Helen Mead, in her recent column (LT, June 17), wrote about inaccuracies when predicting the future.

There is something in humans that makes them seek predictions about the future, and there is no shortage of experts willing to satisfy this need.

In quite a few areas of activity, such predictions are bogus and utterly meaningless. Humans have trouble coping with the truth when that amounts to: we don’t know.

Where a story in the media is based on a report, then sourcing the report is vital.

Too often the story in the mainstream media is at best nothing more than a repeat of a press release and at worst a selective use of material from the release.

Sometimes, reports contain nuances that are omitted from press releases yet allow you to gain a far better understanding of the issues, findings and conclusions.

Risk, across a whole raft of areas of activity, is often poorly understood. Unfortunately, the mainstream media does little to improve the level of understanding.

My conclusions are that one should be very wary of the media and on balance there may be merit in limiting consumption and being highly selective on the basis that it is better being uninformed than misinformed.

Sadly, a great deal of modern journalistic output is now framed around sensationalism and measured by quantity, not quality. Quality journalism requires time and resources, but both of these commodities are in short supply.

Kevin, Colne (via website).