That should cut down on the number of science articles in newspapers.Those interpreting science for the public, whether journalists, educators or other communicators, should use peer review as a benchmark.
Mark Vernon on Proof: we need better questions on religion and science.
I credit Maxine with delving into the problem deeply enough not to come up with any pat solutions.
ReplyDeleteI've thought a great deal about this issue, using what I call the Wal-Mart model - will any proposed method of ensuring the public has an accurate understanding of a particular set of facts result in a sizeable majority of Wal-Mart customers having that understanding? So far I haven't come up with any process that will do so.
For one thing, we have the problem with factual reporting that Frank recently pointed out - -much of what passes for objective reporting is actually done with a preconceived narrative. (Maxine also acknowledges similar issues.)
A second issue - close to my own heart - is that some of what the public ingests as facts actually come from fictional sources. In my own area of science expertise, movies and fictional TV shows provide most of the public's context and understanding. And these entertainments are grossly inaccurate. (I suspect I'm subject to the same thing in areas I don't know about.) From time to time I see similar complaints from Doctors on the impact of medical shows.
There can be small individual efforts to chip away at the problem (and maybe some improvements to education systems), but I really don't see much that can be done on a process level to solve the problems of ignorance and misunderstanding. It seems to me that only in the most egregious cases (such as the widely held perception that Iraq was responsible for 9/11) can there be a significant swing in U.S. public perception of factual issues. Perhaps just retreating back into the forest in small groups would be best.