Compact Cassette supremo Lou Ottens talks to El Reg

@Paul Kinsler - Re: written by someone who clearly has no idea about science or technology

"well, the great majority of their audience probably does have no useful knowledge at all (i.e. on the specific subject being presented)"

Perhaps, but is this true? And what exactly do you mean by 'useful knowledge'? And then at what level should science reporting be pitched?

These are serious problems for science, especially in this highly technological era. It seems to me that the best answer is to assume that the 'default' reporting level be pitched at those who have graduated high school science. My reasons are that that target is actually a large number of people, and they are of a demographic that matters when it comes to implementing policy: they're voters, educated consumers and some of them eventually go on to be policy makers etc.—and even physicists. (More on this below.)

Of course, targeting those who've lesser knowledge is useful and should be undertaken for all sorts of reasons that I've not time to enter into here, but it should be done as a secondary exercise. What I'm saying is that most science reporting is dumbed down to the point where it is essentially useless. (Or that it is interpreted in misleading or hyped up ways, often deliberately so: reporting on cancer research being the classic example, here both researches and reporters are complicit; reports if not bullshit are often presented in disingenuous and misleading ways to a gullible public). Such trivial reporting often irritates the technically minded and it's questionable whether those who've no interest or little education in science will benefit significantly (please note I'm paraphrasing here, this issue is detailed).

Why high school graduate level in science? Well, someone who graduates science at high school has the basics of five or six years of science—that's chemistry, physics and often biology. Moreover, they know a good deal of basic mathematics: trigonometry, algebra and calculus. Whilst concepts such as e^(pi*i) + 1 = 0 may be somewhat difficult, they'd not be incomprehensible double-Dutch. For instance, they'll know about e, pi and (-1)^1/2, and even if they can't derive Euler's equation from scratch, few would have difficulty in understanding the beauty within just from its structure alone.

With physics, they'll be able to understand and mathematically manipulate basic mechanics, heat/thermodynamics, light (and know about the particle/wave duality), and electrodynamics and even be knowledgeable about the basics of quantum physics. At this point they might not understand the intricacies of cavity resonators or why radiation from a black body is aperiodic (thus understand the ultraviolet catastrophe conundrum of the late 19th C.) but with a little explanation they'll accept and understand the basics when explained to them.

Even more importantly, with good reporting and simple explanations, they'll be able understand why things that depend on such physics occur (for example, with high school science alone, it's not hard to understand the basic reasons for the snow or noise that appears on an analogue TV in the absence of a signal without needing to fully understand the thermal noise equation). Essentially, by the time a high school student graduates, he/she has a reasonable understanding of not only Dalton's Scientific Method and how that impinges on science and technology but also he/she possesses a basic ability to extrapolate and develop upon already-learned scientific knowledge. For those without any working knowledge of science or only popular superficial knowledge thereof, this is hardly possible, as one hasn't developed a working methodology of the subject (and targeting them in the first instance simply isn't as productive).

So what do we get from science reporting in real life? Putting magazines such as Nature, Science, Physics and other peer-review journals aside then what do we have left? Not much, bugger all in fact! Take the next level of science journalism down, New Scientist or Scientific American for example.

Whilst Scientific American isn't as bad, it's obvious that the editorial policy of New Scientist is pitched well below that of a high school science graduate. Frankly, technical explanations are trite in the extreme, pathetically inadequate in fact. And as for a maths or physics equation coming near the magazine, we'd have a better chance of quantum physics randomly reincarnating Margaret Thatcher, methinks. The same problem goes for popular science programs on TV; these are little more than 'ooh ahh—look at that' shows with little or no explanation of the underlying science involved.

The fact is that science reporting is diabolically inadequate. Those with high school science but who are not involved directly with science are never pushed to keep their science education current; as science reporting never pushes them they consequentially lose their 'habit or ethos for science'. Put another way: popular culture is only superficially interested in science, few outside science have an intrinsic and knowledgeable understanding of the subject.

Moreover, and tragically for science, those who despised science at school, usually the lawyers, accountants, economists and politicians, are those who have ended up with control over science policy and science funding. (It's a strange irony that scientists themselves are usually those least able to control science funding.)

In essence, we're left with a society that's pathetically illiterate when it comes to science, it's a society that doesn't think in a scientific way, and nor is it forced to so do. The consequences are that it's a society that's often scared of science—mention the word 'chemical' for instance—and thus it's all too prone to accept junk or pseudo science (for instance, look at the farce that's the climate change debacle: scientists themselves aren't immune from both accepting and doling out sophistry). That we're in a scientific age with a society that collectively doesn't think scientifically is mainly attributable to the failure of science education; there are no ifs and buts about the fact!

Meanwhile, scientists are locked away in their ivory towers—in environments where they only have to relate to and explain things to their peers. No so you say: well, where's the plethora of magazines that fit between the trite science of New Scientist and peer-review journals such as Nature, Science etc? Also, where are the TV programs that actually explain science and engage the viewer at a technical level? Right, there's none—although some 50 years ago there were at least a few. Touché.

It seems to me that the only ones who can correct this crisis are those professionally involved with science. When one becomes a scientist (or an engineer for that matter), one needs to accept that an essential part of the job description is to ensure that society gets dragged along with one. The two aspects of the job are hand in glove.

Re: Ah, cassette tapes...

Of course I never had any threadlock on me, so once it had been adjusted once it would wander out of true again after a few months.

"OK, done. Now, can you grab a bottle of nail polish from your mum's dressing table?"