Do You Recognize Betteridge's Law of Headlines?

From time to time, journal articles and Op Ed's are titled with a question and a question mark.   There's a name for that.

I ran across this topic while reading the genomics blog at CDC, in a July 2017 article by Scott Gross and Dave Dotson.   Here.   As they discuss an article called, "Cost effectiveness of pharmacogenetic guided treatment: Are we there yet?" (Verbelen et al., 2017, here), they opened by citing Betteridge.

The gist of Betteridge's Law: "Any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word, NO."

For more on Betteridge, see Wikipedia here.  Calling this principle Betteridge's Law dates to about 2009.  Wikipedia also dates it to Marr in 2004 and earlier examples.

Here's a headline that would invite puzzlement:  "Is Betteridge's Law True?"

From Lancet Oncology today: Op Ed title and question mark

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Footnotes.

Not to be confused with (William) Beveridge, a father of the UK NHS.   

In Gross and Dotson, they believe that "cost effectiveness of PGx" is too broad a topic, and it's better to ask when and where PGx is cost effective, not "if it is."

There are exceptions.  For example, MedPage Today "Are Medical Meetings Skewed Toward Big Pharma Trials?"  (Yes!)  Here.   This headline was highlighted I believe on Twitter by Vijay Prasad at OHSU circa 10/1/2019.