Off Topic — HabitableZone

Off Topic » in reply to Mr Anderton can start talking

Pamela Gay summed up this debate issue quite well
New Age Vapors — (archived)

The relevant quote:

Somehow, as scientists, we have gotten in the bad habit of putting truth above clarity. We have, somehow as scientists, gotten into the bad habit of calling people uneducated if they don’t know the specific and non-obvious chains of evidence and resulting facts we deem important. We have gotten into the bad habit of being obtuse and arrogant in our educations. No wonder we have an image problem.

And this has allowed people in other communities - creationism, paranormal, astrology, - to come forward and frame the debate by making it all about controversy and demanding equal time for both sides of the issues. With complete clarity (and often no truth) they state their side and use emotions to compel the audience. Then we come in, and (ignoring wonderful exceptions like Phil Plait), we use complete truth to blast their arguments. We try for clarity but often lose it, and then we say emotions have no place in the debate.

And our audience hears, “I don’t care what you feel, I’m right, you’re wrong, and here is a bunch of explanations: [insert Charlie Brown’s teacher’s voice here]. Got that? If you don’t, then you don’t understand logic.”

From this page here:

http://www.starstryder.com/2007/07/30/increasing-science-literacy-requires-extreme-epo/

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