iphone

Apple iphone

Only one thing spoils it a bit for me: the ’science grad vs humanities grad’ sparring. That’s good slapstick stuff, but it tends to obscure the point that respect for the truth (or lack of it) cuts in a different direction than the divide between scientists and humanities folk.

I’ve met non-scientists who are very respectful in practice of the truth (but I can’t name any journalists among them!). I’ve also met some numbers of ’scientists’ who aren’t.

I wonder where our tolerance for mistakes and outright lies comes from? By contrast, many of us are so sensitive to the tiniest degree of pollution or contamination of our supplies of air, water and food. What a difference it would make, if we were even a fraction as sensitive as that, about contamination of our word supplies! Maybe the reason for the shortage of truth in the media is that ‘there’s no demand for it’?

terry

John A said,
Disseminating knowledge from the scientific community to a scientifically undereducated public requires effort on the part of all those involved. Scientists communicate all the time at conferences, in papers and indeed to anyone who shows the remotest interest (as many have learned to their cost at parties). It is the media’s job to inform and educate the public, not the front-line scientists’. If the media is incapable of understanding scientists and unwilling to employ those who can, it is lazy and unfair to demand that scientists should come to them while they remain resolutely fixed.

Tom said
..it would seem logical that while humanities graduates often have an inadequate grasp of science (not the greatest sin, but as Ben says, one compounded by the pretence of understanding), a possible reason they are given so much influence in science journalism is that scientists often have an equally inadequate grasp of effective, interesting communication.

What you have here is not a problem with news media and science, it is a problem with news media on the one hand, and media literacy issues on the other. It isn’t just that the reports of science are ‘breakthroughs’, ‘wacky’, or ‘impending doom’ all news in the American market is framed to sell. Everything is dangerous or controversial or the incredibly overused frame, “breaking news”. Is it any wonder then to see science research reported using the same formulas?

What is needed is for scientists to use their scientific skills to evaluate the problem and find workable solutions, then to disseminate those solutions for all of us to use. This blog entry goes a long way identifying the problem.

John thinks it isn’t our problem, but it is. I for one, don’t want the neighbor’s kid to go unvaccinated. Nor do I want my health insurance provider to be forced by legislation to cover treatments and medications which are not evidence based. And I would like my government to quit peddling anti-scientific climate change research.

Media literacy is the first place to start. Educate yourself about the tactics and formulas of the junk news you hear everyday. Get over the no longer valid belief, the goal of the news media is to inform. The goal is to sell the news.

Recognize the language scientists use that hinder public understanding of science. Some examples are:

1) do not interchange the terms, ‘theory’ and ‘hypothesis’;
2) state the weight of the evidence as it is, ‘equivocal’, ‘overwhelming’, ’suggestive’, because the lay public doesn’t understand why theories are not ‘proven’ and the anti-science promoters take advantage of the language of uncertainty;
3) when intelligent design/creation supporters try to turn the argument into one about fairness and allowing alternative theories in science, don’t let them, address where ID evidence fails, don’t argue that science doesn’t address gods and designers, the lay public doesn’t understand that argument but they do understand fairness;
4) don’t assume everything is a knowledge deficit, we need to look at the reasons people choose to believe unsupportable facts like the MMR-autism connection that has been ruled out, it wasn’t one bad science paper that has been solely responsible for the campaign against MMR and other vaccinations, there is a campaign by people who believe conspiracy theories that government and “Big Pharma” are out to make money at the expense of their child, you have to address those beliefs, the facts are not convincing by themselves;
5) as we investigate these issues, we need to develop tools that other scientists or reporters or health care workers or anti-climate change lobbyists can use to communicate science effectively to the public.

The anti-science promoters like those who see scientific discoveries interfering with their profits or challenging their religious beliefs happen to be very good at getting their message across to the public. The one area of science they have expertise in is the science of persuasion. And that is the one science that scientists rarely use.

Don’t expect the news media to get any better. If anything, you can expect them to get worse as more and more, corporate profits becomes the driving force behind the news, not actual news gathering and reporting. But at the same time, the next generation is already getting most of their news and information from the Internet, not the TV and newspapers as my generation did.

Scientists need to include the science of communication, education, and persuasion in all fields of science. Why not? We are including such fields as computer science into other fields of science. There is a wealth of research in the science of education and the science of marketing we could be taking advantage of. Why should all the research in marketing be ignored by scientists? You might be surprised to know how well the anti-science crowd uses the scientific method researching marketing and communication.

It isn’t up to reporters, that is unless we don’t care. I care. And persuasion does not require I persuade you to believe something false. I prefer to have scientists persuading the public to accept research supported evidence and conclusions. I prefer to not leave it up to profiteers and religious proselytizers to choose what they would persuade people to believe given the chance. We should be able to use the news media to our advantage. We shouldn’t merely passively lament.

How much longer is the reporting of science in the mainstream media going to be relevant – except perhaps as a stimulus to discussion and righteous indignation?

It may not be relevant to the readers of this blog, but sadly there are many people who still take stories published in the more established media very seriously indeed. And politicians and other decision makers are either influenced by those stories, or else they are aware of the extent to which others are influenced by them.

It is tempting to think of all those surfers out there getting their news from the blogosphere or avidly researching things on wikipedia or even reading online scientific journals, but I think a great many people’s online lives consist mainly of shopping on e-bay or amazon. Even people who read news articles on Yahoo! aren’t getting a much better picture than the newspapers offer – since most of those articles originate from the same press agencies, and are just as sensationalist.

To some extent this is a cliche. In fact, programmers are not usually given time to properly test or document their code. It isn’t seen as valuable in the short-term by management. And even if they do have budget to do this, they are generally writing documentation for other programmers, not for users. Your analogy is interesting though. Why would you expect programmers to write user manuals? Why would you expect scientists to write press releases? Scientists have all sorts of pressures, just like everyone else. They generally don’t set themselves up as communicators of science. They just want to do their job.

I don’t think we are responsible if the media decides to misrepresent our work.

Isn’t it also a story about obsession and its consequences? Quite a lot of the story is taken up with Frankenstein’s descent into obsession and irrational behaviour from a previously promising carreer. His horror at what he achieved and the revelation of his obsession is as much a theme of the story as is the ill-treatment of the monster.

At least part of the story’s message is that there are boundaries we shouldn’t cross – that scientists shouldn’t play god.

I think this was what Ben was referring to.

http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/page.asp?id=3115