Welcome to Entanglements. In this episode, a special guests asks hosts Brooke Borel and Anna Rothschild: How did the first season go? And what’s on deck for Season 2?
On most episodes of Entanglements, our hosts invite two experts with differing opinions to share their points of view, in an effort to find some common ground. The point isn’t to both-sides an issue or to try to force agreement. Instead, the show aims to explore the nuance and subtleties that are often overlooked in heated online forums or in debate-style media.
Over the course of the season, the podcast has covered contentious topics ranging from artificial general intelligence to the Covid-19 lab leak hypothesis to fluoridated water. In this social experiment, the conversations have been surprising, challenging, and enlightening.
Below is the full transcript of the podcast, lightly edited for clarity. New episodes drop every Monday through the end of the year. You can also subscribe to Entanglements at Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
Brooke Borel: Welcome to Entanglements, the show where we usually dig into the biggest scientific debates in the news today. I’m Brooke Borel, Articles Editor at Undark.
Anna Rothschild: And I’m science journalist Anna Rothschild.
Brooke Borel: This is the final episode of our first season. And today we have a very special guest on, don’t we, Anna?
Anna Rothschild: We do. You could call him the originator of Entanglements.
Brooke Borel: Indeed, it’s Tom Zeller Jr., the editor in chief of Undark magazine.
Tom Zeller Jr.: Thanks for having me.
Anna Rothschild: Thank you for coming on.
Brooke Borel: So Tom originally came to me with this idea for this podcast to dig into scientific controversies in a different way. To figure out how we could bring people together on opposite sides of an issue and have a calm, respectful discussion, in the hopes of capturing more nuances in these conversations.
Tom Zeller Jr.: Yeah
Anna Rothschild: Right, and then Brooke and I workshopped the idea together, and thus Entanglements was born.
Brooke Borel: Congratulations, it’s a podcast! Anyway. So we’ve really been thinking of this as a social experiment. We realize we are not the first show to try to do something like this, but it does feel like in the age of the internet, those forums are fewer and farther between. And, you know, it’s not just a social experiment for our guests, right? It’s one for us, as journalists, and maybe even for our audience, as media consumers.
Anna Rothschild: Right. Can we all break through our entrenched ideas and try to hear another point of view?
Brooke Borel: Yeah.
Anna Rothschild: And, you know, in just the short time we’ve been working on this show, the world has changed a lot. Donald Trump was elected president again. He’s tapped a bunch of people with views on science that veer from the establishment for various governmental positions. And the media, and especially the science media, is scrambling to figure out how to cover all this.
Brooke Borel: Exactly. So for this final episode of our first season, we thought we would have Tom on to talk a little bit about, you know, what we’ve learned so far, and what we have on deck for next season. So, Tom, what gave you the idea for this podcast to begin with?
Tom Zeller Jr.: Yeah, I mean, probably Covid was the proximate thing. A lot of people were fighting — all the Covid wars over Covid origins. The wars over, you know, vaccines related to Covid. But it was also other stuff that was in the air, like pediatric transgender medicine, all of these sort of really kind of consequential political issues — where science was kind of at the center of it — were just, had become so fractious and just so polarized. And not just among people sort of bickering on social media, but among scientists and experts who seemed to be talking past each other in a way that just, in some way, I felt that we’d reached a moment where it was no longer instructive.
I think that the media was also doing this. We were, and we were modeling a sort of certainty about science that really isn’t sort of at the heart of that kind of enterprise. So that was sort of the main thing to me. I felt like there was a need or a niche to fill where we kind of tried to bring together experts, but I wasn’t sure exactly what that might look like. And that’s, that’s kind of why I brought it to you, Brooke. I mean, I’m curious to know, you know, how that struck you when I first came to you was just that sort of amorphous observation.
Brooke Borel: I mean, I really liked the idea. And it’s funny because I think that even though — despite all of that and despite the sort of fighting that happens online and in other media — I didn’t realize how hard it was going to be. I guess I’m just an optimist because it didn’t really occur to me how hard it would be to get some of these people to talk directly to each other.
And another thing, I mean, this occurred to me a little bit later in the process. Even as journalists, when we write stories, we are bringing a lot of these people somewhat in conversation with each other, but on the page of a story or whatever. They’re never actually talking to each other. And that seemed like a very interesting endeavor, to see what would happen if they were.
Anna Rothschild: Yeah it was really shocking to me too as a science journalist that we couldn’t get a lot of people to speak to each other. And maybe this is my bias, I just sort of thought that scientists would be a little bit more open-minded or like a little bit more, dare I say brave? I don’t know.
Tom Zeller Jr.: I think that’s a good word.
Anna Rothschild: You know, because I think that sometimes we got resistance because the issues were too heated, right? Like with lab leak.
Tom Zeller Jr.: Mm hm.
Anna Rothschild: But with other issues, I think that it’s more about money and funding and being worried about rocking the boat a little bit.
Tom Zeller Jr.: Mm hm.
Brooke Borel: I think that’s absolutely right. I will say with the Covid, with the lab leak one, I was talking about this with another journalist friend. And that person pointed out that — I mean, that fight had gotten so, so heated and we were pretty late to it. So at that point they were like probably tired of talking about it too.
Anna Rothschild: I think that’s absolutely true. And as you, I think, know, I had a lot of hesitation about whether it was even worth doing that episode because I felt like: This has been going on for 4 years now. Like, what are we — what is there to talk about, right?
Brooke Borel: Talk about the emails we got, though, from the guests.
Anna Rothschild: Yeah, so afterwards, both guests wrote us complimentary emails. One said something about that we added something to the conversation, the other said something along the lines of it being time well-spent.
Brooke Borel: Love that.
Anna Rothschild: I know. Which, I have to say I was surprised about it all, given how heated this conversation is. And, you know, we didn’t even get them to speak directly to each other.
Brooke Borel: Yeah.
Anna Rothschild: But I do think that talking about it almost more from like a “how do we know when science is done perspective,” was a really big value add.
Tom Zeller Jr.: I think that’s the most important point in all this in some ways is that I think it’s a natural reaction — and this happened with the climate debate too. And it happens elsewhere. It’s a natural reaction for both reporters, I think, and scientists who are talking about this stuff to become a bit weary of, you know, saying the same things over and over and over again. And, I feel like that in some ways is a tactical mistake, even if you are weary, because there’s always people out there who have not been following these issues closely enough.
There are always audiences out there who don’t have the technical background and the accumulation of evidence on either side, and they can’t weigh it properly. And so every time we sort of say that the science is settled — which to be fair, almost is never true, at least in a technical sense. I mean it’s a discipline that kind of depends on weighed risk and percentages and associations and correlations and not so much on certainty. And the minute we say we’re not going to have this conversation anymore, the people that you’re abandoning are really sort of lost. They can’t — it’s a body politic of voters and lawmakers who are robbed of an opportunity to get nuance.
Anna Rothschild: I’m wondering, Tom, like, is that part of why you wanted to do this because of sort of what you were seeing with how people trust science post-Covid or even during Covid?
Tom Zeller Jr.: Yeah, I mean, there was definitely a huge loss of trust in expertise. But I also was worried about loss of trust in the media, too, because we facilitate these conversations and we also facilitate these animosities. In some ways, I mean, there was a great deal of certainty on the part of the mainstream press about the origins of Covid long before there was really enough evidence to say one way or the other. I tend to think that the preponderance of evidence such that we have it — and in large part, based on the episode that you guys did — points to an animal origin or a sort of leap from the from the Wuhan market, But you know, I think there are so many people, if we didn’t have those conversations out there to look at — we would be, yeah, that’s what erodes trust, I think.
And when the media stops covering it, it erodes trust. When scientists stop talking about it, it erodes trust. And I think that’s even true for questions about climate change, for instance. Not that it’s, you know, whether or not it’s happening or not, but what we ought to do about it and what does the science say about how bad it’s going to be. And it’s much more complicated than Armageddon. So yeah, trust was a big motivator for me.
Brooke Borel: I wonder also with the incoming administration, we might see also science media, et cetera, digging in more on these things and sort of wanting to express more certainty than there is because of the folks that are going to be in charge.
Tom Zeller Jr.: I think that’s what went wrong the first time around, honestly. The press took this oppositional — understandably, because in a lot of ways — but that’s not our role. I mean, that’s really not our role. And while I don’t subscribe to the notion of, you know, objective journalism such that it is, because we all have points of view, I do subscribe to the idea that as a discipline, we sort of have an obligation to be open minded, we have an obligation to be fair, we have an obligation to bend over backwards to try to understand competing points of view, we have an obligation to understand that, you know, value systems vary so greatly across the population. If we assume everybody’s bad faith on one side, then again, the conversation is done.
Anna Rothschild: I mean, I’m curious from you, Tom, as the editor in chief of Undark — like one of the examples we’ve given in the podcast of something we wouldn’t cover, right, is the idea that vaccines cause autism. There is a preponderance of evidence showing that vaccines don’t cause autism. That being said, at what point, from your perspective, do you stop giving that a platform?
Tom Zeller Jr.: Yeah, I guess, you know, my initial inclination would be: Of course, we would not invite, you know, Wakefield onto the show to sort of mount a case. At the same time, I do find myself being a little uncomfortable, almost always, on foreclosing on conversations, no matter what they are. And I think to myself, even as you were asking the question, I was like, “well, of course I would not want to discuss, you know, the link between vaccines and autism.” But then another part of me, there’s some other voice in my head that says, is there a creative way to do that? Is there a sort of enlightening way to do that? Is there a helpful way to do that that would bring more people into the realm of reality on that issue?
Yeah, I figured you were going to challenge me on that. Like, where does it end? You know, do we bring in the lizard suit people, the flat earthers? I mean, I think we have to pick and choose, but I would also say that on a lot of these other questions we’re talking about, they’re nowhere near a lizard suit conversation.
Brooke Borel: Or even a vaccine and autism conversation. I mean.
Tom Zeller Jr.: Yeah. I don’t like shutting the door on most of these conversations just because you’re losing inquisitive minds out there who might otherwise have been reached.
Anna Rothschild: I have a question for both of you, too. One of the things that I’ve thought about as I’m sort of deciding whether or not an episode is worth doing. So just to come back to lab leak for a second. Something that really swayed me that it was worth doing is the number of Americans who believe that Covid came from a lab in China.
Tom Zeller Jr.: Yeah.
Anna Rothschild: And I can see with something like vaccines, RFK Jr. is going to probably be the Secretary for Health and Human Services.
Tom Zeller Jr.: I mean, if he is approved.
Brooke Borel: We’ll see. We will see.
Anna Rothschild: If he’s approved. And that idea is going to be out there much more in the next few months. I’m really curious if the number of people who believe a thing has been part of your calculus for choosing topics.
Brooke Borel: For the podcast specifically, I mean, for me, I think that’s part of it. But also I’ve been — the way I’ve been thinking about these questions that we’re asking is these are questions that you see flying around in the media and on social media. And they’re framed in these ways that are like a debate, like: Is AI really going to kill us all, for example?
Anna Rothschild: Yeah.
Brooke Borel: I didn’t put exact numbers to those things, but that’s how I’ve been thinking about these questions and what we should be covering and showing what these debates actually are really about and the more nuanced sort of take on it. We originally did not have fluoride on the roster for this season. We had it as a possibility at some point — but we actually, once we heard the RFK news, between that and that case in California, where a federal judge was like, “hey, EPA, you actually have to take this seriously and reconsider, you know, whether or not you should be regulating this differently” — we moved that into the season for that reason. So I think kind of paying attention to what is on the minds and sort of at the forefront of people like floating through their headlines or however many people believe a certain thing or not. Yeah, certainly. I think that that’s going to play a role.
Tom Zeller Jr.: How did that — I mean, I’m curious how you felt about going into that particular topic, either of you, because, you know, in some ways I’ve often thought it’s axiomatic that fluoride is fine. It’s been a good thing. It’s been a public health revolution to me that’s sort of akin to some of the questions we were talking about, like where you draw the line. But and yet here we are. I mean, did you feel the same?
Brooke Borel: I felt — I mean, so I edited, we of course have now published a few pieces at Undark, including one big investigation about what’s happening with the fluoride research right now, and I edited those pieces. And the first piece came to us through, I think, a whistleblower situation. But I felt kind of like, “oh no — I don’t — do we want to cover this?” In some ways it feels like it has been sort of an off limits topic in science journalism because everyone’s like, no, this one’s pretty settled. This is silly. This is like tinfoil hat stuff to even engage with this seriously.
And to be clear: The science is definitely not settled that it is definitely a danger for people. But it is a lot less clear than I thought it was. And so by the time we got to the point that we were going to perhaps tackle this on the podcast, I had a better sense of: “yeah, I think this is worth doing for these reasons, and we have to be very careful in how we’re explaining what this evidence is.” But yeah, I think when I’ve told some friends and colleagues that we’re including an episode on that, some of them have given me a side eye.
Tom Zeller Jr.: I mean, and I think that the reaction that you got and, you know, we got some of it as a publication too, from our colleagues in the science journalism world who — I think that reaction is in some ways part of the problem. There was nothing in the episode that you two have done on fluoride that was anything but nuanced, accurate, careful reporting. Which is what we should be doing.
We’re in a period where journalists are sort of, I don’t want to say that they’ve become cheerleaders for certain strains of science, but they certainly feel like it’s their duty to sort of hold the line on certain evidence and not question it and maybe even be allies of you know scientists tribe A versus bad scientists tribe B. And then we end up with sort of slanted coverage and and not very enlightening journalism and so I — it worries me when I hear that like fellow journalists are sort of thinking we’re stirring the pot. We’re giving ammunition to, you know, crazies. I — that really disturbs me.
Anna Rothschild: Yeah, I have to admit, to that point, Tom, during reporting for the lab leak piece, certain scientists writing me mean emails was extremely difficult for me. Not because it’s always unpleasant to get a mean email from somebody, right, but because these are people who I have deeply respected in my career as a science journalist — but also just a person who loves science and has followed science for a long time. And so I did feel like, “oh, damn.”
Tom Zeller Jr.: You feel like you were doing something wrong?
Anna Rothschild: Yes. Absolutely.
Brooke Borel: Well, and also — I mean, if I may, Anna.
Anna Rothschild: Yeah, please.
Brooke Borel: I think you even were worried at one point — I think you said “I am worried that this episode is going to hurt my career.”
Anna Rothschild: I did think that. I felt that way at one point. Because also, I mean, particularly being a science journalist who covers that — I’ve done a lot of coverage of vaccines since before the pandemic. And so a lot of these people are sources that I’ve reached out to many, many times over the years who I have a good working relationship with. And I felt a little uneasy about it all. I’m really, really glad we did the episode ultimately.
Tom Zeller Jr.: I am.
Anna Rothschild: And I am very proud of it. And, yes, I also was surprised by my reaction and a little disappointed in myself to be perfectly honest.
Brooke Borel: But we’re all humans, right? Right? I mean, this is like — we’re all, we’re humans. We’re human.
Tom Zeller Jr.: Absolutely, absolutely. And you know, what does it say about the state of our culture and about our profession if very obviously talented, conscientious science journalists wonder about the integrity of their own career simply by talking about something? Simply by talking with other scientists, with scientists about this issue? That’s a problem. I mean, that’s a real problem. If you’re feeling that way and you’re getting those sort of signals from the culture, then that’s something that we really need to fix, I think. And I think you guys are both, you’re fixing it. You’re helping in a small way that we hope is getting bigger. I mean that, I mean that, I really do.
Brooke Borel: We’ll see, Tom. Tall order there.
Tom Zeller Jr.: What are you guys working on next? What are you thinking about for another season? What are the hot topics and debates that you are going to try to mediate in 2025?
Anna Rothschild: One that I think would be really interesting based on the fluoride episode is IQ and whether IQ tests are a good measure.
Tom Zeller Jr.: What draws you to that idea?
Anna Rothschild: I guess I just thought it was really interesting that Scott Tomar, who was one of our guests on the fluoride episode, was casting doubt on that measure of testing cognition in kids.
And you know, IQ is used as a proxy for all sorts of things that happen in our brains. So shouldn’t we be sure that it works well?
Tom Zeller Jr.: That’s a good one.
Anna Rothschild: And then another that I’m really interested in is should we mine the deep sea? Could basically sucking up metals from the floor of the ocean solve all of our climate problems, or are we just destroying another ecosystem?
Brooke Borel: One topic that we really wanted to do this season and it just didn’t work out — we couldn’t get the right guests on — is to tackle geoengineering. So I’m hoping we’ll get to revisit that next season. We also have some ideas, like, various health claims. I’d like to dig into — maybe something in nutrition science. I don’t know. These are in the headlines so much, like, is meat safe for us or is this safe for us? Or is that? So I think that we could have some interesting conversations there.
Anna Rothschild: I would love to do gain of function experiments.
Brooke Borel: Oh yeah,
Tom Zeller Jr.: Yes. Should we? Yes. Yes.
Brooke Borel: Maybe we’ll do mirror cells.
Anna Rothschild: Totally. Though I also think we should probably quickly explain what that is. So, just, for those who don’t know, researchers are creating synthetic proteins that are in the reverse orientation of what’s found in nature. And a group of scientists just warned that mirror microbes made with these proteins.
Brooke Borel: Which, to be clear, don’t exist yet. Right?
Anna Rothschild: Right, yes, those don’t exist yet. These scientists warned something like — I think the quote was that they could cause “unprecedented risk” to life on Earth.
Tom Zeller Jr.: I mean, you have to do it.
Brooke Borel: Put it on the list.
Tom Zeller Jr.: Mirror microbes. I don’t know. I do think that, you know, for an inaugural season, you guys really knocked it out of the park. I really think you guys just took the idea and ran and so I’m grateful.
Anna Rothschild: Thank you so much, Tom.
Tom Zeller Jr.: Yeah, thank you. What a great ending.
Brooke Borel: What a great ending. Let’s end it there. Hey listeners, what do you think we should cover next season?
Anna Rothschild: Yes, please send us an email at [email protected].
Brooke Borel: And that’s it for this episode of Entanglements, brought to you by Undark magazine, which is published by the Knight Science Journalism Program at MIT. The show is fact checked by Undark deputy editor Jane Reza. Our production editor is Amanda Grennell, and Adriana Lacy is our audience engagement editor. Special thanks to our editor in chief, Tom Zeller Jr. I’m Brooke Borel.
Anna Rothschild: And I’m Anna Rothschild. Thanks for listening, see you next time.