PHYSICISTS have been dreaming about gravitational waves for decades. Zinging out from cataclysmic explosions in our Galaxy, these tiny ripples in space-time would tune us in to a whole new cosmic broadcast. So if Italian researchers really have detected them, it is fabulous news. How big is that if?
The team has yet to prove the result is real, but we thought it was time for a lively discussion (see 鈥淕ravity waves detected at last?鈥�). The leading lights of physics didn鈥檛 all agree. Some were loath to comment, and one advised us not to mention the news in New 杏吧原创 at all.
Perhaps they are simply worn out by d茅j脿vu. Several unconvincing reports of gravitational waves have sparked furious arguments in the past 鈥� and no one will be too shocked if the latest signal also turns out to be a mirage. But is this a reason to stamp the experiment unfit for public consumption? Is it ever a good idea to hush up complicated and controversial findings in this way?
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This magazine would say no. However, parts of the scientific community seem increasingly willing to reply with a maybe or even a yes 鈥� and not just over gravitational waves. Last month, the Association of Medical Research Charities in Britain introduced guidelines that would deny funding to teams that publicise findings prematurely or hype the implications of their results. Other organisations are also considering tougher rules.
You鈥檇 be forgiven for thinking such steps are needed. PR-wise, the scientific community has certainly been having a rough time of it. In life sciences we have seen repeated linking of the MMR vaccine to autism based on evidence most researchers thought was irredeemably flimsy, and a row over whether genes did or didn鈥檛 spread from genetically modified maize to wild relatives in Mexico. Not to mention publication by press release, fuelled by biotech companies unveiling findings to city investors before the scientific community.
Physicists, meanwhile, are licking their wounds after blistering rows over so-called 鈥渂ubble fusion鈥�, the much-trumpeted discovery of a new element that never was and revelations of data fabrication at one of the world鈥檚 most famous electronics labs.
Small wonder then if those holding the purse strings believe too many scientists are shooting from the hip, or worse, and that someone needs to get a grip. Trouble is, the proposed remedies, blacklisting scientists who go 鈥渙ff message鈥� and browbeating journalists into airbrushing away problematic findings, are worse than the disease.
To begin with, taxpayers and charity donors continue to fund much basic science. So they have every right to be informed of progress, even if it is messy and inconclusive. To say otherwise is to conceal the true nature of scientific discovery and imply people are too simple-minded to cope with anything more than sanitised eureka moments.
Second, can anyone say precisely where hype ends and legitimate optimism begins, or at what point in the scientific process premature findings turn into respectable preliminary ones? It鈥檚 impossible to draw reliable lines, and to pretend you can expose science and the journalists who write about it to charges of censorship and/or collusion.
Take gravitational waves. With a Nobel at stake, rivalry between teams is intense. What鈥檚 more, hundreds of millions of dollars are being spent on a major detector called LIGO (see 鈥淔ocusing on gravity鈥�). The Italian findings don鈥檛 for one minute make this mighty project redundant, not least because discovering how to analyse gravitational waves across a spectrum of energies 鈥� LIGO鈥檚 forte 鈥� will be as important as detecting them.
Superficially, however, the new findings could make the larger project harder to sell to politicians and the public. And it is this, paradoxically, that seals the case for openness, since keeping quiet about any news simply because it threatens inconvenience is a recipe for triggering florid suspicions of a cover-up.
Ironclad evidence of gravitational waves will only drop from the heavens if we see a nearby star explode, and the last time that happened, Shakespeare was still penning plays. Instead, unmistakable gravitational waves are likely to emerge gradually from a cacophony of confusing background noise. That could take 10, or even 20 years. In the meantime, we are surely all grown up enough to hear from the pioneers of these experiments, whether they鈥檝e got definitive proof or not.