The EurekAlert site at www.eurekalert.org is yet another "science news" site that seems to just pass on press releases coming from university press offices. Nowadays university press offices are not a very reliable source of information, as they tend to display all kinds of "local bias" in which the work of researchers at the university gets some adulatory treatment it does not deserve. University press offices often make grandiose claims about research done by professors at their university, fawning or hype-filled claims that are often unwarranted. The press releases from university press offices often make unimportant or dubious research sound as if it was some type of important breakthrough.
The EurekAlert site says that it is "a service of the American Association for the Advancement of Science." That makes it sound like we would be getting some kind of "official science news" or at least news of better-than-average reliability. But very strangely at the bottom of each news story on the site, we read this notice: "Disclaimer: AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert system." How very strange. So if you look at the top of the page, you'll think the news releases are some kind of "official science news," as we see the AAAS acronym displayed prominently. But the bottom of each page makes it sound rather like the site is just a kind of a bulletin board where people can throw anything.
Looking at some of the stories, I can see why such a disclaimer appears at the bottom of each of the EurekAlert press releases. Some of the press releases make you say, "Come on guys, you call that Science News?"
A recent silly "science news" story at the EurekAlert site was entitled, "Does the human brain resemble the universe?" The story attempts to convince us that the brain resembles the universe because of strained reasons such as 70% of the brain is water and 70% of the universe is supposedly dark energy. That isn't very convincing, because we don't know that dark energy even exists. Moreover, a brain consists of fantastically organized cells, but neither stars nor galaxies are very organized.
Another very dubious story at the EurekAlert site had the headline, "Tel Aviv University study finds hyperbaric oxygen treatments reverse aging process." The "treatment" in question consisted of the pretty preposterous procedure of having patients breath through masks for 90 minutes on each of 60 different days in a special "hyperbaric chamber." No evidence is provided that any of the subjects in the study actually looked or felt any younger after such an absurdly inconvenient treatment.
What the study did was to analyze a bunch of cell types, looking for anything that might be reported as an improvement. A few minor things have been found, such as an increased telomere length in some types of cells. But since pretty small study group sizes were used (20 for one measure, and 25 for another), we have no robust evidence that some effect has been found that is not something due to pure chance. Since the study was not a preregistered study testing a hypothesis previously declared, and since no mention is made of blinding techniques, we should not have very much confidence in such results. There is no basis for thinking that some mere increase in telomere length would actually reverse the aging process. The aging process is typically believed to involve hundreds of different factors, and it is very doubtful that you can slow down aging merely by increasing telomere length in some cells. The study admits "the lack of a control group." A control group is usually considered an essential for any serious experimental medical study. The study also admits "the duration of the effect has yet to be determined in long-term follow-up." One of the three persons responsible for data analysis in the experiment is a shareholder of a company that stands to profit if a successful result was reported, and three of the authors are employees of such a company.
No robust evidence has actually been provided that the health of any of the subjects has been improved, and for all we know the health of the subjects may have worsened, because of some side-effect that was not looked for. The treatment described is some ridiculously impractical thing, and so inconvenient that I doubt even millionaires would put up with it. So what is our EurekAlert site doing, giving people false hope that some cure has been found for aging?
I will not discuss in this post the groundless press release found here on the EurekAlert site, because I already explained here why its triumphal annoucement is baseless. The EurekAlert story here is entitled "Melatonin: finally, a supplement that actually boosts memory." The story provides no robust evidence for such a claim, merely referring us to a study involving mice. That study is ridiculously low-powered, involving study group sizes of only 4 mice or 6 mice. It is very easy to get false alarm effects using such too-small study group sizes. 15 animals per study group is the minimum for a moderately persuasive experimental result. I have taken melatonin on and off at various times in my life, and never noticed any improvement in memory from taking it.
The EurekAlert story here gives us the erroneous headline "Astronomers detect extended dark matter halo around ancient dwarf galaxy." The astronomers didn't actually detect any dark matter. They merely "detected stars at the edge of Tucana II, in a configuration that is surprisingly far from its center." From this observation they are speculating that the galaxy has a halo of dark matter, but that's just a speculation, one of dozens of possible explanations for stars located in such a position. All that really has been found is some stars consisting of ordinary matter. Dark matter has never been observed, and never been detected.
Then there is the very misleading EurekAlert story here which is entitled "Genes for face shape identified." Making claims not actually made in the scientific paper, the story says, "Genes that determine the shape of a person's facial profile have been discovered." The claim that genes or DNA specify anatomy is a claim with no basis in fact. DNA and the genes inside it are not a blueprint, a recipe or an algorithm for constructing the human body or any of its parts visible to the eye, and bear no resemblance to any such thing. DNA and genes do not specify how to make any organ or appendage of the human, and do even specify how to make any of the 200 cell types in the human body. DNA and the genes inside it merely specify low-level chemical information such as the amino acid sequences that make up the polypeptide chains that are the starting point of protein molecules. The claim that genes or DNA specify high-level anatomy is a groundless claim that many biologists or science writers have been pushing for 70 years, ever since the discovery of DNA. Many other biologists (such as more than 20 that I quote at the end of this post) have pointed out that genes and DNA are no such thing as a blueprint or recipe or program for making a human body. The research discussed by the "Genes for face shape identified" merely has identified a slight statistical association between certain genes and certain differences in facial characteristics, which is an entirely different thing from discovering "genes that determine the shape of a person's facial profile."
An article on today's EurekAlert is entitled "Researchers have broken the code for cell communication," which makes it sound as if there is one code for cell communication that has been discovered. The two hundred types of cells in the human body actually communicate in thousands of different ways, with a diversity of communication as impressive as all the communication of the internet. The study discussed (involving mere yeast) has shed light on only one of the countless types of ways cells can communicate. Once again, some forgettable little study has been trumpeted to make it sound like some epic breakthrough. It will take scientists many decades or centuries to unravel all the ways in which cells communicate.
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