Prompted by the (wilful or not) misunderstandings about science and apparent loss of faith in experts, we dedicated a session to examining the foundations of critical thinking and science communication.
We invited two external experts:
- Ms Marina Joubert from Stellenbosch University’s Centre for Research on Evaluation, Science and Technology (CREST)
- Dr Elisa Galgut from University of Cape Town’s Department of Philosophy
Marina gave an overview of tools and attitudes in science communication (5.8 MB pdf of the presentation). She related how the expectations of scientists are different in the era of social media compared to when most science communication was done by science journalists. She highlighted a number of resources for science communicators, e.g.
- The NAS Sackler colloquia on the science of science communications
- Communicating Science Effectively (free PDF download)
- Oxford Handbook on the Science of Science communication
Elisa gave an overview of her research interests, which included irrationality, philosophy of psychoanalysis and philosophy of literature. Through this lens, we discussed challenges of communication, among others that:
- facts polarize and people relate to what they already believe
- social media creates echo chambers
- communicating scientific uncertainty is challenging because experts appear “not to know” and people exploit that uncertainty
The picture of the whiteboard (below) shows the main topics of discussion, and how they grouped broadly into challenges (including how people can be misled), what strategies work in science communication, and finally, what interventions might be useful.
The following options for interventions were raised:
- A course on critical thinking specifically focussed on scientists. See the current 1st year course on Critical thinking at UCT.
- Identifying and addressing root causes of irrationality
- Communicating science by using a mixture of case studies and supporting evidence
- Alt-Astrology: A “horoscope” that used your *actual* zodiac sign (1 of 13) and related to real, transient objects in the universe/solar system in both a funny and informative way. (Leads: Catherine Cress and Adi Eyal)
- Guidelines on trusting information sources (for lay people)
