Interesting, OP, I was reading about neural oscillations a few weeks ago: http://voyteklab.com/neural-communication-jazz-not-symphony/ I've found it's easy (enough) to find dense scientific literature online, it's just a matter of searching the right way, which takes practice. I can find complex dissertations on quantum mechanics, neuroscience, biology, semiotics, linguistics, astrophysics and so forth. Also, youtube can be awesome for this kind of thing. The frustrating thing about trying to find quality scientific literature online: 1) I find when doing the initial search, I run into a LOT of websites that are geared for the average reader. 3rd grade, 5th grade, elementary school reading level. They also repeat themselves a lot (a trick writers use to help readers understand things). It takes me a bit of work to wade past all of that to find actual scientific papers, with college level and higher reading levels. 2) There are people writing papers and blog posts that have no idea what they're talking about. People who deliberately troll. People who propagandize, try to shape public opinion, political or moral agenda. And just bad writing in general. So many science articles I come across purport to discuss a complicated scientific topic, but out of 7 paragraphs, there's one sentence of actual information. The rest is baggage and filler. This last part requires skepticism, knowledge of cognitive fallacies, and the ability to recognize these things.
Brad Voytek is awesome! I just took a grad seminar with him on oscillations this year, which is why I have all this random knowledge about it. Such a cool guy, and he's also very interested in public dissemination. Yeah, I agree that this is a problem. Plus, these kinds of websites often are about providing basic information, not about the nuances of some field. Headline results always need to be taken with about a bucket of salt, but you never hear about it and just get a nice simple story. Yup. Super annoying when people read these and then just take the author's word for it and consider it definitive evidence for their viewpoint. It would be fantastic if there were some sort of in-between -- like a mini-review article, but with less jargon and more clear explanations and discussion about the field's standards, methodology, etc.I find when doing the initial search, I run into a LOT of websites that are geared for the average reader. 3rd grade, 5th grade, elementary school reading level. They also repeat themselves a lot (a trick writers use to help readers understand things). It takes me a bit of work to wade past all of that to find actual scientific papers, with college level and higher reading levels.
There are people writing papers and blog posts that have no idea what they're talking about. People who deliberately troll. People who propagandize, try to shape public opinion, political or moral agenda. And just bad writing in general. So many science articles I come across purport to discuss a complicated scientific topic, but out of 7 paragraphs, there's one sentence of actual information. The rest is baggage and filler.