Framing
So in today's America, like it or not, those seeking a broader public acceptance of science must rethink their strategies for conveying knowledge. Especially on divisive issues, scientists should package their research to resonate with specific segments of the public. Data dumping -- about, say, the technical details of embryology -- is dull and off-putting to most people. And the Dawkins-inspired "science vs. religion" way of viewing things alienates those with strong religious convictions. Do scientists really have to portray their knowledge as a threat to the public's beliefs? Can't science and religion just get along? A "science and religion coexistence" message conveyed by church leaders or by scientists who have reconciled the two in their own lives might convince even many devout Christians that evolution is no real threat to faith.
It certainly is true that Dawkins puts an exclamation point on godlessness, and good for him. The path we've taken in the past, the cautious avoidance of the scarlet letter of atheism, has not worked. Dawkins represents a different, bolder, more forthright approach — we are staking out a place in the public discourse and openly discussing our concerns, rather than hiding in fear of that old Puritan scowl. We will not go back in the closet.
The new atheists . . . spend a lot of time insulting religion and the religious, whether they're calling all religious people irrational or stupid, describing parents teaching their children about religion as child abuse, comparing belief in the Chrsitian God to belief in fairies and unicorns, or just endlessly mocking the religious. And that's where the old atheists and the new atheists part ways. The old atheists feel that it's imperative, both for improvement of the atheist image among non-atheists, and in order to create social change, that our criticisms of religion be voiced respectfully, even if forcefully. The new atheists have, in the words of one of their leaders, "nothing but contempt" for religious belief, and therefore feel they're justified in their rudeness.
The point—such as it is—is that framing isn't something new that needs to be added to our communications. It's already part of every communication. No matter how we present information, the information is always framed. Even if we just ha[n]d out CDs with raw data on them, we're presenting the information in a frame. All communication is framed. The important thing is to recognize that how we present information is important, and that for many scientific subjects, the way that we present information is incredibly ineffective, because we do such a poor job of framing the information.
The theme is, indeed, framing. I promise I'll get to it in my next post.
Labels: education, general, mathematics
Comments:
John Derbyshire was recently in a debate about evolution, and here is what I sent him--since framing (though not in this particular sense or context) is one of the problems:
"My BA is in bioanthropology, so I've read a great deal of the literature and have thought a great deal about this. While much of the problem is that for various reasons, evolution has been politicized (on both sides), part of the problem is that, for whatever reason (I haven't figured this one out yet), "evolutionists" are perhaps the very worst academics in speaking accurately about their field (I'm using the rather awful word "evolutionists" to describe anyone who speaks or writes about evolution, biologists, anthropologists, etc.) Evolutionists almost exclusively use metaphors that are not only inaccurate, but convey the idea that evolution is a sentient, directed process leading to a preconceived goal. So perhaps once out of a hundred times, you'll hear, "Nature selected for such-and-such a feature in the spotted toad," and the other ninety-nine times you'll hear, "The spotted toad evolved such-and-such a feature in order to better survive." Both statements are inaccurate to some degree, but the second is an absurdity. It miscommunicates the nature of natural selection (evolution includes other mechanisms, of course), and implies nonsense. This same love of inane metaphor trickles down to school teachers, who use it in class. To the average layman, it must seem that evolution is some sort of super-intelligence--that is, an alternative to the Divine. This can only fuel the flames.
Physicists are better at talking about quantum mechanics than evolutionists are at talking about evolution. Chew on that."
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