I have a passion for four magazines which I subscribe to - Nature, New Scientist, Science and Scientific American - and it seems to me that the breakthroughs they report are not only underappreciated but also say much more about us and the universe than the arts ever could.
isn't helpful.
I'm not saying this is a good thing, but 'Hey, it's science, therefore it's important' is so not how most people's understanding of reality works now.
At least until it falls apart on you. But by then it's too late.
The fact that the science community has failed to understand this and believes that all it has to do is present facts and people will do the right thing is literally its biggest failure of insight since the Enlightenment.
Generally, stuff that works and lasts, rather than stuff that can't and doesn't.
The fact that the science community has failed to understand this and believes that all it has to do is present facts and people will do the right thing
I don't think you're talking about scientists or the "science community" much there...
New Scientist had an interview with Phil Jones of Climategate recently and he said that he was very surprised by it all because he'd tried to keep it all completely apolitical.
As if the biggest policy issue in history, with literally trillions of profits in non-renewables at stake, was ever going to be left to disinterested research.
Scientists have spent their time chasing after homoeopaths and astrologers because of 'fraud' while economists have blown up the economy, slashed academic spending on research, closed departments, forced PhDs who could be doing useful research into jobs in finance, or put them on the dole.
Unfortunately just because someone isn't interested in politics, doesn't mean politics isn't interested in them.
Yawn - "it"s all about narrative" yet again - and yet another unsupported generalisation about a whole "community" - a rather diverse and argumentative one, and about the whole period since the Enlightenment - which actually did much to spread scientific ideas to a wider public - a tradition continued today - see earlier reply. Maybe it's because I'm a Londoner - that I moved to Nice.
Probably most scientists, wisely, wouldn't come up with generalisations like this. But it works both ways and is a reflection of the UK's very early specialisation, rather than something characteristic of scientists in general.
There is a great tradition in Britain of popularising science. Charles Darwin himself was a popular science writer, for what else was On the Origin of Species but a summary in plain English of the evidence for the theory of evolution by natural selection? In the 20th century, there has been a tradition at Cambridge of science popularisers, with Arthur Eddington, James Jeans and Fred Hoyle all disseminating the biggest cosmic ideas to the general public. Hoyle even coined the term "Big Bang"during a 1949 BBC radio broadcast. And the genre remains healthy, with the big writers including Richard Dawkins, most famous for The Selfish Gene, Simon Singh for Fermat's Last Theorem and Matt Ridley for Genome. This month came the news that Graham Farmelo won the Costa Biography Award for The Strangest Man, his brilliant biography of the Spock-like physicist Paul Dirac. Independent
And the genre remains healthy, with the big writers including Richard Dawkins, most famous for The Selfish Gene, Simon Singh for Fermat's Last Theorem and Matt Ridley for Genome. This month came the news that Graham Farmelo won the Costa Biography Award for The Strangest Man, his brilliant biography of the Spock-like physicist Paul Dirac.
Independent
"in terms of political influence and persuasive power the humanities can kick science's ass all the way to Pluto and back."
Oh really, any evidence for this ? Or do you just mean that few politicians studied science ? But in relation to the formation of policy today I think the humanities as such (as opposed to political considerations) have little effect in contrast to the sciences, e.g. the NHS, agriculture, etc. - even though the sciences are too often neglected (again for political reasons). Maybe it's because I'm a Londoner - that I moved to Nice.
