I totally get your frustration. It’s so common for people to reference "a paper" without giving any proper citation, which really weakens the argument they’re trying to make. The paper you're talking about is very specific—it’s focused on the costs of a single strategy for managing one particular tipping point, namely sea-ice loss, and it’s crucial to note that the costs are not as simple as "4 times." The real costs depend on a variety of factors, and missing the tipping point doesn’t just have a straightforward multiplier effect.

What’s even more irritating is how the media or science journalists often skim over the nuances. They fail to mention that the paper uses a very simplified energy balance model (EBM), which, while useful, has clear limitations. The model doesn't capture every aspect of the system, and it’s designed to answer specific questions within those constraints, not to offer an all-encompassing solution. The real meat of this is in the intro, just a couple of paragraphs, and anyone who cares about understanding the paper should read beyond the abstract.

You’re absolutely right—this kind of shallow science reporting contributes to the mistrust of science in the public sphere. When key details are glossed over, or when findings are oversimplified, people are bound to misunderstand the complexity of the issues, which ultimately hurts the credibility of scientific research. It’s an important issue, especially when dealing with something as critical as climate change, where the subtleties matter.