2454) on Thursday May 12 2016, @04:24PM (#345291)

      Not just infotainment, but sponsored infotainment imagine yourself in a BMW that is indistinguishable Emirates cares from actual the American beer content.

      It may be that I am only similar in capability to the slow members of Oliver's audience, but I have no idea what the above means.