Raymond Klassen – Ideals and Identities

The ubiquitous mass market is pernicious. Why? It provides a quick fix to our unreflective desires – and we don’t comprehend the deep costs for fulfilling those desires. The deep costs include not only the contribution to global warming and the loss of biodiversity, the personal habits of overconsumption, and increasing isolation and a breakdown of social trust, but it more deeply erodes our own experience of freedom – from our fleeting experiences of autonomy to our more robust sense of community identity and the deep needs of recognition and personal power. Everything that is delivered on the platforms of the mass market hides such erosion from view. Many have argued that such an opacity in global finance and large tech companies has been an essential component in the widening gap between rich and poor. It is why I have written in such strong opposition to mass society. And today, I would like to take on one example of mass society – popular science – pop science.  

Pop science is science for the masses. The stock and trade of this industry is nifty insights and surprising facts, conclusions that amaze and astound. It brings the scientific fire from Mount Olympus to mere mortals below all in a way that won’t bore us to death. And this genre of scientific communication is nothing new, but it’s become increasingly popular with media figures that are more well-known than any of the scientists they talk about. On YouTube, there’s a burgeoning market for pop science, something I’m a very small part of. Pop science is the market’s answer to fractured attention spans and vast storehouses of available information. Many of us want a way to keep up to date with the latest science without becoming a part-time grad student. 

Most of the pop science from writers, speakers, and YouTube channels are incredibly useful for millions of people. Pop science serves as an introduction to subjects that people would otherwise know nothing about. But that all said, I think it’s worth talking about the limitations of top science, because the genre has certain constraints and incentives that we should wrestle with. So today we’re going to figure out what makes pop science popular and what counts as science in pop science. So, what makes pop science pop? 

Our story begins with Murray Davis, a sociologist who studied what makes an idea interesting. Ideas are interesting not because they are true, but because they subvert your weakly held beliefs about the world. To see how this works, let’s talk about the Barnes and Noble King of Pop Science, Malcolm Gladwell. Gladwell’s methods, if I can be a bit reductive, is presenting you with what you currently believe, what you think you know, and then presenting a series of arguments to explain the opposite. You know how winning is all hard work? Outliers exploring the role environment plays in success. You know how you should never judge a book by its cover? Blink. Thin slicing is a powerful force. You know how dyslexia seems like it’s always a disadvantage? David and Goliath, how being an underdog can actually be an advantage. But let’s go back to our definition. Why does Davis’s idea of interesting only include weakly held beliefs? Why aren’t all beliefs susceptible to this? To find out, let’s go back to Gladwell, who recently wrote a controversial article called The Unwatched Pop, an article about the lack of science on marijuana and the need for more evidence. The formula was the same as always, set up and knocked down a common belief that marijuana’s effects are fairly benign. 

The article was a disaster with critics coming out of the woodwork to tear it down as fear mongering and bad science. I would argue it wasn’t the signs that Gladwell got wrong. He’s always had a few detractors accuse him of not having a deep enough reading of the evidence. No, the severity of the backlash was unique and even Gladwell noticed. He had tried to subvert a strongly held belief and because of that it was rejected. People on both sides of an important belief tend to galvanize and entrench in their positions. So while Gladwell’s insights can normally pass the belief brain barrier without criticism, his insights were picked apart when he tried to write on something more controversial. Every chink in his argument was blown up to debunk his whole idea. That is the first feature. What makes pop science pop is an ability to subvert your weekly held beliefs. It must challenge you, but not challenge too much. 

The next feature is simplicity. Since pop science is communicating to a lay audience who doesn’t care about all the new ones in the topic, there’s a big focus on focus. It needs to provide a memorable takeaway. If the interestingness of an idea helps it get into someone’s head, the simplicity of an idea is what helps it stay there. For this reason, pop science promoters cultivate neat short sayings that sum up the whole topic. The 10,000-hour rule, the 7 habits of highly effective people. Popularizers are master communicators who know that most of what you hear or read you forget. They package their ideas neatly so that even if you forget 99% of the arguments, you remember the 1% of the conclusions. And even simpler than popsite books is TED, where you often don’t hear many arguments at all. There’s only time for a nice story and a conclusion from a charismatic speaker. Now, one of the challenges is when you simplify ideas enough, you not only get less information, sometimes you get misinformation. 

Often the first thing to go when trimming a script are counter arguments, nuance, and differing perspectives. This means that topics that are the best candidate for pop science uncontroversial ideas where the conclusion isn’t complicated. But where it all goes wrong is ideas containing plenty of dissent and other opinions, ideas that are broad, like say the topic of addiction. This is Johan Harari. He wrote a book on addiction called, “Chasing the Screen,” that presents the following idea: disconnection, primarily, not chemicals, is what causes addiction. During his promotion of the book, he did a TED Talk where he was presented with the ambitious task of summarizing a 400-page book inside of 14 min. He nailed the talk. It was compelling and he was met with a standing ovation. The only problem is that what he said in his TED Talk isn’t exactly what he said in his book. If I can summarize, he left out the primarily. Instead, he focused on his main thesis, that disconnection is an important part of addiction, and he shaped his talk around that. But because of the limitation on time, this important caveat drifts away and you’re left with disconnection, not chemicals, causes addiction. But is that Harari’s fault? I don’t think so. Everywhere he can in his books, in emails, along podcasts, he explains that he doesn’t think addiction is purely psychological, but those longer form media just don’t get the same level of distribution as a TED Talk because they’re less accessible and the ideas stop being neat. This is the challenge and strength of simplified ideas. Wherever you find them, you find an idea that sticks, but it always cuts against the strength and nuance of what it’s trying to convey. 

Now we come to the most vital aspect of pop science… the science. That is, what is said is backed by real robust results. Unfortunately, this seems to be the least important feature for popularity. Even if it’s the most important in terms of what pop science should aspire to. And the reason for this is that the appearance of being backed by science is often just as good as the genuine article when it comes down to market potential. 

Let’s talk about Adam Grant. He’s known to many of his colleagues as something of a boy wonder. He’s the youngest tenured professor at Wharton. All the while he’s been blossoming as a pop science celebrity. His best-selling book, “Originals: How Nonconformists Move the World,” was a sensation; he made a TED Talk out of it. He’s actually done multiple TED Talks, but, at this point, he’s kind of running up the score on the rest of us. Grant is the ideal case for pop science. He has a background in real scientific research and he’s a master communicator. Originals shows that it’s full of science-backed stories and studies made to amaze. One of which is that procrastination can actually help creativity. The procrastinators like me who rush in and do everything early are rated as less creative than people who procrastinate moderately. Procrastination gives you time to consider divergent ideas – or so we are led to believe. To think in nonlinear ways to make unexpected leaps. Now, I want to believe this. Because I procrastinate all the time. And it would feel incredible to chuck it all up to a secret way of being creative. Apparently, a lot of yuppies think this this idea has been disseminated in the New York Times, Fortune, Business Insider, even a Harvard blog. 

But what was the science backing this claim? Well, it wasn’t mainstream literature. Instead, Grant relies on unpublished research from his grad student. Seeing this, University of Calgary Professor Steele went to Grant and his doctoral student. He asked them to see the unpublished paper, to see the research that gave grounds to such a conclusion. They refused because the paper was still under review, and they didn’t want to share it before it was ready. Steele was puzzled by this. Here’s this claim made in the field that he is an expert in. Made to a public audience of literally millions of people. But when he tries to fact-check the claim, he’s told to wait until the research is ready. This was, 2017. Look, not sharing unpublished research is perhaps understandable, but Grant has already put the conclusions onto shelves everywhere. This is research that constituted a main piece of scientific evidence for the idea that procrastination can help creativity. For 3 years now, the study has been cited all across the internet, but the actual proof is still under review. This doesn’t mean the research is wrong. Grant could absolutely be right about procrastination, although I happen to know that Dr. Steele, a leading expert, finds this highly unlikely. My main point isn’t whether it should be a requirement in pop science to only write about published research. Who am I to say that? I just want to point out the simple fact that most people who read that chapter probably took Grant’s word for it and didn’t realize that this is a very controversial claim built on evidence that hasn’t been made public. 

But even when the data set is available inaccurate, the way it’s presented can also be misleading. Angela Duckworth, the author of Grit, famously claimed that West Point students who had more grit were 99% more likely to get through a training camp called the Beast Barracks. But if you dig into that research as Marcus Creedy did, you might be surprised to find out that 95% of all cadets made it through. While 98% of the grittiest candidates made it through summer training. Which isn’t bad, but I’m guessing when you heard 99% more likely to get through, you are probably expecting something else. And look, the issue here is not with words, Grant, or Duckworth especially. I want to be clear on that. They just happen to be some examples I stumbled upon. The problem is that no one catches this stuff. Pop science has a huge blind spot in self-correction because most of us never check the research beyond what is presented to us and even when experts do try to fact check the research, they either get roadblocked or they don’t have as big of a voice as the person publishing the claim. So, in the best case, most of the audience is still left believing bad ideas. Even if those ideas are based on a misinterpreted study, unpublished research or exaggerated results. But the issue of science in pop science doesn’t stop there. That’s just the challenges that we as an audience face. 

Now let’s talk about the challenges that creators of pop science face because we have a double-sided problem. Not only does the public often believe wild claims if they appear scientistic, but the pop science market also creates powerful incentives for popularizers to rush in to be the first to release an insight. This means people are often looking to the cutting edge of science for these insights, hoping to be the first. But the cutting edge is where things are untested. Things are unpublished. Moreover, it can be easy to focus on the studies that agree with you and ignore other literature. The problem with this is that scientific studies often contradict each other and choosing only one can create misleading conclusions. According to the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, if one cherry picks the right study, one could conclude that a very many common foods could either cause cancer or prevent it.

Of course, not all jumping to conclusions is about money or fame. Barry Schwartz wrote a really thoughtful article when it was found that “The Paradox of Choice” wasn’t as solid as advertised. He says that it is no doubt true that scientists sometimes seek popular audiences prematurely before their claims have been adequately tested by peers. He said, “I myself may have been guilty of this when I wrote The Paradox of Choice.” In most cases, the reason for this is that the scientist believes they have found something out that, while hardly certain, will improve the lives of some people. This is a very sympathetic cause. They feel compelled to share. But while well-meaning, this can be an excuse for any amount of misinformation that the pop scientist essentially hopes is later confirmed. 

This is where we have to ask ourselves, what do we expect of our science entertainers? Do we expect pop science to start conversations by arming us with dinner party tidbits? Or do we expect pop science to educate us efficiently and accurately using robust science. Different people give different answers, but maybe the most interesting take is an interaction between John Ronson and Malcolm Gladwell, which encapsulates the problem. John Ronson challenges Gladwell on a situation where getting something wrong in the tipping point led to actual problems in the real world. Ronson went to the Bronx and met her. A defender who said that when she started trying to talk to people about aggressive policing quite often. They said policing works. Malcolm Gladwell says it works. I read about it in “The Tipping Point.” Ronson says, “This whole generation of people’s lives were kind of damaged really seriously. You know, harmed as a result of broken windows. I wondered when I heard that story about Kate and you look pained for a moment… I wondered whether part of the reason why was because you said you don’t think journalists should have power. And there was a story about you having power.” Gladwell retorts, “Well, I think you’re probably overstating that is when you say I have power. These books are not policy prescriptions. They’re conversation starters. And when I say I want to start a conversation, what I mean is I would like to present a series of ideas and give people access to research to get them thinking about how to be smarter about something. But I would never go so far. I would never presume that I have all the answers.” Gladwell and Ronson both have valid points. On the one hand, you have Gladwell echoing the French philosopher Montaigne. “All I say is by way of discourse and nothing by way of advice. I should not speak so boldly if it were my due to be believed.” But on the other hand, you have Ronson saying, ‘well, we’ve got a problem then, because you are believed.’ So where do we go from here? 

Overall, pop science is a humbling reminder of how little we absolutely know for sure. Within books and videos that appear scientistic, there’s a vast range of surety, quality, and scientific robustness. And it’s difficult to sort through these to identify the capital T truth from what may be true from the downright misleading. On the whole, I have to believe that pop science is a positive. It is important that research sees the light of day and even critics like Professor Steele have mentioned that he’s grateful for voices like Grant. I’m also grateful. People like Grant, Gladwell, and Harari are an important part of the public getting informed. Not to mention that people like being informed and they aren’t going to stop consuming content that makes them feel that way. Especially if it’s quick and entertaining. But pop science, like everything else, is an industry with incentives, power structures, and limitations that we should pay attention to.

Namely that what sells are interesting ideas that subvert your weakly held beliefs packaged as efficiently as possible, appearing to be backed by science. I will reiterate that all the people I talked about in this article, whether it be Schwartz, Grant, Hari, Duckworth, and Gladwell, are not the worst in pop science or even especially bad. They’re actually the best in pop science which is why I chose them. I wanted to focus on the best and the brightest because I feel that if you’re going to critique a genre the way to do it is not by picking low hanging fruit. The way to do it is by picking actually the best in the field.

But some key “takeaways” are important here. To begin with, the mass society of logic to be “first-to-market” can harm the certainty to which all knowledge aspires. Further, pop science actually aims at our weakly held beliefs – not our deeply held social illusions. In other words, it really doesn’t transform; it tweaks. Lastly, it is designed for political discourse – that is, as conversation starters and not as policy descriptions. And this, of course, is where we have found ourselves: from mask-wearing to fight pandemics to questions over the right-to-life.

Mass Society, in the case of pop science, doesn’t lead us to a life of action or fulfillment. Instead, it leaves us insecure, unfree, and ultimately unfulfilled. And no wonder why we, the individuals subject to mass society, are depressed and anxious.