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How To Communicate Science to a Polarized US Audience
Prescott writes "Given the divisions in the US around subjects like evolution and climate change, scientists face challenges in how to communicate good science to a polarized US public. Speakers at the recent AAAS meeting talked about how scientific information is delivered to and understood by a public that interprets it via personal beliefs, religious and otherwise. 'The talks were organized by Matthew Nisbet, a professor of communications who is a proponent of the framing of science, in which communications techniques borrowed from the political realm are applied to promote scientific understanding. As such, a number of speakers advocated specific frames for publicly controversial scientific issues. Unfortunately, the use of those frames appears likely to generate controversy within the scientific community, and several speakers noted that science faces challenges that go well beyond communicating knowledge to the public. There were some hints of a way forward that might work for both the scientific community and the public, but the challenges appear significant.'"
Sorry, but if you start spouting off more nonsense than sense, you don't deserve the appelation "smart". If Dawkins had restricted himself to defending evolution, that would be fine. Unfortunately, most of his time now is dedicated to lame attacks against theism in general.
Scientists are well-paid, haughty workaholics who can't tolerate idiots.. can you blame the public for being jealous of them and annoyed at their elitism? Well I can becaue of everything science has given us, but it's at least understandable that anti-intellectualism is a strong force.
These things are like dominant genes...
Science is a "This is what we think is a good model for things we don't understand, until we find a better model". That is, everything in science is true until proven otherwise, and its an EXTREMELY important part of science. Religion, and other such beleifs, are presented as universal fact (note that "bad" scientists do this too, so its not limited to religious zealots...though bad science could be called a religion, too).
So you have on one side things that are rigid, presented as raw fact, and on the other, something flexible that can change anytime, and has as its FOUNDATION a "you may prove it wrong if you know better". So obviously, the rigid "facts" will be pushed as a "we know better".
A lot of things in life are like that. Take western culture, which embraces (officialy anyway...in practice its something else sometimes) all cultures, then you have mid eastern culture, which is extremely close minded. So you have an increase in the mid eastern culture, as it will inevitably spread faster.
Flexible and "open minded" things will always get eaten alive by the close minded who push harder. Heck, the only way science ever goes through lately is when legislation gets in the way...because then science lowers itself to a point where it does the same thing religion does.
If you jettison anyone fighting for your side (i.e. science) as soon as they are attacked, you will very soon run out of smart people like Gore and Dawkins.
Escuse me? Isn't the core of this conversation about how politics + science = bad times for science? The problem with "global warming" is that Gore, a politician, is speaking a story that climatologists, meteorologists, scientists are denying is occurring. I'm more concerned that he is profiting from involvement in venture capitalists tied to "green" alternatives, while driving the national conversation to enable "carbon credits" managed by his firms.
This guy's not a "smart person", he's an "opportunist"... I'd even go as far as a textbook "special interest", which is doing nothing but driving a weakly supported climatology theory into our nation's science classrooms, and through his political history drives it into our nightly news. Newsflash: The Polar Bear population is not decreasing, and the earth is not getting warmer over the last decade despite predictions, and there's good evidence that the rush to follow the Kyoto treaty is now damaging the ozone layer again. I'd prefer to stick to the measured facts instead of politically jumping the gun just because it's a good "story".
-- Scott
Do you even know what Theism is, and how it differs, from, say Deism?
Do you know what Frotzianism is, and how it differs from, say, Ozmology?
That question is just as relevant to our daily lives. My made-up "isms" are just as valid as yours.
I mean come on, intelligent design? evolution as a theory? velociraptors and children playing happily together? That sort of muddy clouded rubbish is surely out of date in todays world. Except in the US.
/if/ velociraptors lived at the same time as humans that they had to play nice?
Please tell me where anyone has said velociraptors and children played together, that would be a stupid comment to make, but alone doesn't say anything about religion or God. For example, there's plenty of animals you want your kids to stay away from today; wild dogs, alligators, anything of the large cat group, what's to day
These idiots want to have their cake and eat it - on one hand they want to rubbish scientific thinking and deny evolution on the other they want bluray discs, microwaves and nuclear tipped bombs. Get real.
Lets see... On one hand you have bluray discs microwaves and nuclear warheads; all which involved observation AND experimentation. On the other you have evolution, which involved no experimentation and very limited observation. If you've ever read Origin of the Species you should know that Darwin himself said that if within the next decade the fossil record should show his finding true, and if it doesn't then you shouldn't listen it him. 150 years later we're still in search of some key 'missing links' so if I'm to listen to Darwin himself I shouldn't pay much attention to evolution as anything more then a theory until there is more evidence.
From my viewpoint all religious fundamentalists are just as dangerous as each other - no matter what they preach, what religion they follow, what they wear or what country they come from. Sometimes the danger is more subtle then other times. I'll let you draw your own conclusions from that.
I'm a libertarian, and from my viewpoint you are at the very least as dangerous religious fundamentalists. You seem to think it would be great if no one ever thought for themselves and assumed everything you said or that's "peer-reviewed" is automatically fact. Accepting anything without skepticism is stupid. There are plenty of reasons to doubt evolution or climate change which don't even involve religion in the argument. Disregarding either idea without listening to it is incredibly arrogant, to me you're no better then some religious fanatic who puts their fingers over their ears and hums pretending not to hear you about science.
Ok that's enough Devil's Advocate. I just found the velociraptor line humorous so I had to comment about it.
If i had one dollar for every brain you dont have, i would have $1.
I'm speaking here of fundamentalists from Christians, Muslims, Hindus, to whatever.
When a small, incredibly noisy portion of society is trying to drag us back into the stone age, people who know better have to speak up. Fundamentalists aren't satisfied with living their own lives. They have so little faith in their own belief system that they believe it needs to be legislated to everyone. Personally, I think this is because people are beginning to recognize intuitively that they would rather live without religion than without science, thus, the greatest threat to religion is the continued success of science, which by definition, is exclusive of a god or many gods.
If members of the scientific community do not speak up, the next generation of young people could hold the ideas of evolution and intelligent design as equals. Imagine that for a second: a veritable mountain of tested theory, which is congruent across every body of science we currently know, would carry the same weight as believing that an invisible man in the sky created the world in a week.
The most solid and clear test was provided by the supreme court over twenty years ago, as to whether something should be taught in government schools, or posted in front of government buildings: is there a clear, secular purpose? It's useful to keep repeating this when they try to dodge the question.
Yes, we too can then kill ourselves off (as nations) from ennui. How's that 1.3 TFR working for you sparky? I'd feel much better about that secular future people keep talking about if, you know, there was any future in it.
Most of the leaders of the early 20th century eugenics movement were Christians. It seems to me that you may be putting the mark on the wrong door. Neo-nazis have racial ideas which are simply not supported by science, and, like most other adherents to pseudo-science, will cherry pick real science to their own ends.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Scientists tend to concern themselves with their research. Other than a few like Sagan, Dawkins and Hawkings, most are not in the business to spread any doctrines, or to be seen doing so. They're interested tend to be focused on their fields, which is good, because that's how you get results.
As to teachers, I don't ever recall having a teaching advocating atheism, and none of my childrens' teachers have either. This sounds precisely like the kind of false dilemna Creationists want us to believe is happening.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.