BBC Headline #7

BBC headline from the iPhone app from a while ago (18 March 2012).

Neutrinos “slow down” in new test

This headline suffers the following issues:

Quotation in Headline
Oversimplification
Bull

Quotation in Headline
As I have demonstrated many times you can get any old crank to say any old shit and then put it in a headline. Heck, you could even ask the desk jockey next to you to say something and then include their quotation. “He has a double direction reversible torch to see daylight, he’s that far up his own arse” says industry insider!

Oversimplification
Science and the method of science doesn’t follow a simple narrative or allow for simplification of its ideas. The original neutrino results were released because the scientists wanted criticism of their experiment, not because they believed the results to be true. Now, after nearly a year, they are closer to understanding the problems with the original experiment and are ready to try again. One scientific result does not a whole new paradigm make.

Bull
The neutrinos NEVER went faster than the speed of light and so they can’t have slowed down!