Comment by andrewescott

I am increasingly of the view that we need publications for a lay audience that focus on debate between experts. While an opinion piece can seem reasonable on its own, it may be full of errors that are easily highlighted by an expert. However, popular publications today focus on publishing the opinions of well-known figures, and if there is scrutiny of their views it typically appears in a different publication. While this approach gives the non-expert reader a warm and fuzzy feeling of being informed, they may worse off than if they had read nothing at all.