I am a History of Science researcher interested on scientific controversies who has read the KBOE’s standards, and couldn’t find in that document that they had “voted to take evolution out of the state’s science curriculum.” As a matter of fact, they increased the coverage of evolution in that educational document.

But as has been endlessly pointed out, there are entire television stations dedicated to promoting science, and every bookstore has shelves and shelves of the stuff. And there’s the entire frickin’ internet chock full of science if you want to read it. The issue isn’t that scientists aren’t pushing the information out, and making postdocs sound 10% less dorky when talking about their work just isn’t going to result in any ginormous change.

I mean, look at the birther nonsense and the death panel stuff. There are constituencies who find it congenial to have large numbers of people passionately believe satisfingly outraging nonsense. People aren’t signing up for this stuff because the people who issue birth certificates are talkin’ all egghead-ese about this stuff. When its mentioned that most senior citizens in the US are already covered by a single payer system and the US hasn’t become a soylent-green dystopia full of death panels and mandatory euthenasia, it’s not that they’re speakin’ all technical mumbo-jumbo.

Carl, I realize since you’re both Discover blogs, you feel a need to respectfully refuse to criticize your misguided colleagues at The Intersection, but someone must be the voice of reason against what seems to be a terrible premise.

The truth is that only through an expanded scientific literacy program, both for the young, and even perhaps those who have moved beyond their schooling, will we maintain a high standard for critical thinking and reasoning. The abandonment of religion is just a byproduct of scientific understanding. Although there are those whose fears of just such a personal revelation prevent them from exploring their scientific curiosity, it should not limit the different varieties of communication by scientists to the public. As long as religious institutions and their leaders continue to voice their false rhetoric, some have to stand up and challenge those fervently misguided and probably disingenuous equivocations.

“It’s like asking football players not to wear their cleats in the house. You’re not asking them not to be football players, only to use their specific skills in the right place.”

To me this is not a great analogy. You would still expect football players at home to act like football players: watching their diet, exercising, taking an interest in their opponents’ games and so on. Scientists are no different. They don’t bring their gear home. They don’t bring their experiments home. But they do bring home their questioning and inquiring world-view, their probabilistic view of the world. Because they ARE scientists.

Also, scientists talking to lay people or in interviews are not at home. They are working. As scientists. It’s like saying to the football players not to be so ‘footbally’ when they go along to school training sessions to interact with the kids.

One would think, on the surface, that a scientist speaking to a large public audience would be relaxed and feel comfortable explaining things at a lay level — perhaps like describing science to a neighbor or friend.

In fact, that’s very hard to do. I taught at a good undergraduate liberal arts college for 20 years, and I think I have a handle now on how to talk with lay people — intro students, in effect. But I have to say some lectures my first few years of teaching were pretty disastrous.

I’ve told beginning profs that the best training I had for teaching was involvement in drama when I was an undergrad (my roommate for a year was a drama major).

But another factor is at work. A scientist speaking to an unseen audience may be cowed by the unseen audience. The speaker may think, “What if the leaders of my field also see this and think I’m oversimplifying or underplaying their work? The safe thing is to over-qualify findings, to hedge my conclusions and make things complicated. To speak as I speak to scientists.”

However I will repeat the positive thing I had to say about ‘Sizzle’, which I thought Randy should have emphasized: Scientists talk ‘egg-headdy’ to journalists/media, and talk about science ‘normally’ to laypeople directly. Probably should keep that ‘normal’, conversational tone with everyone except your scientific peers.

Howeverrrrr, conversations are a two-way street. Ive given presentations where I thought I gave simple, easy to understand explanations, only to have people tell me later that they didnt get it. AAARRRRGGG!! Ask questions!! In a million years I wont get offended if someone says “Chick, you so lost me…” And sometimes there is another lay person in the audience who once didnt get it, but found a neat analogy or parable that helped that they can share– LOVE THAT!

Sorry.

Carl: Thanks–no apologies necessary. I’ve fixed it. (That was my mistake, by the way, not Olson’s.)