Particle physicist Lawrence M. Krauss* addressed the gathering at the Canadian Science Writers’ Association conference at Science North in Sudbury, May 24, 2009.
I made some notes of his remarks in a darkened cave, the Inco Cave at Science North, though I do not have a transcript.
His talk was billed Star Trek Physics, and the PowerPoint revealed physics bloopers spotted in Star Trek, the X-files, and other film resources.
It was certainly entertaining, but not riveting, at least for me. Anyone who gets their physics from sources clearly labelled science fiction or UFOlogy, well …
But Dr. Krauss had advice for science communicators:
1. Don’t assume your audience is interested. “Don’t expect interest, create it.”
2. Science is dull, hard, and unrelated to the real world. Communicators must work against that. (“Remember how boring science can seem.”)
3. “Most people perceive themselves as fundamentally uninterested in science.”
4. Confront misconceptions: it’s the only way people remember.
Now, I have reservations about career academic scientists advising journalists how to communicate, or high school science teachers how to teach. They tend to emit platitudes that are too general to be put into practice, and therefore too general to fail.
Take the advice offered above, for example:
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