Assignment 4

The science journalist is certainly in the best position to "give science away." Giving science to the public is easy when you have a large audience, access to top scientists, and good writing technique. It is the torch that the science writer carries. The scientist can be thought of as the fire giver. These Promethean figures have this knowledge and light, but their ways of disseminating to the public are poor. They publish papers that are intensely boring to anyone not already interested in the subject matter you study. The public is left in the dark about most science. It is the job of the science journalist to get that information out. When we think of a world with no science reporting most people in this country would know nothing beyond what they can remember from high school biology.

But there is still this issue of scientific illiteracy. Our biggest issue as science writers is the distribution problem. How on earth do we get people to read an article in a section of the paper they simply skip over? I think one way is to insert science into articles in other sections of the paper or online newspaper. By adding science into stories related to other topics of news we can expose a larger audience to the wonderful field of science. For example,  If an article on water wars is printed in the international section then a section of the writing should consider why there are water shortages and how we can resolve these issues scientifically, as well as politically.

What about the people who do not read the news? Television media does not seem to be a great substitute. There is some science reporting, but on television you cannot enter the kind of depth you can in text. To reach the non-news reading public it is not necessary to abandon science writing as a tool. I tutor K-5 children and part of my job is to teach science lessons. When I do this I use science writing as a way of getting predigested information, images, and ideas. Science writing can still be useful even when it is not being read. It is possible to take the torch from science writers and carry it yourself for a little while.

So, written above are several ways to give science away to the public, but does this dissemination of information have a large impact on the common good. Yes, it does. A more informed scientific public may lead to more scientists. My chief concern is not to increase scientific literacy, but rather inspire some children (or maybe even adults) to work in the sciences. If we can inspire some people to get into science then we have done a good job as the torch carriers.