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The recent passing of one of my scientific heroes, Benoît Mandelbrot, the overly large sports section, coupled with the distinct lack of science news in the newspaper this morning has me thinking... Where are our science heroes these days?
It seems to me that in the mid 20th century there were a lot of scientists who were mainstream and in the public eye regularly. Such well known scientists as Einstein, Oppenheimer and Feynmann along with the Goodalls and Leakeys and Carl Sagan (so you don't think I'm all about the physicists) were part of the public consciousness and regularly on/in the news for their opinions and work. But in these times, it seems that we don't have the same rapport with our scientists, other than those viewed as freaks or those who have beaten the odds (e.g. Stephen Hawking). Why should it be that way? We still have nobel laureates and many, many other scientists doing exceptional and exciting research, most of which struggles to reach a few lines in the papers. If you went out onto the street and asked a random passer-by to name a working scientist, could they do it?
Through my looking-glass, it appears that there may betwo three four reasons
Surprise and fear! Fear and surprise and a ruthless efficiency! First is that there is a general lack of understanding of science in the general population, such that the general population now fears science to a greater extent than formerly and is worried that science will end the world somehow. Perhaps this is partly caused by the next reason...
Which is, the tendency amongst the media to only really report on things that have gone wrong, such as animal rights protests or escaped GM crops, or mis-diagnoses from doctors leading to a death/disfigurement of a patient. Along with a hyping of pseudo-science, where genuine science is painted as the bad guys as they don't/can't give a full reason why something won't work and stick to the scientific, but easily misconstrued as weak, arguments of statistical probablility and statements like "We can't say that about X at this point in time"
Third is a lack of visibility - there are no more large projects with an obvious objective and outcome (the Large Hadron Collider is underground and most people don't know or care what a Higgs bosun is) for people to get behind. The race for the moon in the 1960's was a big, obvious outcome project. Sure, people will support cancer research and mental health research etc., but there isn't anything tangible there for people to see and they certainly don't understand the research that is being done.
fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency and a fanatical devotion to the popeFourth is the lack of communication. As scientists we are used to using language and abbreviations every day that are completely incomprehensible to the average person, indeed, outside of your specific field of research it is quite likely that you, dear reader, as a scientist still won't understand many of the the terms used.
So I reckon it is time for scientists to learn to communicate simply and effectively so that when their research makes it into the news they can explain what they do, how they do it and why and possibly create a new science hero.
It seems to me that in the mid 20th century there were a lot of scientists who were mainstream and in the public eye regularly. Such well known scientists as Einstein, Oppenheimer and Feynmann along with the Goodalls and Leakeys and Carl Sagan (so you don't think I'm all about the physicists) were part of the public consciousness and regularly on/in the news for their opinions and work. But in these times, it seems that we don't have the same rapport with our scientists, other than those viewed as freaks or those who have beaten the odds (e.g. Stephen Hawking). Why should it be that way? We still have nobel laureates and many, many other scientists doing exceptional and exciting research, most of which struggles to reach a few lines in the papers. If you went out onto the street and asked a random passer-by to name a working scientist, could they do it?
Through my looking-glass, it appears that there may be
Which is, the tendency amongst the media to only really report on things that have gone wrong, such as animal rights protests or escaped GM crops, or mis-diagnoses from doctors leading to a death/disfigurement of a patient. Along with a hyping of pseudo-science, where genuine science is painted as the bad guys as they don't/can't give a full reason why something won't work and stick to the scientific, but easily misconstrued as weak, arguments of statistical probablility and statements like "We can't say that about X at this point in time"
Third is a lack of visibility - there are no more large projects with an obvious objective and outcome (the Large Hadron Collider is underground and most people don't know or care what a Higgs bosun is) for people to get behind. The race for the moon in the 1960's was a big, obvious outcome project. Sure, people will support cancer research and mental health research etc., but there isn't anything tangible there for people to see and they certainly don't understand the research that is being done.
So I reckon it is time for scientists to learn to communicate simply and effectively so that when their research makes it into the news they can explain what they do, how they do it and why and possibly create a new science hero.
