Bad Science and Coffee-Mouth

This might be a rant…

Or, should I say, this might be yet another rant…?

A couple of weeks ago, the CDC put out some data on COVID deaths and, just as fast as a spreading virus, more than a few misguided social media influencers – who were mostly not scientists or medical professionals – nor do they play them on TV – jumped on a single data-point as proof that the numbers were inflated proving, by the way, that all these health precautions including quarantining were unnecessary…

Meaning, once again, that the social media sleuths and conspiracy theorists were right all along, and actual people of science – those folks who have dedicated their life’s work to medical research and deeper understanding of the often-invisible workings of the world – are not to be trusted.

On the one hand, I get it: Science can be complicated, subtle stuff that’s difficult to wrap one’s head around. Science involves observation, experimentation, data, mathematical models and connecting dots that can be wildly moving targets…

On the other hand, simplistically isolating one raindrop and declaring that now, finally, you have disproven all previously accepted, peer-reviewed works on the nature of water, unlocked the key to the hydrodynamics of the world’s oceans and proven that clouds are evidence that H2O isn’t subject to gravity, well…

C’mon, people…

Or, as my southern friends would say, “bless your heart.”

Science can be challenging stuff, particularly when it rubs up against previously accepted norms.

For instance, it wasn’t all that long ago that the Earth was obviously flat, the sun flew around it every day – and it (and, therefore, we) were clearly not only at the center of the universe – we were the Center of the Universe.

Galileo, of course, looked through his telescope, made his observations – and then famously landed in the slammer for the last several years of his life for espousing the heretical, heliocentric views of Copernicus.

The Pope and his peeps had a bad case of scientific confirmation-bias happening back in the day, making Galileo’s teachings, from the Papal point of view, a set of very inconvenient truths…

It should be noted that in 1992, a mere 359 years later, the Vatican admitted they’d made a bad call as far as Galileo was concerned…

Here’s the thing: As a species we love to be right. Goodness (and neuroscience) knows being right just plain feels good.

When we’re right, (even if only in our own minds) we get a lovely little shot of dopamine, making being right – and the behaviors that go along with it – addictive.

Being right happens a lot on social media, to the point it’s become sport to “own” those who are on the receiving end of that rightness – and the righteousness that goes along with it.

Just imagine the thrill of standing atop that heady, righteous mountain peak, waving the mighty 6% data-point flag of victory, having publicly (because, you know, social media) laid ruinous waste to that once-trusted institution, the United States Centers for Disease Control…

Now that’s some seductive power-tripping, ain’t it…?

It’s also remarkably lazy, irresponsible nonsense, the social media equivalent of yelling “FIRE” in a crowded theater.

Here’s a great piece by Dr. Zubin Damania, MD, aka ZDOGGMD, explaining, as he puts it, the “simple science” being conveniently overlooked by those pushing the 6% silliness…

And one of the tragedies is that this IS relatively simple science. It takes a critical eye, an understanding that there’s a bigger picture, a modicum of humility and curiosity – and a willingness to put down an addictive need to be “right” at all costs…

In other words, it requires one approach the available information – the entire data set – as an adult.

Aside from misguided political agendas – including the desire to drive ever-deeper wedges of division – there is really no excuse for dishing out the sort of non-scientific, (or worse yet, anti- or pseudoscientific) ridiculousness that virally infected Social Cyberville shortly after the CDC death rate data was released.

Personally, I find this sort of agenda-driven misuse of science maddening. Its far worse than even a severe case of coffee-mouth – and that’s nasty. It ruins an otherwise lovely morning and makes me feel anything but kissable…

On a more serious note, from a developmental point of view, this stuff lives in the realm of actions an angry, self-righteous adolescent would take: short of impulse-control and chock-full of simplistic indulgences appealing to equally simplistic ideologies, grasping for hand-holds that enable an avoidance of responsibility…

Don’t ask me to grow up. I can’t handle it.

Here’s my invitation…

Pay attention to your sources and dig a little deeper…

Avoid the temptation to consider what you see trending on social media as hard truth.

If something triggers you or sparks your own internal adolescent to righteous, angry life, be wildly curious, slow down and reach for the more grounded, consciously adult aspects of yourself…

Particularly when you’re tempted – say, by a seductive meme or shockingly revelatory story that lights up all those confirmation bias hot-buttons – to hit “share.”

Take a few breaths and a moment to be patient and present enough to know that if it’s really real today, it’ll still be real a day or two from now, and your “share” button will still work.

Because, if nothing else, approaching life from a place of conscious adulthood, embracing complexity and hanging out in responsibility beats coffee-mouth and spreading bad science – every time.