The New Science of Putting "The New Science..." in Every Book Subtitle
MNFKBA: Make Nonfiction Kinda Boring Again
If we’re going to embrace new science, let’s make it “the new science of understanding that science is complicated, and life is complicated, and there’s not going to be one big, brilliant answer to all our problems, and that maybe life is about figuring things out little by little, incorporating bits and pieces of knowledge and wisdom as they come to light, and slowly bringing ourselves closer to our potential for happiness and health.”
Maybe you’ve heard already, but old science sucks. Old science is stupid. Old science is, you know, old.
Not this new science. New science is awesome. New science is fresh and exciting and is turning the world upside down. Best of all? New science takes things we thought were hard and makes them easy and simple.
Don’t believe me? Don’t believe that “new science” is taking over the world?
Here’s a sampling of subtitles from some of the top-selling popular science/self-improvement books currently on the market:
The New Science of Cause and Effect
The New Science of a Lost Art
The New Science of Psychedelics
A New Science of Consciousness
The New Science of Expertise
The New Science of Everyday Wonder and How It Can Transform Your Life
The New Science of Self-Actualization
The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain
The New Science of Narcissism
The New Science of Adult Attachment
The New Science of How We Read
The New Science of Darwinian Medicine
The Surprising New Science of Uric Acid
The New Science of Positive Psychology
The New Science of Old Fossils
I started noticing this trend recently as I began training for an ultra-marathon, which means lots of long runs and lots of listening to audiobooks to help the miles pass. I’ve never been able to do fiction via audio (I struggle to follow storylines this way. Anyone else?) and so my audiobook choices tend to be nonfiction.
I quickly started realizing that all the audiobooks I was having algorithmically recommended to me had some variation on “The New Science of…” in their subtitles. And honestly? A lot of them are really good. I’ve read roughly half of the books whose subtitles I called out in the list above.
And, by the way, this phenomenon isn’t restricted to the nonfiction world. Fiction is just as guilty, in its own way. Remember after “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” came out and every single book had “The Girl…” in the title?
Today, the current trend seems to be “The [NUMBER] [NOUN]s of [CHARACTER NAME].
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo
The Seven Moons of Maali Almedia
The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle
Wait. There are two books with both “seven” and “Evelyn” in the title?
Okay, okay — this is a subject for another newsletter.
In the fiction world, I don’t think there’s anything more insidious at play than simple marketing. Books are, you know, insanely hard to sell, and if publishers are taking advantage of current trends to get people to read more books, I don’t have a problem with that.
(PS— Watch out for my debut novel, The Seven Newsletter Tangents of Evelyn Von Girdle, hitting bookstores 2028.)
But when it comes to nonfiction, there’s something about the whole “New Science” tag that just doesn’t quite sit right with me.
Sure, yes— there is such a thing as “new science.” Science is the systematic study of the physical and natural world. There are many topics that, up until now, we haven’t studied very systematically. Something being studied in that way, for the very first time, would equate to a “new science.”
But I can’t help but be wary about the sensationalization or trend-ification of science generally.
Call me a traditionalist, but does anyone else feel like science is meant to be just a little bit, I don’t know… boring? Or if not boring, then at least a little complex?
Don’t get me wrong — I love science. And I really love popular science, the translation of complicated theories and concepts into something all of us in the general public can understand.
After all, I’m the dweeb who’s constantly citing research studies in this newsletter.
But I feel like what makes science wonderful is the way it enhances our understanding of the world in concrete and inexorable ways, regardless of how we wish the world would behave.
Obviously knowledge evolves as we learn more, as our technology advances, as our understanding of how the world works becomes more nuanced and refined. But there’s something comforting about the fact that in this world of unique perspectives and loud opinions, some facts are just facts.
We’re not creating them, we’re just discovering them.
So when I see a phrase like “The New Science of…” plastered on every new self-development and self-help book, I’m instantly slightly skeptical.
Because let’s face it — the “new science” these books share is never one that’s more complicated than the “old science.” It’s never something that makes our lives more complex or challenging to navigate. It never introduces new nuances into how we live our lives.
Because that book wouldn't sell.
These “new sciences” are almost always about taking something difficult or complex and saying, “Wait! This one thing will solve all of these complicated problems!”
It’s the same reason I’ve been wary of this very newsletter turning into a missive to “get outside and move more, because it will solve all of your problems!” The fact is that while exercise and nature have been shown to help us be happier, they’re not the only things we need. There’s a whole lot more going on in the equation.
So when a book claims to reveal a “new science” which proves that the one, shocking secret to better life satisfaction or improved health is looking at beautiful views, or breathing through our noses more, or taking fewer selfies, I think it’s healthy for us all to be skeptical.
Make no mistake: We should still read the hell out of all the books!
But we should also remember that for a book to be greenlit by a publisher, it has to present itself with a clear, un-complicated angle.
No one’s going to read a book with a subtitle like: “A New-ish Interpretation and Analysis of the Existing Science Behind Sleep and How Better Sleep (When Combined with a Range of Many Other Factors) Leads to Increased Health and Happiness in Some (But Not All) Cases.”
No. Publishers (and we, the readers) want books that are clear and unambiguous. We want a straightforward thesis, one we feel like we’ve never heard before. We want The New Science of Sleep.
And yeah, sleep matters.
But when a lifelong sleep expert who has studied nothing but the effects of sleep on the body for thirty years writes a book about how sleep is the single most important factor for my health, I think it’s wise for me to have a measured response, rather than finishing that book and immediately telling my wife, “Sorry, I now need to get 10 hours of sleep a night, so no more spending time together after we put our son to bed.”
If we’re going to embrace new science, let’s make it “the new science of understanding that science is complicated, and life is complicated, and there’s not going to be one big, brilliant answer to all our problems, and that maybe life is about figuring things out little by little, incorporating bits and pieces of knowledge and wisdom as they come to light, and slowly bringing ourselves closer to our potential for happiness and health.”
In the meantime, I’ll come up with a catchier subtitle.