EarthSky - the company that produces this website - is a new media company. Since 1991, our goal has been to produce content about science, and distribute it widely.
EarthSky’s core purpose is to be a clear voice for science. But in my three decades of doing this work, I’ve watched science move from a more central place in society to a place at society’s fringes. Is global warming real? Are genetically modified foods bad for us? Did evolution happen, and is it still happening? How will our energy needs for the future be met? Will there be enough food and fresh water? In the past, when scientists answered these questions, people seemed more likely to believe them.
Now - while pressing questions like the ones above loom - many trends are contributing to a modern misunderstanding of science, with perhaps none so great as the outcome of scientific research itself, which is simply a better life for all of us. Overall, the standard of living around the world in the past decades has increased, and with that increase has come more freedom across every sector of society, more choices, and more niches filled with people pursuing their interests among others who are like-minded. Media has fragmented and evolved. There’s an Internet, with its many voices. More than ever, the voice of science has to speak loudly to be heard.
That’s what we do, here at EarthSky. Our aim is to use new media to shine a light on scientific activities that lie close to the heart of humanity’s ability to sustain itself on Earth. High falutin’ words, but I really believe that we need the tools of science to navigate the perils of this century. Do you agree?
If it’s true that the tools of science are necessary for humanity, then why has science moved from society’s center to its fringe?
What EarthSky does is produce podcasts - both long and short audio podcasts - featuring the voices of scientists themselves. We’ve interviewed and presented the voices of literally thousands of scientists since 1991, and many have continued to work with us as global science advisors. We also have a a large distribution network - with our podcasts heard some 12 million times each day. And … that number is growing.
With this large broadcast network - built bit by bit over the past 17 years and reaching millions each day - EarthSky is trying to help ensure that the scientific perspective remains part of the human conversation.
So how are we doing? Do you think EarthSky’s core purpose - being a clear voice for science - is worthwhile? Do you like hearing from scientists directly? What do you think about the role of science in the world today? Why do you think science has moved from the center to the fringes of human culture? Please share your thoughts below.
Btw, the photo at right is called Stopping to Think. It’s from Envios‘ photostream.
The photo at top is called Do You Believe in Change? It’s from Carf’s photostream.
And here I thought your purpose was to spread alarmist propaganda about so called “global warming”. At least you do it well.
Hi Tom T. Thank you!
Yes, you see, this is exactly what I’m talking about. Most climate scientists do believe that global warming is real. Most governments - including the U.S. government - have acknowledged its reality. There’s a wealth of misinformation on the internet, suggesting that there is a scientific controversy, where no true scientific controversy on global warming exists.
And yet you don’t accept the view of the scientific mainstream on global warming. Why not?
Deborah
Thank you for underscoring your dedication to bringing the views and expertise of scientists to the world over. Keep up the fantastic work!
Thank you Chris. We are dedicated.
D
I believe science will continue to be fundamentally involved with our society throughout this next century. However, it seems to me our ever complicating economic systems will become the central topic overshadowing mundane science especially considering the bargain basement costs of information and (scientific) knowledge.
Hi Peter! Interesting point. But aren’t the state of our world’s natural resources at the basis of all economic systems? And don’t we need science to determine what that state is?
In general, I agree with you, though. A reasonable standard of living for all of us should be a higher goal than knowledge for the sake of knowledge (which is what I think you meant by “mundane science”).
Deborah
Hi Deborah, Sounds like we’re on the same page. I agree a hundred percent with your first paragraph. In my previous comment I wanted to express my opinion that one of the major underlying elements as to why science has moved to the fringes of human culture is because in the twentieth and pre-twentieth centuries humankind’s knowledge was more limited and science proved itself to be an effective method of gaining knowledge and understanding of our world, which in turn improved the standard of living. Hence it was held in high regard. Now, however, thanks to the internet and other advances of science, information and knowledge are significantly more accessible to the general public (more mundane), reducing the value of the currency of science, pushing it to the fringe and having human cultures’ focus shift towards the complicated global economic landscape we are creating. Fundamentally, however, this doesn’t negate the need for science as you succinctly articulated in the first paragraph. Thanks!
Hmm! Interesting perspective!
The internet does seem to have been a great equalizer for the information of science compared with other information. I guess - coming from a science perspective - it just surprises me that people believe the things they find on the internet, even when what they’re choosing to believe is in direct conflict with science.
So much misinformation out there!
I am very happy with the content of information produced by Earth and Sky. The idea that people want to cross reference pop media with real science is laughable to me. Humanity should be less concerned with what is alarmist and focus on the research and news being published by accredited researchers. I hope that your show will continue to broadcast the information that has scientific meaning with or without popular tendencies. I have been a supporter of the show since my freshman year at the University of Houston in 1996. It was the Earth & Sky broadcast along with Enigines of Our Ingenuity that shaped my preferences toward public broadcasting in general.
That is a very kind compliment, Wesley. Thank you.
I’m wondering if maybe science just needs to be speak even more loudly to be heard.
And I love what they’re doing this week at the World Science Festival … they’re mixing science with art and theater to get science’s point across. I started as a science fiction buff, so the step across to real science was relatively easy. But I can see that some people find science to be too dry maybe, or too narrow, or just generally annoying. I’m thinking that stems from a lack of understanding about what science is and how it works.
This website seems to promote the global warming agenda well. Science is about truth and many scientist who dissagree with global warming are censored, fired, or gotten rid off in some way. An example is Dr. William Grey, (Ex maybe now) at Colorado State University hurricane prediction school. I remember one of the scientist interviewed about global warming, on this website seemed to go against the “scientific laws of nature” just to agree with global warming. He seemed to go against all he learned at the university. Remember during “the Middle Ages” the conseious of scientist believed the Earth was flat and Earth was the center of the universe. Just because there is a conscious does not make it “The Truth”. As to answer why science is is the background, I put most of the blame on our public schools. Look at how much science is required to graduate high school. I have the equalivant of 2 college degrees in science and many high school grads still feel they know more in science than me. Elected politicans and reporters seemed to forget all they have been taugh in college about science.
Thank you, ap garcia. At least we’re doing it well!
I just have to repeat and repeat that, in science, there is no controversy about global warming. There are some dissenters, yes, and the various models do not completely agree with each other. And of course all sorts of scientists - not just climate scientists - have weighed in on this subject. Still, most climate scientists today speak out pretty loudly that global warming is a fact of the 21st century.
Anyway, I noticed a couple of days ago that the “global warming petition” was making the rounds again … signed by “30,000 scientists” or some number like that. One day I sat down and spent about two hours googling the names of those “scientists.” As an editor, that’s something I do routinely nearly every day - look online for scientists web pages, so I can review what they say about themselves and their own studies. Strangely, I could find almost no web pages associated with the names of the “scientists” on the petition. Are they real people’s names? I don’t know. But I’d lay money they are not real scientists.
I agree with you, ap. Part of the issue of science being in the background has to rest with the schools.
Thanks for writing,
Deborah
It never ceases to astound me when people talk about an “agenda” when it comes to scientific consensus. These are probably the same people who believe that evolution is also propaganda and that God put dinosaur bones on Earth as a trick to test people’s faith. Geez. As far as the role of science today, there’s a great article in the New York Times today about the role science can play in giving life context and meaning. It talks about how it’s important for everyone to look out on the world and see that “the wonder of the cosmos transcends everything that divides us.” Check it out at
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/01/opinion/01greene.html?ex=1369972800&en=4207abcbbd7f1e65&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink
Charlynn,
Wonderful comment and great link, thanks. If you want to hear Brian Greene speak more about the power of science, you might check out this EarthSky Clear Voices for Science podcast with him. He’s amazing!
Deborah
I have lived in NEW orleans all of my 48 years and the weather has never changed! Global warming must only be a yankee thing! Maybe yall will be able to grow more corn with the warmer weather! This might help yall stop migrating to Florida every year when it is snowed in. p.s save energy stop using computers and cell phones!
WHAT IS CULTURE
Culture, A Ubiquitous Biological Entity
A Recapitulation
1. General comprehension of evolutionary biology is an essential pre-requisite to the study and comprehension of cultural anthropology.
2. Culture is a basic biological entity. It is the ubiquitous elaboration- extension of the sensing of and reactions to, by the genome, to the goings-on beyond the outermost membrane of its housing, the cell, and of multicelled organisms, to the totality of their outer and inner environments.
Culture has been selected for survival of the genome as means of extending its exploitation capabilities of the out-of-cell circumstances, consequent to the earlier evolution and selection of the genome’s organ, its outermost cell membrane (OCM), for control of the in-cell state of the environment.
3. Every cultural element is an organism’s artifact that involves biological intra-/inter-cell expression and/or process. Biological and cultural domains are not ontologically distinct. Culture inheres in biology.
4. Culture And Intelligence
http://blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-P81pQcU1dLBbHgtjQjxG_Q–?cq=1&p=247
The core (wordnet.princeton) definition of “intelligence” is “the ability to comprehend, to understand and profit from experience”. These surviving abilities are different for the different phenotypes within a genotype, therefore each phenotype has its own meaning of “intelligence”.
Intelligence is to culture approximately as essential amino acids are to proteins. Culture evolves in response to circumstances only by use of intelligence and to the extent and scope feasible by the extent and scope of intelligence.
5. In human cultures ethnocentrisms are phenotypic cases of anthropocentrism; biologically both are normal Darwinian biological survival phenomena. Ethnocultures are human phenotypic survival tools.
6. Life is a phenomenon of temporary energy constraint. It pops in out of its matrix, the energy constrained in Earth’s biosphere by Earth’s organisms, which are the many varieties of genomes, the communal interdependent life forms of the primal, once-independent, genes, the formers and conservers of life’s energy on Earth.
7. Culture is the universal driver of genetic evolution
The major course of natural selection is not via random mutations followed by survival, but via interdependent, interactive and interenhencing selection of biased genes replication routes at their alternative-splicing-steps junctions, effected by the cultural feedback of the second stratum multicells organism or monocells community to their prime stratum genes-genome organisms.
8. Science is a human cultural artifact, a tool of human survival
During the recent several centuries in the course of human history Science has been evolving at an accelerating rate as a provider of convincing, ever closer approaching, approximate models of the real world. We understand that Science is one of the components of our Culture, the totality of our capabilities to observe the environment, react to it and exploit it for our satisfaction and survival. There is a distinct, even if still small, growing spreading tendency to accept the findings of evolving Science with ever increasing respect and appreciation, especially in the realms of all forms and types of its progenies - technology and life disciplines.
9. The crucial 21st century question facing humanity is how much further and into which additional disciplines may or should Science be welcome and adopted by society at large, with what hopes and with what expectations.
Which doctrine(s) may or should be welcome and adopted, with what plans or hopes and with what expectations?
Life is a temporary affair. It is temporary on all scales at all levels.
Life’s purpose is ours to decide and ours to fulfil. The arguments about life’s doctrines should ensue from our choices of life’s purpose.
Dov Henis
http://blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-P81pQcU1dLBbHgtjQjxG_Q–?cq=1