"The discovery that will change our view of science" or the scourge of hyperbolic headlines

Ever since Google began bombarding us with news related to our interests from digital media, I've been constantly receiving news stories with headlines like "the discovery that will change our view of..." or "that revolutionizes" this or that field, or "that could change everything." Of course, there are discoveries that change our understanding of a certain area of ​​knowledge and deserve such headlines. But if this profusion of extraordinary milestones were credible, it would indicate that we are experiencing a scientific revolution in the sense of Thomas Kuhn ... in all disciplines within a few years! And this, even though the available equipment and the global population of scientists surpass those of past eras, is completely implausible. Multiplying these hyperbolic headlines not only offends the news that deserve them, but also conveys to citizens a biased and somewhat frivolous view of how science works and advances.

It's now understood that the more spectacular a headline is, the more citizens will click to find out what it's about, and this impulse to satisfy curiosity fuels advertising revenue. Or not? The digital media that disseminate these stories underestimate citizens' capacity for learning, especially after a few years of experiencing the relative disappointment that comes with taking the bait and reading some of the news that accompanies those headlines. In fact, exaggeration in general may not be a communication problem when it's part of cultural habits that the interlocutor or reader can decode. This, like so many things, can function as an arms race, and these media outlets will invent new ways to surprise or scare readers to provoke a click. But the speed of cultural and customary change in recent years in our societies—remember life without cell phones —suggests that at some point we might well stop taking the bait and that our skepticism will eventually cool the bombast of the headlines.

In fact—I should have pointed this out earlier—serious media outlets, like the one I'm writing for , usually handle news about scientific discoveries appropriately. Scientific dissemination , especially in print media, has made incredible progress in rigor, timeliness, and agility in recent decades in our country. But what should we do with the science news from those other media outlets that are adorned with those kinds of headlines? I suppose they won't buy my definitive remedy for so many ills and dysfunctions that torment our society: a good universal education that develops our critical spirit and isn't the privilege of a certain group.

If we ask ourselves how this happens, the final hyperbole in the headlines is not usually attributable to the press offices of universities or research centers, even though their mission is to polish what is done there. We researchers should calm our egos and modulate some of these headlines that are proposed to us, instead of inhibiting ourselves because we are not experts in communication. The media are primarily responsible, with the writing of the aforementioned headlines—who knows, perhaps aided by AI—and with the selection of parts of the original press release, although the news agencies that distribute them also tend to use only parts of it. There are perhaps two aspects that are susceptible to exaggeration: the impact on global knowledge in the scientific field in question and the usefulness of the discovery to society. Neither is directly verifiable for an ordinary citizen. But it is also not unlawful to suggest that a discovery may contribute in the future to making life easier or curing a disease if someone familiar with the field so deems it. Therefore, to help alleviate this problem, I can't think of any better recommendation, aside from the need for the evolution of our society to correct this practice and for these media outlets to improve their accountability in how they disseminate certain news— the accountability of the Anglo-Saxons—than trying to differentiate between scientific findings that have already brought about change (whether exceptional or not) and those that point us toward a possible future. Regarding the former, at least, the headlines should be much more measured and in line with reality. Regarding the latter, one could be more optimistic as long as the forecast is actually made by a researcher in the field and not someone from communications or the media.

You'll tell me that inflated headlines are used in press articles on any subject or topic, not just in science news. And that's true. But in the field of science, where facts are associated with probabilities and burdened with a certain amount of uncertainty, exaggerations fit particularly poorly. If they try to sneak in, since we're all human, someone in the scientific community will take care of checking them out in peer review.

Gonzalo Nieto Feliner is a biologist, research professor at the CSIC, and former director of the Royal Botanical Garden.