Why evidence matters

How can scientific evidence help us in an age of “alternative facts”?

As chief data reporter for the Financial Times, John Burn-Murdoch uses statistics and graphics to dig into the most pressing issues of the day, covering everything from the economy to climate change, social issues and healthcare. His high-profile use of visualization and data science helped audiences around the world understand the complexities of the coronavirus pandemic. He helps to inject data and evidence-based argument into what can be very polarising topics.

In her new book, Beyond Belief: How Evidence Shows What Really Works, science journalist Helen Pearson tells the story of the global movement championing the idea that evidence, not opinions, should guide our decisions. For many years, most medical advice was based on doctors’ opinions and conventional wisdom, not solid science. Helen Pearson describes how evidence-based medicine swept the world in the 1990s—becoming the predominant form of medicine practiced today—and how the idea that evidence should guide decisions is quietly transforming a host of other fields as well. At a time when science is under attack and questionable claims run rampant, Pearson underscores the importance of evidence in all facets of our lives, empowering each of us to sift fact from falsehood and misinformation from the truth.

From the start of his reporting on climate change more than twenty years ago, David Shukman sought to convey the scientific evidence about it as clearly as possible - to try to give audiences a sense of what’s known about the risks and what isn’t. Key to that has been finding the right language to explain complex research in intelligible ways, a task he’s continued in his new book, The Response: A Story of Fire and Flood in Britain’s New World of Extremes, published in May 2026. The BBC’s first Science Editor, David now works as a speaker and consultant. Sir David Attenborough described him as ‘a leader in raising awareness of the climate emergency’.