Follow your head AND your heart

[ugly_boy]

Adam Frank makes some interesting points in his NPR blog post entitled Science Deniers: Hand Over Your Cellphones! One passage in particular reminded me of an issue that I feel is often overlooked:

In [climate change deniers'] worldview the scientists are in it for the money or the fame or the power. Scientists are overstating the case. They are

Comments

[ken_roberts]

You right, in my experience, that "most scientists enjoy conducting research, and are fascinated by the systems that they study". Returning to the university environment, after 3 decades in business, has been refreshing. Many business people are also interested in problem solving, but there is a greater proportion of that behaviour in science

[ugly_boy]

I think what you're saying is that scientists often are not great at addressing the social implications of their research, and that a greater emphasis should be placed on this aspect of science. I completely agree. I think there are several factors that contribute to the problem. Some scientists may not care much about what "laypeople" think, some simply have a hard time understanding how non-scientists view the issue and why they do, and others probably value this but aren't good at participating in non-technical discussions of the problem(s).

I'm only an undergraduate, but I find myself suffering from all three problems, and they tend to reinforce one another. I generally do care about the public perception of science and the practical-political, economic, even cultural-barriers to implementing good science-based policy, but I sometimes get frustrated by the non-scientific or even denialist approach that people use to argue about issues. I try to be sympathetic to the way that people without scientific training view the issue at

[ken_roberts]

How to communicate effectively with the public (group or person) is something that can be taught, and learned. The assignment you mention sounds like an excellent exercise. I recall, from Ben Franklin's autobiography, that he taught himself to write clearly, by reading a section of an explanatory work, closing the book, and writing out his own paraphrase of what he had read -- then he compared his version with the original, and saw what he had misunderstood or had not explained well. Empathy, or something like it, is an important aspect of writing well. Also, I think it helps to have a particular reader in mind; the others who read your words are "listening in" and will make the effort to follow the conversation. People are really good at inferential learning

[ugly_boy]

Communication skills definitely can be taught, but at least in my experience almost no emphasis is placed on non-technical communication or on applying science to social issues. It's a shame. I have done some of that in college, but not enough

[ken_roberts]

There's no need to delay publishing. Early availability of data is worthwhile. However, it is recognized eg in teaching courses, that a person new to a field should receive info in a sequenced manner for best learning.

My concern was more that scientifically trained people, when in general discussion, and faced with a statement like "nothing can be done about (such and such), because (glib opinion about how the world works)", do not recognize how simple such a statement is. They take it at face value; end of discussion!

Yet they would doubt a scientific article that said something like "cathodic rays cannot be particles, because when passed between two charged plates, they did not deflect", instead asking "did you consider eliminating the air between the plates", and "what if the cathodic rays are particles moving really fast?"

Scientific thinking applies to all aspects of life, not just the laboratory and technical topics.

[ugly_boy]

Now I get it! It's fascinating that people can grapple with the intricacies of some complex systems and not others. We tend to think that some people have a mind for business or engineering or politics, but I wonder how different these mental tasks truly are.

Are you familiar with the skeptical movement? Its purpose is to promote critical thinking in all domains. There's a lot of overlap with the scientific community, but it's interesting to see how people who are dedicated to applying the same standards to all problems sometimes approach things differently than, say, a practicing scientist faced with something outside of his or her field.

[ken_roberts]

I was not familiar with the "skeptical movement" but just took a look, at www.speptic.com. Very interesting.

I'm not entirely sure that's for me, though, as I treasure unusual hypotheses as a source of inspiration.

For example, regarding flying saucers, I'm prompted to look at frisbees and wonder how a flying disk might be designed as a viable aircraft for human scale. Another example: the Ebola outbreak in Zaire, some years ago, should logically have spread to Sweden and other countries whose medical personnel came to help; that there were no cases outside Zaire prompted me to speculate on the societal context, eg perhaps chlorinated water, or even tooth-brushing with flouridated toothpaste.

Most such hypotheses are necessarily wrong. If I do not make enough mistakes, I cannot get some right guesses; it is like prospecting; one must look at lots of rocks to find valuable ore.

So joining a society which might augment the already prevalent social pressure to go-along, might be high risk for me.

[ugly_boy]

Fair enough. It appears to me that you practice skepticism most of the time, but I can certainly understand not wanting to take up the cause and all of its trappings. One thing I will say in defense of skeptics is that the only real pressure is to consistently science and critical thinking to all areas of life.

[ken_roberts]

Thanks! Good discussion. Got to move on now. Another lecture attended yesterday, interesting topic, models of stellar formation.

Met someone in coffee shop after, who gave me three new perspectives, on meteoroid velocity distribution, angular momentum transfer from rotating cloud via mag field lines, and whether there is entropic approach to mag field line stretching. And have found lots of new info about trillium species, and the "Lambert W function" which relates to closed form solutions of problems like Wein's displacement law. Wow! A day at the univ can stack up a lot of opportunity for learning! Also obtained a small mike that might be good for listening to lawn mower.

By the way, the lecture attended was the PhD public lecture for someone. If you have chance you might enjoy attending some of those. It is a chance to see what people are really doing at leading edges. Most I don't understand of course. Does not matter. Just allow osmosis to occur.