Why?...Bill Nye vs creationism debate

Seems like a waste of time...each side is entrenched.

"Bill Nye will debate founder of Creation Museum"

Bill Nye, science education advocate and TV personality, will visit Kentucky in February to debate Ken Ham, the founder of the Creation Museum. The event will be titled, 'Is Creation A Viable Model of Origins?'

by

Dylan Lovan

January 4th, 2014 

The Christian Science Monitor

Bill Nye "The Science Guy" is set to visit Kentucky to debate evolution and biblical creation with the founder of the Creation Museum.

Ken Ham wrote on his Facebook page Thursday that he will square off Feb. 4 with Nye, the former host of a popular science TV show for youths.

The event is likely to attract plenty of attention in scientific and faith circles, as Nye is a high-profile advocate of science education and Ham is a respected leader among Christians who believe the Bible's origin story is a factual account of the Earth's beginnings.

Ham had been hoping to attract the star of TV's "Bill Nye The Science Guy" to the northern Kentucky museum after Nye said in an online video last year that teaching creationism was bad for children. The video was viewed nearly 6 million times on YouTube.

"Having the opportunity to hold a cordial but spirited debate with such a well-known personality who is admired by so many young people will help bring the creation-evolution issue to the attention of many more people, including youngsters," Ham said in a release Thursday.

The Creation Museum has been lauded by supporters and prodded by scientists for exhibits that assert the Earth was created in a few days about 6,000 years ago. It also has displays with dinosaurs and humans living alongside each other, in contradiction to scientific findings that the two species were separated by more than 60 million years.

Nye said in an Associated Press interview in September that steering children away from evolution and teaching creationism would hurt scientific advances. Science has demonstrated that the Earth is billions of years old, and "if that conflicts with your beliefs, I strongly feel you should question your beliefs," he told the AP.

Nye, who is executive director of the Planetary Society, said in that interview that he would be willing to travel to Kentucky and debate Ham if the museum paid his travel expenses.

An email message sent to Nye's assistant was not returned Thursday. Nye agreed to participate in the debate early last month, said Mark Looy, vice president of outreach for Answers in Genesis, the ministry that operates the Creation Museum.

Ham said some "mocking, strident evolutionists" have invited him and other Creation Museum staff to debates in the past, but they have declined. Ham wanted to engage with Nye because, "as a serious advocate for his beliefs, Nye's opinions carry weight in society," Ham said in the release.

The event will be titled "Is Creation A Viable Model of Origins?" Tickets to the evening event at the museum's Legacy Hall will be $25.

B. Nye's plea to NASA

"The Science Guy Wants Money For Space Exploration"

The Planetary Science Program is facing steep budget cuts in 2014

by

Denver Nicks

December 6th, 2013

Time

In a video appeal to President Barack Obama released Thursday through The Planetary Society, Nye decries the steep budget cuts that may be in store for NASA in general, and the Planetary Science Program in particular. Nye’s impassioned plea describes the potential scientific discoveries have to change the course of human history.

“The space program, NASA, is the best brand the United States has,” Nye says. “Right now what NASA does best is explore the solar system through the Planetary Science Program.”

The White House’s proposed budget for 2014 includes millions of dollars in cuts to the NASA budget, but the Planetary Science Program gets a particularly close shave, its budget trimmed from $1.5 billion to $1.2 billion. The Science Guy is not pleased — Nye calls for the Planetary Science Program budget to be held steady at $1.5 billion.

Bill Nye's Open Letter to President Barack Obama...

Bill Nye should stick to popular science promotion

Tyne Stecklein

From io9...

Bill Nye, who tore 80% of his quadricep last week, was told not to participate in last night's Dancing with the Stars. But he did anyway, performing a Daft Punk-inspired robot dance with Tyne Stecklein that required him to move his injured leg as little as possible. The duo won't be returning, but they left the stage to chants of "Bill! Bill! Bill!"

B. Nye on the move

"Firebrand for Science, and Big Man on Campus"

by

John Schwartz

June 17th, 2013

The New York Times

As the car pulled into the parking lot of a Starbucks, William Sanford Nye unknotted his trademark bow tie and slipped it off.

“This might buy us a couple of minutes,” he said.

Roughly two minutes later, before his drink was ready, he was recognized anyway. Two awed young women approached to ask if he was really Bill Nye the Science Guy. Like more than a dozen other college students who would approach him over the next several hours, they asked if they could take a picture with him. He smiled, took a proffered iPhone, scooched the students in and, in a practiced gesture, stretched out his arm to take a shot of the three of them that you just knew was totally going on Facebook.

Mr. Nye had come to talk to them, and a few thousand of their friends, at Iowa State University. If he were a politician, college students would be his base. Instead, he is something more: a figure from their early days in front of the family TV, a beloved teacher and, more and more these days, a warrior for science. They, in turn, are his fans, his students and his army.

They have gone from watching him explain magnetism and electricity to defending the scientific evidence for climate change, the age of the earth and other issues they have seen polemicized for religious, political and even economic reasons.

He takes on those who would demand that the public schools teach alternative theories of evolution and the origins of the earth — most famously, in a video clip from the site BigThink.com that has been viewed some five million times. In it, he flatly tells adult viewers that “if you want to deny evolution and live in your world — in your world that’s completely inconsistent with everything we observe in the universe — that’s fine. But don’t make your kids do it, because we need them. We need scientifically literate voters and taxpayers for the future.”

In any given week, you’re likely to see Mr. Nye, 57, somewhere on television, calmly countering the arguments made by people like Marc Morano, the former Republican Senate staff member whose industry-funded organization, climatedepot.com, disputes the increasingly well-understood connection between rising levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide and warming. In an exchange several months ago on “Piers Morgan Tonight” on CNN, Mr. Morano denied that warming is occurring, and scoffed that Mr. Nye’s arguments were “the level of your daily horoscope.”
Mr. Nye quietly rebutted his opponent with the gravity of scientific consensus. “This will be the hottest two decades in recorded history,” he said. “I’ve got to disagree with you.”

Sometimes his advocacy can step out in front of scientific consensus, however. In May, after a monster tornado devastated large parts of Moore, Okla., he took a jab on Twitter at one of that state’s United States senators, James Inhofe, who has written a book calling climate change “the greatest hoax.” He mused: “Has anyone asked Oklahoma Senator Inhofe” about the frequency of such destructive storms? Yet a link between climate change and tornado activity has not been established.

On the night the tornado hit Moore, Mr. Nye explained to Mr. Morgan that “you can’t say from any one storm that ‘this is a result of, let’s say, climate change.’ ” But he noted that “if there’s more heat driving the storm, then there’s going to be more tornadoes,” and added that the question “is worth investigating.”

Neil deGrasse Tyson, the director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History, said that he considered Mr. Nye “among my best friends” and complimented him for “hitting controversial topics head on.”
But, he said, his own style is a bit less confrontational: “I’m looking to stimulate curiosity so most people can go out there and learn on their own.”

Phil Plait, the creator of the Bad Astronomy blog at Slate.com and a fierce advocate himself, is more like Mr. Nye, willing to take the gloves off in rebutting those who might deny that men landed on the moon, or the evidence for human effects on climate change.

Mr. Plait said admiringly of Mr. Nye, “He will very calmly tear them apart,” adding, “His big advantage is, he’s right. We know that climate change is real. We know creationism is wrong. These are no longer scientific controversies.”

“When people call these ‘controversial topics,’ that’s misleading,” he continued. “They are only controversial politically. And politics is not necessarily evidence-based.”

There was nothing in Mr. Nye’s early days that suggested he might be a firebrand for science. Born in Washington, D.C., he studied mechanical engineering at Cornell, where he got to know a professor named Carl Sagan. He moved out West to do engineering for Boeing, where he spent some three years designing a hydraulic tube for the 747 that served to dampen vibration in the steering mechanism. He refers to it lovingly as “my tube.”

He tried his hand at stand-up comedy — his first time onstage was during a Steve Martin look-alike competition, which he won. He would achieve escape velocity from Boeing with an idea for a television program that would teach science to children in a wacky way. The best-known version of “Bill Nye the Science Guy” ran from 1992 to 1996, and won 18 Emmys in five years.

Mr. Nye’s past teaching and present crusading have made him a rock star for scientifically inclined students across the country. That celebrity has allowed him, as executive director of the Planetary Society, to push for the kind of interplanetary exploration that, he said in an interview, “leads to the reverence that we have for our place in the cosmos.”

“Space,” he added, “brings out the best in us.”

On the day of Mr. Nye’s visit to the Iowa State campus, students began lining up by midafternoon to make sure they got into the evening lecture. Stephens Auditorium holds about 3,000 people, and as many as a thousand would ultimately be turned away.

They came, many said, because “Bill Nye the Science Guy” helped shape their lives. “He was probably the one who inspired me to keep going in the science career track,” said Betsy Salmon, the first person in line at one entrance to the auditorium. She majored in animal ecology.

Kaci McCleary, an “aspiring neurobiologist, or neuro-something,” said that Mr. Nye was “a very inspiring person in the field of science — he tells people to make science part of their lives, even if it’s not their career.” Ms. McCleary, who knitted as she waited to be let in, said a friend had joked to her, “I hope to be able to touch the hem of his lab coat, so he could cure me of my stupid.”

Mr. Nye did not disappoint. In a lecture that gave evidence of his stand-up roots, he started out with rambling asides on his his family and its generations-long fascination with sundials. He talked about the bluish tinge of shadows on Earth compared with the orangy shadows on Mars, and described the sundial that he convinced NASA to send up with the Curiosity rover. He got a little risqué with a joke about the gnomon — the part of the sundial that sticks up, you know — and bounced into a discussion of the hellish heat of Venus and that planet’s high concentration of greenhouse gases.

He told the students that if they figured out ways to solve problems like greenhouse gases and global warming, “You could — dare I say it? — change the world!” And what’s more, he added, throwing his head back for a hearty mad-scientist laugh, “you could get rich!”

Over the hour-and-a-half talk, those statements started out as a laugh line that got funnier through increasingly manic repetition. But he shifted his tone gradually, from goofy to fervent. By the end of his speech, it was an exhortation, a command: Change the world.

During the question-and-answer session, a student brought up Mr. Nye’s comments on evolution and creation. The problem, he explained, is that some people advocate requiring public schools to teach religious apologia as science.

“The earth’s not 4,000, 6,000, 10,000 years old,” he said. “I’ve got no problem with anybody’s religion. But if you go claiming the earth is only 10,000 years old, that’s just wrong.”

The students roared their approval. As the audience streamed out — did those dudes really rip off their shirts to show that they had painted, in all capital letters, “Bill Nye” on their chests and “science” on their backs? — Mr. Nye looked like someone who had just run a triathlon. And then it was time for more pictures.

Earlier in the day, he had marveled at the chain of events that made him the Springsteen of the nerds. “I was making a TV show. It had commercials for toys.” Yet, he noted, “It stands the test of time. It’s very gratifying.”
What he did then, and what he does now, are all part of the same crusade, he said. “There’s nothing I believe in more strongly than getting young people interested in science and engineering,” he said — “for a better tomorrow, for all humankind.”

He stopped, realizing that sounded grandiose, or at least corny.

“I’m not kidding,” he said.

What a group: Day, Greene, Flatow, Tyson, Krauss, Dawkins, Nye, Stephenson

Tracy Day, Brian Greene (standing), Ira Flatow, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Lawrence Krauss, Richard Dawkins, Bill Nye, and Neal Stephenson at Arizona State University for the Origins Project's Origins Stories weekend.

"Neil deGrasse Tyson on Van Gogh's Role in Space Exploration and Other Great Tales of Science"

by

Torie Bosch

April 1st, 2013

Slate

Science panels don’t normally involve a striptease, even a G-rated one.

But on Saturday, March 30, Neil deGrasse Tyson took off his shirt to prove a point about the stars, science, and art.

It happened at Arizona State University during “The Science of Storytelling,” a panel featuring Tyson, Science Friday’s Ira Flatow, World Science Festival Executive Director Tracy Day, physicist Brian Greene, atheism rock star Richard Dawkins, science fiction writer Neal Stephenson, Bill Nye the Science Guy, and host Lawrence Krauss.

ASU’s Origins Project, which is directed by Krauss, sponsored the panel as part of a series of weekend events celebrating science, reason, and stories. (Disclosure: ASU is a partner with Slate and the New America Foundation in Future Tense, and Krauss is a regular Future Tense contributor.) As part of the festivities, the radio show Science Friday broadcast live from ASU, and there was also a Friday night screening of and discussion about The Unbelievers, a documentary following Krauss and Dawkins as they travel the world to promote atheism and skeptical thinking. Cameron Diaz, who appears briefly in The Unbelievers, even took to the stage with Krauss, Dawkins, and authors Ian McEwan and Cormac McCarthy to discuss the film. (Upon introducing Diaz to the audience, Krauss remarked that he initially met her at World Science Fest a few years back—and during their first conversation, he apologized to her for having been surprised to see her there.)

In his opening remarks at “The Science of Storytelling” on Saturday, Krauss said, “One of the things I like to tell students … not all the problems are solved. There’s still an incredible need to understand things in the universe.” By telling the human stories behind the science, we can stop making it feel like something that was “done by dead white men.” Accordingly, each panelist told a tale (or several) about science—and that’s where Tyson’s shirt comes in.

Tyson was riffing on a familiar theme: art’s relationship with science. For eons, he said, artists had a responsibility to paint primarily what they saw. But with the advent of photography—science!—“it was no longer the obligation of the artist to capture reality.” That’s when he shucked his beige button-down to display a T-shirt bearing Van Gogh’s Starry Night. (Tyson’s office at the American Museum of Natural History boasts both a Starry Night print and a Starry Night pillow, which he showed off in a Science Friday video in March 2012.)

Van Gogh, he said,

    didn’t call the painting Sleepy Village, Cypress Tree, Church Steeple, Hills. It is the first painting that I know of … [in which] the background is the subject of the painting, and that background is the night sky, and it [has] elevated the cosmos to become fair game to the artist. I submit to you that science, scientific discovery, especially cosmic discovery, does not become mainstream until the artists embrace the fruits of those discoveries. So I applaud Vincent van Gogh for thinking that the sky is what mattered more than anything in the foreground for this painting.

Tyson famously criticized director James Cameron over the night sky portrayed in Titanic as the ship sinks. After receiving a “snarky” email from Tyson, Cameron corrected the stars for the film’s 10th anniversary rerelease. So, Tyson said at ASU, people have often asked him why he doesn’t object to the untrue-to-life celestial bodies seen in Starry Night.
 
I was asked, given how nitpicky I was about the wrong sky over Kate Winslet as she floated on that plank … what do I think about the Van Gogh sky? Clearly that’s not accurate. My reply was, “In the case of the artist, I don’t want them to represent reality because I have that via my own telescopes. I want and need the artist to take me to new places, and the new place that Van Gogh took me not the sky as it is but the sky as he felt it. And the more of us that feel the universe, the better off we will be in this world.”

As he wrapped up, Krauss interjected, “You notice that Pluto is not on this shirt.”

“Get over it,” shot back Tyson, who has confessed to “driv[ing] the getaway car” in Pluto’s demotion from planetary status.

Much of the evening was devoted to pointing out just how straight-up cool science is—and the 3,000-person crowd reveled in it, especially during raucous disputes between panelists over space privatization, math as the “language of the universe,” and whether we could ever find out what consciousness really is. During a particularly contentious bout, Tyson stood up as if to go after Greene—and Nye held him back as Greene fled.

But the panelists turned serious at moments. “If we only talk about how fun science is, we don’t do it justice,” Dawkins said. In recognition of one of science’s less-admirable facets, Krauss concluded the night with a frank acknowledgment: that Tracy Day was the only woman on the eight-person panel. Krauss said that he hopes that that won’t be the case much longer. The speakers were “the old guard,” Krauss said. “And I’m hoping that we will encourage young women to go into science and go into communicating about science so when we have this panel in the future, we’ll have an all-female panel.”

That would be a story worth hearing.


Astronomy...art

Astronomy--forensics

Van Gogh's mystery star at the White House

The heat is on for Bill Nye

"Bill Nye the Science Guy defends anti-creationist video"

by

Dennis Bodzash

August 30th, 2012

examiner.com

Last week, Bill Nye, best known as TV's 'Science Guy,' created quite a stir when he appeared in a video for the website the Big Think, in which he declared that a belief in creationism was bad for children. Now, after the video has gone viral (over 1.6 million hits and counting), a lot of attention (and criticism) has come down on Nye for his view

Appearing on CBS This Morning, Nye is fighting back against his critics, declaring that he was not attacking religion at all, but is merely trying to promote science.

Speaking on the science vs. religion struggle, Nye stated that "You can believe what you want religiously. Religion is one thing, but science, provable science is something else,” adding that “you want people to believe in science, this process, this great idea that humans had to discover more about the universe and our place in it, our place in space.”

Turning to current events to illustrate his point, Nye focused on Hurricane Issac, stating that “this morning, talking about Hurricane Isaac, and we're watching satellite maps made with spacecraft orbiting the earth, and this all comes from science. If you have this idea that the earth is only 6,000 years old, you are denying, if you will, everything that you can touch and see. You're not paying attention to what's happening in the universe around you. As I say, this is bad for kids."

Basically, Nye is saying that people can believe in whatever they want to in terms of religion, but that religion should not be confused with science.

As for what is supposed to be taught in schools, Ohio has implemented academic content standards for all core school subjects, including science. The goal of these standards is to ensure that teachers are teaching the same content in every school at any given grade level. By looking at the Ohio science standards, one sees no reference to creationism/intelligent design, only evolution, to which there are over a dozen in just the high school grades alone. Besides scientific facts, the Ohio standards also emphasize the scientific method, which makes no room for including one's preconceived notions in scientific research. .

Now, one may be asking “what does all of this have to do with astronomy and space? Answer: plenty.

Like biology, astronomy is a subject that has had a history of conflicting with religion and, even now, can shock the sensibilities of some, particularly religious fundamentalists, who continue to hold onto the belief that the world was created in a matter of days and that the age of the Earth can be determined by counting back the years as given in holy books. Just as anyone committed to the correct teaching of science would be appalled at the lack of evolution in biology, a same revulsion would occur if the Big Bang along with solar system formation were taught side by side with the account in Genesis, or skipped altogether, in an astronomy class. Needless to say, omitting these two most basic of processes would do as major a disservice to any astronomy student as glossing over evolution or teaching it in tandem with a most nonscientific idea as creationism would do to anyone learning biology.

Needless to say, if biology teachers are too afraid to teach evolution through either personal ignorance or risk of offending someone, what's not to say that astronomy teachers will become the same way if the religious decide to get up in arms over the Big Bang or solar system formation? It's a scary thought but, considering the social climate of the country we live in, it may not be an impossibility, especially considering that the U.S. is an anomaly in the Western world wherein belief in creationism far outweighs that in evolution.

As a final thought, consider the following: in science, if there is any commandment, it is this: respect the facts. No matter what we want the world to be or what our preconceived notions are, the world is the way it is, inflexible to human will. If one truly wishes to assume a scientific mindset, he/she must have respect for facts, no matter how contrary to personal beliefs they are. In the case of both evolution and the Big Bang, all facts point towards the scientific theories, not the religious dogma, being the truth. Yes, there are many great things about religion, such as ethical principles, its function as a social bonding agent, influence on the arts, and many others. However, religion is not science and it should be kept out of the science classroom.
 
The video is at this link...

Some thoughts by Bill Nye regarding creationism, evolution, and science

Some thoughts by Bill Nye regarding creationism, evolution, and science

"Well-Known Science Guy Says Current Generation Should End Their Beliefs In Creationism"

by

Brett Smith

August 27th, 2012

redOrbit

Americans like to celebrate their freedom to believe in anything they want, from paranormal activity to ancient aliens, but educational presenter Bill Nye said the belief in creationism should end with the current generation in a recent web video for Big Think.

“So, once in a while I get people that really — or that claim — they don’t believe in evolution,” Nye said. “And my response generally is ‘Well, why not? Really, why not?’ Your world just becomes fantastically complicated when you don’t believe in evolution. I mean, here are these ancient dinosaur bones or fossils, here is radioactivity, here are distant stars that are just like our star but they’re at a different point in their lifecycle.”

“The idea of deep time, of this billions of years, explains so much of the world around us” he added. “If you try to ignore that, your world view just becomes crazy, just untenable, itself inconsistent.”

The crux of Nye’s argument lies in his implied purpose for speaking out—that Americans need to embrace science over belief for the sake of a better society.

“We need scientifically literate voters and taxpayers for the future,” he said. “We need people that can — we need engineers that can build stuff, solve problems.”

Nye began his message by saying that the United States is unique in its fairly mainstream opposition to evolution, a position held by mostly religious Christian conservatives.

Creationism has a history as long as civilization itself, with many pre-Christian religions containing some type of origin story. These beliefs have often translated into tangible effects within a particular society. Ancient people have a well-documented history of constructing monuments and even fighting wars over religious beliefs that include some variation on Creationism.

Even the modern day faithful have spent large sums of money in tribute to the book of Genesis. A 70,000 square foot museum in Petersburg, Ky attempts to bring “the pages of the Bible to life” as it depicts dinosaurs roaming along Eden’s rivers. The Creation Museum was established in 2007 to promote the message that all life was created 6,000 years ago in six days.

Creationism and those dedicated to Genesis dedications aren’t restricted to North America either. A Dutch creationist, Johan Huibers, has built a 450-foot long replica of Noah’s Ark that took four years and three months to build. The ship was constructed without technical drawings, which led to delays in receiving permits and passing inspections.

The latest web video by Bill Nye is not the first time the former mechanical engineer has dipped his toe into the waters where science and politics intersect. Nye railed against the media in July for what he believed was a lack of coverage on the issues of climate change.

“The environment is a very important issue. I guess, if I understand this, it’s fallen by the wayside for a few months while we talk about the economy,” Nye told CNN, who he singled out for particularly poor coverage of the issue.

A study by the left-wing media watchdog group Media Matters supported Nye’s assertion, claiming that CNN mentioned climate change less than Fox News during coverage of the July 2012 nationwide heat wave.

"Bill Nye slams creationism"

by

Eric Marrapodi

August 27th, 2012

CNN

Famed TV scientist Bill Nye is slamming creationism in a new online video for Big Think titled "Creationism Is Not Appropriate For Children."

"Denial of evolution is unique to the United States," Nye begins in a YouTube video posted on Thursday.  The video quickly picked up steam over the weekend and as of Monday morning had been viewed more than 1,100,000 times.

Nye – a mechanical engineer and television personality best known for his program, "Bill Nye the Science Guy" – said the United States has great capital in scientific knowledge and "when you have a portion of the population that doesn't believe in it, it holds everyone back."

"Your world becomes fantastically complicated if you don't believe in evolution," Nye said in the Web video.

Creationists are a vast and varied group in the United States.  Most creationists believe in the account of the origins of the world as told in the Book of Genesis, the first book of the Bible.

In the creation account, God creates Adam and Eve, the world, and everything in it in six days.

For Christians who read the Genesis account literally, or authoritatively as they would say, the six days in the account are literal 24-hour periods and leave no room for evolution.  Young Earth creationists use this construct and biblical genealogies to determine the age of the Earth, and typically come up with 6,000 to 10,000 years.

The Gallup Poll has been tracking Americans' views on creation and evolution for the past 30 years.  In June it released its latest findings, which showed 46% of Americans believed in creationism, 32% believed in evolution guided by God, and 15% believed in atheistic evolution.

During the 30 years Gallup has conducted the survey, creationism has remained far and away the most popular answer, with 40% to 47% of Americans surveyed saying they believed that God created humans in their present form at one point within the past 10,000 years.

"The idea of deep time of billions of years explains so much of the world around us. If you try to ignore that, your worldview becomes crazy, untenable, itself inconsistent," Nye said in the video.

"I say to the grownups, if you want to deny evolution and live in your world, that's completely inconsistent with the world we observe, that's fine.  But don't make your kids do it.  Because we need them.  We need scientifically literate voters and taxpayers for the future.  We need engineers that can build stuff and solve problems," he said.

Creationists' beliefs about the origins of the Earth are often a narrow focus, based in large part on religious beliefs, and while they reject evolution as "just one theory," they often embrace other fields of science and technology.

In "The Genesis Flood," the 1961 book that in many ways help launch the Young Earth creationism movement in the United States, the authors write: “Our conclusions must unavoidably be colored by our Biblical presuppositions, and this we plainly acknowledge."  Their goal for the book was to harmonize the scientific evidence with the accounts in Genesis of creation and the flood.

The idea of creationism has been scorned by the mainstream scientific community since shortly after Darwin introduced "The Origin of Species" in 1859.  By 1880, The American Naturalists, a science journal, reported nearly every major university in America was teaching evolution.

"In another couple centuries I'm sure that worldview won't even exist.  There's no evidence for it. So..." Nye ends his video.

Creationism Is Not Appropriate For Children

Bill Nye [Wikipedia]

Bill Nye "The Science Guy"..."Stargate Atlantis"

He's still around even though the program is long gone.

Bill Nye "The Science Guy"

"Talking Physics, Astronomy And 'Stargate Atlantis' With Bill Nye"

by

Joseph Dilworth Jr.

November 21st, 2008

Pop Culture Zoo

"Brain Storm", the latest episode of Stargate Atlantis, guest-stars Dave Foley, Neil deGrasse Tyson and Bill Nye. Also known as the "Science Guy", Nye has shown many people the fun and entertaining side to science. His show, Bill Nye the Science Guy ran for four years on PBS and majorly influenced me in an interest in physics and astronomy. Thanks to SCI FI, I recently had a chance to speak with him about his appearance on Stargate and a whole range of other topics. While this may not read as funny, trust me when I say he had me laughing the entire conversation. Note: there are some mild spoilers below so you may want to read this after you watch the episode.

PCZ: How did you get involved with doing an episode of Stargate Atlantis?

BN: Robert Picardo is on the advisory board of The Planetary Society. I have been a member of The Planetary Society since 1980. Now I'm the vice president and he and I have become really good friends. So he asked me if I'd be interested and he asked them [the producers] if they'd be interested and we converged. It turns out that Stargate-ians are all big Bill Nye fans. It's cool.

PCZ: Most of the time on a show like Stargate, a fictional show, it's usually…

BN: Fictional, what?!? Are you kidding? That's not real?

PCZ: You tell me, how real is it?

BN: I'll just tell you, [on the episode I'm in] the world almost ends, man. It takes us like fifty-four minutes to keep the world from ending. We really had to focus.

PCZ: When they came to you was it always that you were going to be yourself and have such a large role in the episode? Usually they bring the guest star through as themselves for a few minutes, they make a few jokes and then go away. But you keep showing up and you help save the day.

BN: I know, yeah. They let me ad-lib a couple of lines. "I can do math, I'm an engineer!" "It's a convolution integral," or something like that. I don't know if that made it in.

PCZ: Did you get to make up some of the science or help keep the science real?

BN: Well, I mean I made a couple of suggestions. The whole plutoid thing, did that make it in?

PCZ: Yes it did.

BN: Oh good, I made that up or expressed that. Did the public service announcement make it in? The PSA about the importance of science-fiction and imagination and stuff?

PCZ: I just saw a rough cut of the episode and it wasn’t included.

BN: It'll be after the show. Let me just say it was the most fun [being in the episode]. Oh man, the big thing for me I got to just be an actor. Normally, you know, I'm a producer too. I bring the beakers and I develop the demonstration, a lot of extra dinking around. But in this thing I was just acting.

PCZ: That’s easier, right?

BN: Well, it's easier if that's all your doing, if you only have one role. I mean it's gotta be harder to be the player-coach than the player.

PCZ: Had you watched Stargate before?

BN: Yeah. I'll be honest, I wasn't a religious, never-miss-it guy, but I watched it many times.

PCZ: So how does it hold up as far as plausible science or real science?

BN: Oh, that's another thing about this episode for me. It's just a cool idea. You know, we all want as engineers and physicists the second law of thermal dynamics to not be true. We want somehow to be able to move heat from one place to another without the enormous physics penalty that we have. I don’t know if you know what I mean, but if you're gonna move heat around there’s this thing called the Carnot efficiency that just crushes your smokes, as we say. It makes it really difficult. Your dream ever since you're a little kid is that that is really not true, that there is some physics way around that which is not perfectly analogous, but reminiscent of the idea that time isn’t always going one way. If you could go through a wormhole wouldn’t that be great to end up at another part of the universe at another time? Wouldn’t that just be a wonderful thing? And so that's the premise of Stargate.

"If you could go through a wormhole wouldn’t that be great to end up at another part of the universe at another time? Wouldn’t that just be a wonderful thing?"

So, this guy has a way around the second law of thermal dynamics. It's wonderful, it's a great idea as far as science-fiction goes. It's really good and that was another thing that really really appealed to me. Also, and I've said this a hundred times, but [episode writer and director] Martin Gero is really good he's going to go somewhere huge I think.

PCZ: Do you think a show like Stargate fits in well with your idea of combining entertainment and science to get people interested in it?

BN: Well, there's a couple of things about Stargate includes a hopeful view of the future. It's inherently optimistic that we will solve the world's problems and we will have the wonderful luxury of cruising all over the place and as we do everybody will get along. I mean there's wraiths and they’re trouble, sure. We're trying to talk them out of it with that genetic modification. I don't know if that’s going to get resolved. I don't want to frighten your readers, but the wraith could be a problem for a long time.

At any rate, at any wraith, I love the optimist quality of science-fiction. For somebody my age this goes back to Star Trek where if we just played our cards right things would be better. So Stargate Atlantis has this inherently optimistic thing. The great thing about Stargate Atlantis is just the vulnerability of every character. Every character just has so much trouble. Rodney! Dude! And Keller, she's just so vulnerable so fragile, yet she's tough, you know?

PCZ: You and Neil deGrasse Tyson just get to tear Rodney apart in front of his date.

BN: Well, we did our best. Hey, did the whistle come out? They walk away and I whistle? There was a lot of ambiance and I'm not sure I was whistling very strongly.

PCZ: Yes, that made it in. Was that another ad lib?

BN: Oh yeah. The way it was [originally] written was that it didn't quite point out that Neil is very happily married, so he’s not going to hit on her. So I had to sort of slip that in.

PCZ: That was a nice little line there as well.

BN: Neil's wife is something, she's quite charming and brilliant. They met in astrophysics grad school for crying out loud! He's the real deal that Neil. He almost always includes his middle name, it's his thing. Neil deGrasse Tyson. It's his deal, who am I to judge? I think the fewer names the better.

PCZ: Bill Nye is very concise and it’s right to the point.

BN: It’s right there and you're done.

PCZ: When you do a role where you're yourself are you playing exactly yourself or is it more of an exaggerated version?

BN: Well, the guy on camera is a little more wound up than I am. I don't drop as many things on my feet as the Science Guy does. The Science Guy's a lot of trouble. He's always getting hit in the head with an anvil. The world was ending people!

PCZ: You're going to be a little high strung…

BN: Yes! The world's ending, ok?!?

PCZ: You still maintained your cool. I thought you kept everyone focused.

BN: Well, [quoting himself from the episode] "I can do math, I'm an engineer! Now, Rodney, this epsilon is a function of time! The convolution integral is not a constant here. I've been telling you all this for hours, man! At least 50 minutes I’ve been telling you this!" And Dave Foley was great, he was cracking me up.

PCZ: Between you, Dave Foley and David Hewlett how did you keep it straight?

BN: Dave Hewlett, man that guy. He works hard I tell ya. He's a good guy.

PCZ: This episode is all based in one building. Did you get to go see the Stargate?

BN: No I didn't have time, too much going on. We hope we are going to be back. This Stargate is going to get canceled, but there will be derivative products and I hope we get sucked into that.

PCZ: There'll be another series as well.

BN: Exactly. Like Star Trek just reinvent it all the time. So we are hopeful that we get sucked into that. We, the royal we for I, me, Bill. I want to get sucked back into the vortex. It was so much fun and I'm wearing a tuxedo, come on! In downtown Vancouver, down by Robson Street, walking around in the evening. And I bought a pair of shoes there that I wore on camera all week.

PCZ: You kind of had the James Bond thing going on there.

BN: Sure I did, sure I did. And that was my tie and Neil's tie, we both brought our ties. When you're playing yourself you can pull that off. That tie is custom made. I was at a science museum in London a couple of weeks ago and I bought a tie at the Science Center and it's a straight tie and I send it to this company in Vermont called Beau Ties. Get it? Beau Ties will make a straight tie into a bow tie for thirty bucks. I've had two dozen ties made into a bow tie. The one with the planets on it started out as a straight tie and Neil owns another version of that tie from the same company, but he uses it as a straight tie. But we look good I mean, come on, you're standing around in a tuxedo for four days. What’s not to love about that? Neil, he's a busy guy. He's on the NASA board and the National Advisory Council, so he was only there for a day.

"But we look good I mean, come on, you’re standing around in a tuxedo for four days. What’s not to love about that?"

PCZ: And you supported his downgrading Pluto from planet status?

BN: Absolutely, because there's very good, as we say, pedagogical reasons for that. Pluto is different from the other planets and that is a great thing to know if you're a kid, if you’re anybody. It's good to understand that Pluto is inherently not like the planets in what I like to call the Main Plane. The Main Plane is the plane of the ecliptic and Pluto is trans-Neptunian and is closely related to what I like to call the ultra-Neptunian objects. Trans-Neptunian would cross the orbit of Pluto, ultra-Neptunian would be beyond the orbit of Pluto. These objects are form the earliest, earliest days of the solar system and contain water, rockiness and they’re kooky and crazy. If you took Pluto near the sun it would evaporate, it would have a tail. Is a planet supposed to do that? I mean it seems like a planet should be more robust. Although it has enough gravity to be a ball it doesn’t have enough gravity to clear things out of it’s orbit. I mean, the moon is a much bigger object than Pluto. Pluto and Cheron are a doublet, a pair, and the pairs are very common. In certain orbital sectors thirty percent of the objects are in pairs, binaries.

PCZ: I'm learning all kinds of things from this interview.

BN: I give you this because I was just at the DPS, the Division for Planetary Science meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Ithaca at Cornell. Didn't see you there, it’s really a party. Well, it was fun for me, but, hey, I like [New York] hot dogs.

PCZ: Are you still in competition with Ed Begley Jr. ?

BN: Oh, yes my friend! Ed Begley - what is it now punk? What’s in right now and I'm looking right out at it is the subterranean lawn watering system. Instead of pipes coming up with sprinklers and spraying through the air these have these patented shaped tubes with these very small holes drilled in them and water comes from underneath. Now I just put it in on Saturday and we'll see if it works. I think it'll work. I looked at the data, I looked at their test site where they've installed it at other houses. It looks like it's perfect, but one test is worth a thousand expert opinions.

PCZ: So he has no chance still?

BN: Oh he has a chance, but, I mean, come on. He's falling farther and farther behind.

PCZ: Look who he's up against, come on!

BN: Yes, exactly. Right now I am still surprised at how cool my house is inside today. Here in southern California we're having the Santa Ana winds, where air sloshes back from the great basin. The great basin is another name for Nevada and, this is physics and astonishing, the air falls downhill so fast it gets warm. Have you ever pumped up a bike tire and the bottom of the bike pump gets warm? The vibrational energy of all the air molecules that are, if you will, two feet long when you start the pump end up six inches long when you get to the bottom. Compress all that energy, it gets warm. So these winds fall downhill so fast they compress and get warm and dry the land out. Then when you get a fire set by a wrecked car or lightning or something you really get a fire. But my house is quite cool because of these new energy efficient windows. Ed has a few of them, but he hasn’t replaced them all, has he? How do I know that? That's right, Charlie the window guy. Charlie the window guy complaining to me that Begley hasn't finished. Hey man, i finished. And shot the lid. That's right, shot the lid. I sprayed granular beads that are evacuated in this silver spray paint on the underside of the roof. It’s a radiant barrier and all these things are conspiring to make the house so much better.

The trouble with the windows and the insulation and all that stuff is these are the low hanging fruit, this is not sexy. So you replaced the windows, big deal. Ed and I both have solar panels. I have a solar hot water system that I claim was better than his, but he has a new one and I don't know if I'm still keeping up with him on that. His is three years younger. But my electric bill is seven dollars a month and my gas bill is less than ten. It depends on how much cooking I do. Traditionally, environmentalists want you to do less; they want you to drive less, they want you to wear dirty clothes…I tell you what, just don't eat! But that's not what people want. People are not going to embrace that, you've got to come up with ways to do more with less. I have a section of my lawn called the wabe, which is from "Jabberwocky" by Lewis Carol. A wabe is a triangle piece of grass around my sundial. If I can maintain that just as green with a tenth of the water I used this time last year that will, if I may, kick ass.

PCZ: You invented a sundial that's being used on the mars rover, is that correct?

BN: Well, I didn't invent it, but I was a big part of it, I claim. I was the guy who suggested it in this one meeting. I wasn't the first guy to suggest it be a sundial, I was the first guy to point out that there is no symmetry problem because we'll be near the equator.

By the way let take a look right now. Twenty-three cents is my average cost per day for energy, the last sixty days is fourteen dollars. I just opened the bill because I was talking to you. And I remind you I am on the grid, I do not live off the grid. There's a connection charge of seven dollars a month. This is from the Department of Water and Power from August 1st to the 6th of October, so two months. And I'm one guy, I don't have a family. I travel a lot, I'm not here a lot, but the other thing is I have all these energy conserving systems in place.

PCZ: Well, that's all the time I have for now.

BN: It was great talking to you and enjoy the show.

PCZ: I will and thank you very much for your time.

Popularization of science

The popularization of science has been "good, bad, and ugly" at times...sometimes exploiting the stereotypical scientist [usually in cartoon representations such as Prof. Frink of The Simpsons, Professor Hubert Farnsworth (who is 160 years old, has seen Uranus many times, and invented the "Smelloscope", the "Death Clock", and the "What-If Machine") of Futurama, glamorizing a specific science [Carl Sagan, Brian Green, David Attenborrow, or Neil deGrasse Tyson], offering sound educational science [Mr. Wizard (Don Herbert), Bill Nye (Bill Nye the Science Guy), or Beakman's World].

Can there be a genuine bridge built between science and the populace that can explain in a good way the methodology and results of science? I am not sure why people aren't interested in science a little more--lack of interest, of childhood/adolescent exposure through the educational system, of ignorance. But whatever the reason, it appears that people have to have a "hook" in presentation to gain their interest. And, unfortunately, it is under the umbrella of the mysterious or paranormal. The "hook" has to be the promise of the unknown answered, new and startling evidence, unreleased government secret evidence, spectacular film techniques [film, video, animation, computer graphics], bold audio, and a host of recognizable fame [the likes of a Frank Baxter, Philip Morrrison, Don Herbert, Bill Nye, Stephen Hawking, Brian Greene, or Carl Sagan]. Production techniques can put one in awe, fast talking commentators can cloud issues, script writers can omit relevant material and create bias. The bottom line for most of these productions is to profit--make a buck through sponsorship. Good science programing is difficult to find where presentation of material is not biased and relevance is placed on logic and the scientific method. Despite the drawbacks mentioned above, at least some science is being presented to the public, but it will ultimately be the responsibility of the populace to sort through the presentation of material and decide for themselves. But, there is plenty of yakety-yak about the illusion of a rock face on Mars and ancient civilizations. For the most part the science programs are entertainment and not science. There are exceptions to the rule in programing and many of these tend to be tedious and obviously don't draw the crowds that a Sagan or Hawking would acquire. The answer is better educational background, some knowledge of logic and the scientific method, and a critical eye to discern good science from bad science.

Fred Hoyle was one of those pre-Carl Sagan individuals that attempted to bridge the gap between science and the general population, proposed an explanation for the origin of elements heavier than hydrogen ["nucleosynthesis"], and offered the cosmological hypothesis of the "steady state" universe as contrasted to the "big bang" hypothesis. His relationship with orthodox cosmology was a mixed bag with the "nucleosynthesis" and "steady state" concepts--one accepted and one untenable in light of identification of the "back ground radiation" thus supporting the expanding/"big bang" idea. It is unfortunate that Fred Hoyle in later life should be labeled a crank scientist whose company included Immanuel Velikovsky. Extrapolation of the "nucleosynthesis" idea to include bacteria ridding stellar dust particles and thus allowing dispersion of life throughout the universe ["panspermia"], devastating diseases dispersed in the same manner, evolution was to intricate to happen naturally and thus the result of some alien consciousness--all threw him into the crackpot category. Exaggerated eccentricities are not uncommon among high profile scientists: Carl Sagan's SETI or Stephen Hawking's promotion of genetic engineering to thwart errant global minded robots. I think his contributions far outweigh the "crackpot" label and should be considered mere eccentricities--the wheat can be extracted from the chaff.

What about periodicals [Scientific American, Discover, National Geographic, etc.], books both fiction and non-fiction, or even the pulp of science fiction [ Analog Science Fiction & Fact Magazine ]. Do they provide a good bridge as an entity themselves and the contributing authors [on a regular basis or periodically]? The contributors may be low key but they can provide the means of explaining the realm of science to the layman. However, I doubt that they will be successful in eliminating all the periodicals. Now as for the science books in bookstores, it is once again a matter of economics and the complicated world of publishers. It would not be practical for a book store owner to stock a multitude books on "quantum mechanics", but books by Carl Sagan, Stephen Hawking, George Gamow, Bill Nye, Rachel Carson, or Jane Goodall would have a better chance. As a tip, those science books that would never see a resting place at a retail bookstore would find a niche at a run down second hand bookstore or thrift store. Lots of college texts and personal libraries find a temporary home there.

A simple honorarium to a pioneer, George Pal in the film industry that married fascination with astronomy and a good story. For us older ones it was a fantastic thrill to watch science blossom in the 1950's and 1960's to such, as viewed now, naive films as Destination Moon, War of the Worlds, The Time Machine, and When Worlds Collide. Besides making a few bucks for Paramount they did inspire a generation of science nerds and nerdettes.

Ok, ok...don't laugh but the issue of discussing science with the younger generation via the Harry Potter books and films is quite real and worthy. Such complicated things as energy breaking atomic bonds, aerodynamics of broomsticks, visualizing the invisible, magnetism, etc. To quote the conclusion of one of the cited articles: But, as science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke once noted, "Any smoothly functioning technology gives the appearance of magic."

The other evening I was thinking about people who have attempted to popularize various venues of science and it came to me that a rather unique individual that was featured some time ago on one of those Sunday morning magazine type programs: John Dobson . Scratching your head and wondering who John Dobson is? John Dobson is a man of the streets that brought astronomy to the populace. Dobson was not without controversy for he attempted to debunk the existence of the photon [via Einstein's own Theory of Relativity] and became an advocate of the "steady state" universe. But the greatest claim to fame was through an organization called "The San Francisco Sidewalk Astronomers"--a co-production founded in 1968. Dobson and friends brought astronomy to the people and he even provided plans for making a homemade telescope. A remarkable individual who loves science and desires to share the same.

Now recently deceased, D. Allan Bromley was one of those individuals that attempted to bridge the gap between physics and the populace. He was a popular and well liked physics and engineering professor at Yale University, president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, author of many papers and books, won the National Medal of Science in 1998, chairman of Yale's Physics Department [1970-1977] and dean of Yale's Faculty of Engineering [1994 to 2000], and science and technology advisor to President George H.W. Bush. At Yale's he was referred to as "father of modern heavy ion science" and did much to develop and promote Yale's physics department.

This is a few years old but nevertheless is worth mentioning for the "Kalinga Prize for the Popularization of Science Award" was given to Brazilian immigrant, German born Ernst Wolfgang Hamburger. Hamburger is the director of the Estação Ciência [a center of the University of Sao Paulo, Brazil] that is dedicated to the popularization of science and technology. The Kalinga Prize is sponsored by UNESCO and amounts to about $2,000 and the Albert Einstein Silver Medal.

"Mr Hamburger has contributed to the development of the Estação Ciência, through the organisation of many exhibitions and the mobilisation of sponsors for innovative activities such as the Projeto Clicar, created in 1996 with the support of the national petroleum company, Petrobras. Estação Ciência receives 25,000 visitors a month, mostly children and adolescents. Projeto Clicar was established to provide a special space with computer equipment to young people who wish to explore independently the various facets of human knowledge. In 1999, close to 600 children from troubled social or family backgrounds took part in the project. Educators and students assist the children in their exploration."--UNESCO press release.

Yet another small scale attempt to bridge science [in this case mathematics] with non-experts can be attributed to this year's winner [Elias Stein] of the "Bergman Prize" sponsored by The American Mathematical Society in honor of Stefan Bergman [late Stanford mathematician]. "People are impressed by what are called his expository abilities," Breen said. "Math is no different from other sciences in that people specialize . . . A person [must] explain his specialty to other people who aren't specialists. He is very good at that."

And then there was James Burke who provided two excellent British series called Connections and The Day the Universe Changed during the late 1970's. Apparently he is still around and involved in a huge project aimed at the interaction between youngsters and science and how many people and events are connected. The web site example runs like this.

Question:

How was Napoleon important to the development of the modern computer?

Answer:

Napoleon troops in Egypt buy shawls and start a fashion craze.

In Europe the shawls get made on automated, perforated-paper control looms.

This gives an American engineer Herman Hollerith the idea to automate calculation using punch cards.

Which get used to control ENIAC, the first electronic computer.

There are fond memories of my high school physics class. With compliments of the audio-visual department [they were Geeks too] there rested in repose and ready to spring into action was a 2,000 foot reel of a 16mm print of the next installment of two physics professors--Hume and Ivy. This was the classic "Frames of Reference". I guess such instruments of teaching have evaporated:

The history of another activity fostered by the CCP, the Film Repository, has been more uneven. AAPT had long been interested in instructional films, and during the 1950s its Visual Aids Committee, headed by Mark Zemansky, brought out in cooperation with McGraw-Hill Book Company a series of short films on topics in elementary physics. The more ambitious series of longer films, some equally appropriate for high school or college, was produced by the Physical Science Study Committee. An increasing number of excellent films were produced and marketed by others. But with a few notable exceptions, such as "Frames of Reference" (Hume and Ivy), the use of films in formal instruction has all but disappeared.

Science via art:

Arthur Ganson:

"Thoughtful Mechanisms: The Lyrical Engineering of Arthur Ganson"

"Arthur Ganson/MACHINES"

Opera...most don't like and have false visions of stout women wearing iron bras, helmets with horns, or singing things that are incomprehensible. That isn't a true representation of operas. Operas can be contemporary such as The Great Gatsby or Billy Budd as well as a newly commissioned opera by the San Francisco Opera...Doctor Atomic. The theme is Robert Oppenheimer and the Manhattan Project and to be presented October 1st. John Adams composed the score. Peter Sellars is the director and librettist.

"Doctor Atomic"

"Doctor Atomic to Premier in San Francisco"

"The Opera That Chooses the Nuclear Option"


Well, he isn't Arthur Godfrey [ukulele impresario from early television] but he enchants and commands the attention of his students, Walter Smith [Haverford College physics professor] strums the ukulele and sings of physics.

Not all are happy with some who claim to bridge the gap for I read the following article from Scientific American [June 2002] by Michael Shermer entitled "The Shamans Of Scientism".

On October 28th, 2003 PBS/NOVA began a series regarding the universe, string theory, and the "theory of everything"--The Elegant Universe. I must say that NOVA tries very hard to bridge the gap between science and the general public. They utilized every bell and whistle in the store room. Wonderful graphics, support audio, and the usual guest interviews. The cool thing, despite the Newton’s apple myth, was the introduction of a new guru of science--Brian Greene who just happened to write the book The Elegant Universe. Nevertheless, it was a pleasant presentation attempting to explain "string theory". And now that Carl Sagan is gone and Stephen Hawking inaccessible, Brian Greene does a fine presentation. If any of you saw the broadcast, please provide your opinion.

Since the death of Carl Sagan, a vacuum was left when it came to popularizing science, but there are new individuals on the horizon. There is Brian Greene and now Neil deGrasse Tyson [Astrophysicist and Director of the Hayden Planetarium, New York City] who recently hosted NOVA's four part Origins. Like Greene, Tyson is quite qualified academically and has a fine smooth persona of presentation. His on camera presentations are flawless and professional and avoid the pedantic. The "voice overs" are clear and carry the pipes of a professional radio personality/announcer. Neither Greene nor Tyson, as of yet, has achieved the status of "charm" that Sagan had, but they nevertheless do a fine job in popularizing science.

As Neil Tyson said about Origins:

Origins Is the attempt to bring to the public, really for the very first time, a synthesis of all the branches of science that have relevance to answering the question, 'What is the origin of our place in the cosmos?'

From an historical perspective David J. Rhees has written an interesting account of the juxtaposition of science and the populace during the early part of the 20th Century and specifically the rise of a journal called "Science Service".

From the introduction:

The founding of Science Service in 1920 marks a watershed in the history of the popularization of science. It represents the first successful attempt of the American scientific community to create a permanent independent institution for spreading a knowledge of and sympathy for science among the general public. It also marks the end of a decline and the beginning of a revival in the popularization of science, a revival which Science Service played a significant role in furthering.

"A NEW VOICE FOR SCIENCE: SCIENCE SERVICE
UNDER EDWIN E.SLOSSON, 1921-29"

And finally, Paola Catapano was the producer and host of the twelve hour webcast celebrating the World Year of Physics 2005. She works at CERN and is deeply involved in methods of getting science to the public.

Her thoughts:

We have arranged a global civilization in which most crucial elements profoundly depend on science and technology. We have also arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster. We might get away with it for a while, but sooner or later this combustible mixture of ignorance and power is going to blow up in our faces. Science popularization is "the" tool to bridge the growing gap between society at large and the world of science. An institution such as CERN, the largest world laboratory for particle physics, has a key role to play in trying to bridge this gap. In the case of CERN, the promotion of the institutional image coincides with the popularization of fundamental physics and the role of science as a progress "engine" for knowledge. It is therefore a social duty for the scientists to communicate science. However, it is only recently that scientists have developed an awareness that the future of fundamental physics also and increasingly depends on the society’s commitment and the interests of non-physicist citizens. Communicating science to a non knowledgeable public means translating ideas and concepts that are often extremely complex and distant from common sense into a comprehensible language and creating interest in the public without betraying the scientific truth. A very difficult if not almost impossible task !

To illustrate the science-society gap and the difficulties of science communication, some results from two surveys conducted in 1997 on visitors to two similar particle physics exhibitions, "Quark und Higgs" in Vienna and "Quark 2000" in Rome are presented. These case studies illustrate the distance between the scientific community and the public and are an example of how scientists involved in the job of communication do not understand the need to "translate" their jargon and the need to study their audience’s requirements before producing texts, exhibitions, video-clips etc.. The public interpretation of basic science and the public’s failure to understand it correctly are highlighted in these surveys.

Any science communication action, like any marketing initiative, cannot ignore the perceptions, the needs and the previous knowledge of its target public. As obvious as it may appear, this essential starting point has too often been neglected in the popularization of basic science, and in the world of particle physics in particular. The conclusions of the study are an attempt at highlighting the importance of introducing a professional approach in setting a public-oriented science communication strategy.

And:

Science popularization is ”the” tool to bridge the gap between society at large and the world of science.

Compared to formal science communication - science taught in schools - informal science communication, made by the TV, the press, ”science centres” and visits to scientific laboratories, has an important advantage: it makes the public meet science in a direct, informal way and at its own terms. The public is given an opportunity to develop a personal relationship with science, according to the needs, interests and abilities of the individual.

But selling science is a tough job. The object of the sale is not a consumer good, but rather ideas and concepts that are sometimes so complex and distant from common sense that translating them into a comprehensible language and creating interest in the public without betraying the scientific truth is almost impossible. From my experience in the Communication and Public Education Group at CERN, the European Laboratory for Particle Physics in Geneva, I learned that any science communication action, like any marketing initiative, cannot ignore the perceptions, the needs and the previous knowledge of its target public. As obvious as it may appear, this essential starting point has been completely neglected in the popularization of basic science, and in the world of particle physics in particular.

The present research work analyses the public perception of science through two surveys conducted in 1997 on the visitors to two similar particle physics exhibitions, "Quark und Higgs" in Vienna and "Quark 2000" in Rome. The failure to convey the message of basic science at both exhibitions is highlighted. Based on the surveys’ results and on the analysis of more succesful science products science on TV and in the European press, proposals to ”package” science more attractively in order to increase its "sales" are made.

By underlining the importance of adopting a marketing approach in science communication, the present research work hopes to be a modest contribution to an effective public oriented science communication strategy.

Here is a secondary thought...is there an alternate reason in some cases to inform the general public about the realms of science? Sure the main objective may well be to broaden the knowledge base of the public’s contact with certain sciences, and, yes, to inform the public in regards to potential hazards globally and individually, but, is it not also possible that the aim may be to enhance certain avenues of science either in terms of revenue or organized groups of people. Say for example, the PBS/NOVA program on “string theory” might be an attempt to gain public backing for certain programs of further investigation. NOVA employed the best of current technology with spectacular computer graphics, special guest appearances of famous and key people involved in the specific realm., and a fine presentation by Brian Greene. Could this be a way of enhancing public awareness and solicit funding for further research? This is not a negative indictment at all but merely an alternate perspective and a good one nonetheless for it does spur public involvement. Granted the cost of doing physics of this nature is not cheap, but it does heighten the awareness of specialized research projects. After all, we are interested, if not amused in some cases, of the “ultimate” answer to how the universe is constructed and are terribly fascinated by fantastic ideas of parallel universes, worm holes, etc. and this may just provide a means for the alumni or lay person to sponsor such projects through contributions or grants to a favorite university doing similar research. What I am saying is that there may not be a single agenda in bridging the gap between science and the public for knowledge [abstract or “down to Earth”], entertainment, sociological, psychological, and promotion of a particular point of view are all relevant.


Further reading:

"A Conversation with Brian Greene"

"A MEETING WITH THE UNIVERSE"

"A NEW VOICE FOR SCIENCE: SCIENCE SERVICE
UNDER EDWIN E. SLOSSON, 1921-29"

"Benefits of informal education"

"Benjamin Franklin, Civic Scientist"

"Bio: Brian Greene"

"Celebrating Einstein with dance"

"Communicating scientific research"

"Dangers of dramatizing science"

"Earth and Sky"

"Fred Hoyle"

"FRED HOYLE"

"How Scientists View Their Public Communication"

"Jack Horkheimer"

"Let's dance"

"NOVA Science Now"

"Penny Magazine Online"

"Physics for taxi-drivers"

"Physicists on the Money"

"Physics-Related Stamps"

"Popularised science communication modes in Italian popular science magazines (1788-2002)"

"Rap the key to explain relativity/Forward thinking he may have been - but even Einstein would be surprised at the latest use of his theory of relativity"

"Science and The Simpsons"

"Science, delusion, and the appetite for wonder"

"Science Friday"

"Science treads the boards"

"Scientific Photography"

"Sir Fred Hoyle"

"StarDate"

"The Naked Scientists Online -- Internet Science Radio Online"

"The Physics Chanteuse"

"What's Wrong with This Picture?: Educating via analyses of science in movies and TV"

"Who's helping to bring science to the people?"



Here are the NOVA transcripts for the Elegant Universe:

Einstein's Dream

String's The Thing

Welcome to the 11th Dimension


Here are the NOVA transcripts for Origins:

Earth is Born

How Life Began

Where are the Aliens?

Back to the Beginning


Book:

The Science of Harry Potter: How Magic Really Works by, Roger Highfield

ISBN: 0670031534

A review


Special:

Neil deGrasse Tyson's home page with biography and selected papers


Media:

An Audio/video Interview With Brian Greene

Two Neil deGrasse Tyson "Cybercity" audio interviews with Jack Landman


Also see:

Asimov of the 1920s--Edwin Slosson

Berkeley Groks

"Classics Illustrated"...a cult phenomenon?

Harry Potter and science

Honorarium to George Pal

Lawrence Bragg...people's scientist

Mr. Wizard...missed mentor

Mr. Whipple--comet man

NASA's Solar System Ambassadors Program

Neil deGrasse Tyson...new representative

Penny Magazine

Pied Piper of Astronomy

Students and science

Victorian popular astronomer: Sir Robert Stawell Ball

Yale physicist D. Allan Bromley--for the people