Comments on: The Creeping Death of Science Coverage http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/ Progressive approaches to science policy Sat, 13 Mar 2010 13:54:22 -0500 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.5 hourly 1 By: Allan Shore http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/comment-page-1/#comment-3881 Allan Shore Thu, 18 Dec 2008 19:03:31 +0000 http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/#comment-3881 I agree, Mr. Brown, from a historical perspective. I believe that moving forward, however, we should be more engaged in taking what is learned from scientific exploration and incorporating it into "entertainment" type medias as well. I'm writing my novel on the concept that a very true-to-life hero or heroine could, in fact, utilize prgramatic science (including technological connectivity) as the source of his or her "super hero" powers, and thus could help creative real but exciting role models for younger generations. Put another way, we need to demonstrate how science can be integrated into real life for people seeking real solutions--which will inspire more overall interest. I found it fascinating that a Google top executive noted in the press recently that the direction of the Internet in the future will be determined by the ideas of our 13 year olds! While this is fun and interesting to contemplate, it definitely downgrades the true science that has gone on behind connectivity advancements. Imagine if a good in-between was a mindset that rewarded advocacy in action by utilizing the advancements to make life better. Not all heroes or super-duper successes need to be exploited by CGI representations instead of good-hearted, smart and inventive real people. If this happened, I believe policies, politics and even corporate ideals would follow and all boats would rise. I'd love to know more about your book. I agree, Mr. Brown, from a historical perspective. I believe that moving forward, however, we should be more engaged in taking what is learned from scientific exploration and incorporating it into “entertainment” type medias as well. I’m writing my novel on the concept that a very true-to-life hero or heroine could, in fact, utilize prgramatic science (including technological connectivity) as the source of his or her “super hero” powers, and thus could help creative real but exciting role models for younger generations. Put another way, we need to demonstrate how science can be integrated into real life for people seeking real solutions–which will inspire more overall interest. I found it fascinating that a Google top executive noted in the press recently that the direction of the Internet in the future will be determined by the ideas of our 13 year olds! While this is fun and interesting to contemplate, it definitely downgrades the true science that has gone on behind connectivity advancements. Imagine if a good in-between was a mindset that rewarded advocacy in action by utilizing the advancements to make life better. Not all heroes or super-duper successes need to be exploited by CGI representations instead of good-hearted, smart and inventive real people. If this happened, I believe policies, politics and even corporate ideals would follow and all boats would rise.

I’d love to know more about your book.

]]> By: Theodore Brown http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/comment-page-1/#comment-3786 Theodore Brown Thu, 11 Dec 2008 16:29:51 +0000 http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/#comment-3786 Perhaps we are looking at this problem too much from the wrong end. Chris's column is largely about the networks, newspapers and other media that serve the public as sources of news with scientific implications. But those media are in part responding to a lack of interest from the consuming public. Thinking about science is relatively demanding relative to the various sitcoms and drama shows, those relating to celebrities, sports and the like, or newspaper articles about travel. People are put off from learning about science because it is rather hard to follow, and they don't see the material as applicable to their immediate life situations. Because they don't know much science, they don't have a good basis for placing what they are told into a meaningful context. So when we think about this problem, we need to recognize that all the push from the top will not really do a lot to improve public science literacy, and thus understanding of the science underlying salient public issues. As the world has become more complex, driven by science and technology, fewer and fewer people have an intellectual formation that enables them to understand it's workings,whether those be in the domain of science or law, finances or other areas. Our challenge may be to formulate social organizations that can serve to distribute scientific and technological information and insights to the public through politically and socially useful structures that will in all likelihood not involve a large fraction of the populace. That's where we are now, isn't it? Science education in early schooling is of course critical to improving scientific literacy, but we don't seem to be making rapid progress in this area. I've just finished wrestling with some of these ideas in a new book on the authority of science in society, to be published by Penn State University Press, out next summer. Science's influence in society often arises in the context of clashes of authority with other social domains, such as religion, law, and government, both regulatory and legislative. These very confrontations are in fact the occasions that most effectively bring science and technology to the fore in the public sphere. Ironically, they are, therefore, the most effective vehicles through which science can engage public interest. We have to learn how to use them to greater advantage. Perhaps we are looking at this problem too much from the wrong end. Chris’s column is largely about the networks, newspapers and other media that serve the public as sources of news with scientific implications. But those media are in part responding to a lack of interest from the consuming public. Thinking about science is relatively demanding relative to the various sitcoms and drama shows, those relating to celebrities, sports and the like, or newspaper articles about travel.
People are put off from learning about science because it is rather hard to follow, and they don’t see the material as applicable to their immediate life situations. Because they don’t know much science, they don’t have a good basis for placing what they are told into a meaningful context. So when we think about this problem, we need to recognize that all the push from the top will not really do a lot to improve public science literacy, and thus understanding of the science underlying salient public issues. As the world has become more complex, driven by science and technology, fewer and fewer people have an intellectual formation that enables them to understand it’s workings,whether those be in the domain of science or law, finances or other areas.
Our challenge may be to formulate social organizations that can serve to distribute scientific and technological information and insights to the public through politically and socially useful structures that will in all likelihood not involve a large fraction of the populace. That’s where we are now, isn’t it? Science education in early schooling is of course critical to improving scientific literacy, but we don’t seem to be making rapid progress in this area.
I’ve just finished wrestling with some of these ideas in a new book on the authority of science in society, to be published by Penn State University Press, out next summer. Science’s influence in society often arises in the context of clashes of authority with other social domains, such as religion, law, and government, both regulatory and legislative. These very confrontations are in fact the occasions that most effectively bring science and technology to the fore in the public sphere. Ironically, they are, therefore, the most effective vehicles through which science can engage public interest. We have to learn how to use them to greater advantage.

]]> By: Cathy http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/comment-page-1/#comment-3773 Cathy Thu, 11 Dec 2008 02:58:19 +0000 http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/#comment-3773 Yes there is disinterest from the press. Several years ago I applied to be on the Editorial Board of the Des Moines Register. I thought that they might find my dual degrees in chemistry and writing useful to them. This position was not paid. It was volunteer. They did not accept me. They did however keep someone else from my hometown on their board. He wrote and got published an editorial against Darwinism (his term, not mine). It was more important to them to appeal to an ignorant following and to generate controversy than to have real science in their respectable newspaper. I now write an occasional column for a local on-line newspaper. Sometimes I get get paid $25 an article for it. Sadly we have to care enough about science news to make it a labor of love. Yes there is disinterest from the press. Several years ago I applied to be on the Editorial Board of the Des Moines Register. I thought that they might find my dual degrees in chemistry and writing useful to them. This position was not paid. It was volunteer. They did not accept me. They did however keep someone else from my hometown on their board. He wrote and got published an editorial against Darwinism (his term, not mine). It was more important to them to appeal to an ignorant following and to generate controversy than to have real science in their respectable newspaper. I now write an occasional column for a local on-line newspaper. Sometimes I get get paid $25 an article for it. Sadly we have to care enough about science news to make it a labor of love.

]]> By: Andrew Plemmons Pratt http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/comment-page-1/#comment-3767 Andrew Plemmons Pratt Wed, 10 Dec 2008 20:01:32 +0000 http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/#comment-3767 Merrill: There are some existing models for crowd-sourcing community journalism, like the Knight Foundation-supported <a href="http://spot.us/" rel="nofollow">spot.us</a>, which features pitches for individual stories and solicits small donations from the public to fund freelancers who do the reporting. If a major outlet buys it, donors are reimbursed. If not, the content is released under a Creative Commons license. Seems plausible that a similar experiment in science and health reporting could be fruitful, but that's just one model. Merrill:

There are some existing models for crowd-sourcing community journalism, like the Knight Foundation-supported spot.us, which features pitches for individual stories and solicits small donations from the public to fund freelancers who do the reporting. If a major outlet buys it, donors are reimbursed. If not, the content is released under a Creative Commons license.

Seems plausible that a similar experiment in science and health reporting could be fruitful, but that’s just one model.

]]> By: Allan http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/comment-page-1/#comment-3765 Allan Wed, 10 Dec 2008 19:14:24 +0000 http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/#comment-3765 The most direct answer is to stop avoiding the reality that science that matters involves the public from the get-go--even when there is a trend toward user biases, at least until we figure out exactly how to solve this problem. George Soro's writings in his 2008 fiscal paradigm reflects this thinking when he criticizes the economic presumptions of market theory that are based upon the outdated concepts of "perfect knowledge." Now hard-core scientific exploration faces the same reality when fast-moving scientific discoveries promise benefits to real people but their internal biaes about objectivity get in the way. We simply must learn how to do more exploration that incorporates the messiness of democracy. The NIH is offering at least two innovative grant opportunities at this time. They both refer to the integration of behavioral factors into core biomedical and related discoveries. I'm in the process of preparing proposals for these in a way that would directly benefit Latinos with cross-generational substance abuse issues (long-term abuse is associated with genetic modifications). My work will focus on the behavior elements figuring out how to allow us community-based projects to become inside-the-stem-cell-world observers of discoveries as they happen so we can figure out what they truly mean for people in need. I suspect that if this actually happens (and there is much reason to believe NIH will not live up to its own expectations) it may be possible to make scientific advancement more immediately important to the people who make the media so important. I'll keep you up on the progress, even if the NIH uses procedural hurdles once again to stop the very kind of answers they are probably really looking for. A good discussion on this with the Obama administration wouldn't be a bad thing. Though I suspect people who think this way may not make it into the "change design" cloakrooms. The most direct answer is to stop avoiding the reality that science that matters involves the public from the get-go–even when there is a trend toward user biases, at least until we figure out exactly how to solve this problem. George Soro’s writings in his 2008 fiscal paradigm reflects this thinking when he criticizes the economic presumptions of market theory that are based upon the outdated concepts of “perfect knowledge.” Now hard-core scientific exploration faces the same reality when fast-moving scientific discoveries promise benefits to real people but their internal biaes about objectivity get in the way. We simply must learn how to do more exploration that incorporates the messiness of democracy. The NIH is offering at least two innovative grant opportunities at this time. They both refer to the integration of behavioral factors into core biomedical and related discoveries. I’m in the process of preparing proposals for these in a way that would directly benefit Latinos with cross-generational substance abuse issues (long-term abuse is associated with genetic modifications). My work will focus on the behavior elements figuring out how to allow us community-based projects to become inside-the-stem-cell-world observers of discoveries as they happen so we can figure out what they truly mean for people in need. I suspect that if this actually happens (and there is much reason to believe NIH will not live up to its own expectations) it may be possible to make scientific advancement more immediately important to the people who make the media so important. I’ll keep you up on the progress, even if the NIH uses procedural hurdles once again to stop the very kind of answers they are probably really looking for.

A good discussion on this with the Obama administration wouldn’t be a bad thing. Though I suspect people who think this way may not make it into the “change design” cloakrooms.

]]> By: Harold Hellickson http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/comment-page-1/#comment-3764 Harold Hellickson Wed, 10 Dec 2008 19:07:01 +0000 http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/#comment-3764 It seems rather foolish to anticipate anything of value to be expected from Modern Media. 1. The media is corporate owned. 2. The purpose of corporate media is to aggrigate an audience to sell advertising. 3. The goal of advertising is to create uninformed consumers who will make irrational choices. (Noam Chomski) Corporate media cannot be expected to cover anything regarding serious science. It seems rather foolish to anticipate anything of value to be expected from Modern Media.

1. The media is corporate owned.

2. The purpose of corporate media is to aggrigate an audience to sell advertising.

3. The goal of advertising is to create uninformed consumers who will make irrational choices. (Noam Chomski)

Corporate media cannot be expected to cover anything regarding serious science.

]]> By: mike fallwell http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/comment-page-1/#comment-3763 mike fallwell Wed, 10 Dec 2008 18:47:51 +0000 http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/#comment-3763 Many of the journalistic problems of science begin in academia. Science is fettered by a system of tenure that blocks the flow of ideas with a huge plug of bureaucracy. Tapping into this this trickle doesn't produce a lot of good stories but it is easy. Many of the journalistic problems of science begin in academia. Science is fettered by a system of tenure that blocks the flow of ideas with a huge plug of bureaucracy.
Tapping into this this trickle doesn’t produce a lot of good stories but it is easy.

]]> By: Merrill Goozner http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/comment-page-1/#comment-3762 Merrill Goozner Wed, 10 Dec 2008 18:41:53 +0000 http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/#comment-3762 How might crowd-sourced sponsorship of science and health reporting work? How might crowd-sourced sponsorship of science and health reporting work?

]]> By: Zane Selvans http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/comment-page-1/#comment-3744 Zane Selvans Tue, 09 Dec 2008 18:44:49 +0000 http://www.scienceprogress.org/2008/12/the-creeping-death-of-science-coverage/#comment-3744 I hate to say it, but I have to agree with Matt Nisbet on this. Journalism has been subsumed by the entertainment industry, and news coverage has been fragmented beyond recognition. If we want real journalism to continue, we need to find a way to fund the best citizen journalists, so they can do their work full time, at least occasionally. Distributed (crowd-sourced) sponsorship is one option, institutional funding, either from government granting organizations, or NGOs is another. The latter will inevitably lead to (probably justified) suspicions of bias, or conflicts of interest, and similar (probably better funded) citizen shills for industry groups. What to do with the resonant opinion chamber? I hate to say it, but I have to agree with Matt Nisbet on this. Journalism has been subsumed by the entertainment industry, and news coverage has been fragmented beyond recognition.

If we want real journalism to continue, we need to find a way to fund the best citizen journalists, so they can do their work full time, at least occasionally. Distributed (crowd-sourced) sponsorship is one option, institutional funding, either from government granting organizations, or NGOs is another. The latter will inevitably lead to (probably justified) suspicions of bias, or conflicts of interest, and similar (probably better funded) citizen shills for industry groups.

What to do with the resonant opinion chamber?

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