I heard a good talk about science this week – good, that is, except when the presenter touched on history. That part was pretty much a caricature of scientists’ typical take on their predecessors. There was stuff in the past we now think is right (good) and stuff we know is wrong (bad). The notion […]
Category Archives: Public understanding of science
This small piece originally ran under the heading “Translating the Language of the Lab”, but I’d steer clear of the translation metaphor now, at least without careful elucidation. It records early stirrings of useful UK research on public understanding of science. I liked the book because it came out of an education department and the […]
Review of an old favourite – Roslynn Haynes excellent survey volume From Faust to Strangelove. There’s a lot to cover, but she manages it very well. A book that stayed on my shelf for ready reference. On they march, the fictional scientists. The best are well intentioned but misguided. Some are simply intent on knowledge, […]
One of the several books that came out in the ’90s on media and cultural images of DNA and genes. Celeste Condit’s offering is complementary. Tomorrow’s Children, a film first seen in the US in 1934, features a courtroom battle over sterilisation. An evil-looking young man with a violent history is spared the operation because […]
Public understanding of science types (I was one for quite a while) are easily diverted by topics in the news. Genetics was big in the ’80s and ’90s, for example. There were other, good reasons for this as well. Lots of science going on, and some medical and other application. And there were some good […]
Science Observed 