One can't account for everyone, but there's no conversation to be had ever, about *anything, if you automatically presume that the other person is not at least somewhat serious about the subject matter and does not care about it at least a little bit.
I'm sure grown men and women will not lose their capacity for critical thinking after a laugh. If anything, the humor's role is to relieve tension. Maybe it would enhance the conversation.
Not that there is any, at the moment. The paper got retracted, and we know why, and we know the reason wasn't a matter of falsification, but in the following of the ethics of science. The way I see it, there are other subjects around the news that are worth considering – for example, as someone in the comments has already mentioned, how come the bug hasn't been noticed before.