This is a VERY interesting article that will help you understand the difference between science, junk science and News. (Unfortunately the last two are closely related)

http://www.bazian.com/pdfs/HowToReadANewsStory_vers03_26Nov08.pdf

Pay close attention to the part about 'Conference Abstract.' That means it hasn't been peer reviewed yet to see if the idea actually holds up or has more holes than a spaghetti strainer.

Peer review is not blogging, nor is it Kipling-esque monkeys dancing around chanting "This is true, we all say so." It's rough. I often refer to the scientific process as getting 'jumped into a gang.' (The newcomer has to fight everyone in the gang to prove his worth to join.) If you come up with a scientific idea, there are a lot of other very smart people who are going to throw that idea a beating. If the idea stands up to this smack down, THEN and only then does science accept it as fact.

And that's what gives us junk science. Someone gets an idea, presents it as an abstract and the news prints it as though it is carved in stone and already scientifically approved. In fact, a big grumble among scientific type is when someone goes running to the press to get their idea published as THE TRUTH (tm) before it has been fully tested and peer reviewed.

Here's an important thing you may not know. Do you know the difference between
a hypothesis
a theory
and a law?

It's got everything to with being tested and found to stand up (surviving the smackdown).

A hypothesis is an idea that a smart person came up with about a subject.

The dictionary says: A proposition or set of propsitions, set forth as an explanation for the occurrence of some specific group of phenomena either asserted merely as a provisional conjecture to guide investigation.

In other words, it's an idea. An idea that you need to check out to see if it's true.

And that DOESN'T mean it's true because a bunch of people want it to be true. In other words just because someone says "this is how it is" doesn't make it so. This is where the news and publishing industries really muck up people's understanding of science and promote junk science. (As in don't bother going through peer review, run out to the press or get a book published ... folks will believe it's true because you have letters behind your name OR because you're getting them all riled up).

A theory on the other hand is a hypothesis that is halfway through the being jumped in process. There's been some people beating on it for a while and it has withstood what has been thrown at it so far.  Does it work here? Yes. Does it work there? Yeppers. Does it still hold true over there? We don't know, we haven't tested it under those conditions yet.

If it falls down over there, then it's back to the drawing board with the theory.

There is however an interesting exception. That is the Theory of Evolution. There is NO theory that has been as well tested, reviewed, studied and tried to figure out than evolution. It works, they know it works and they got the proof. So why is it still a theory?

Because they haven't figured out HOW it works.

That's the booger. Does evolution work over time or in giant spurts? Uh... yes. Okay so how does it know to do which one? We don't know ... that's why it's still a theory. 

Laws however, are senior gang members. They've not only been jumped in, but they've kicked some ass. It's been tested and proved under all conditions (over here, over there and way over yonder) and found that it works. Most importantly scientists know HOW it works.

For example: Force = mass x  acceleration pretty much works everywhere until you get to quantum. In the physical world laws work reliably every time.

Here's a big issue though, courtesy of the media, news and publishing houses you're going to hear a LOT of hypothesis presented as if they were laws.

In fact, when a person with letters behind his name makes a statement of A=B, unless this idea has gone through the scientific process then what you're hearing is a hypothesis, NOT the undisputed truth.  But see new sources don't care about that slow and boring scientific process, that takes too long. They want to get their story out NOOOOOWWWWW!

So they're going to make it sound as if this "Hey, I got an idea" is as solid as the laws of gravity.

The link
http://www.bazian.com/pdfs/HowToReadANewsStory_vers03_26Nov08.pdf
gives you some ideas how to tell the difference. Because a study is just a tool in the whole peer review process. It isn't proof positive. Which also should make you kind of wonder about people who use studies to promote their agenda.