Over at the Intersection, Chris generated a discussion of what issues might be the next big science policy debates. I'd like to turn the question in a slightly different direction and solicit reader opinion:
In the coming decades, what are the next great framing controversies?
In my research and at this blog, I have tracked how strategists selectively define stem cell research, intelligent design, and climate change to suit their policy goals, and how media coverage combines with citizen values to shape public concern and policy preferences.
As I have also argued, given certain conditions, food biotechnology and nanotechnology are potentially the next big issues to go political in the U.S., erupting into major frame contests.
Within these new communication contexts, scientists have a duty to engage in effective public engagement efforts. If they don't, they cede the communication ground to others, in many cases the opponents of science.
But in coming years, what are the other public engagement flashpoints to anticipate? On what issues can we apply a scientific understanding of the public and the media system to avoid communication failures?
These potential communication breakdowns might be specific to a particular issue but might also be more meta-topics. Here are a just a few possibilities. Let me know your own thoughts:
With increased investment in biomedical research, will animal experimentation become a major debate?
With genomics research, will the patenting of novel or synthetic lifeforms be an issue?
Perhaps the ethical and economic implications of life extension research?
Genetic enhancement for athletic performance and other human traits?
In the face of climate change, a renewed debate over nuclear energy?
The impact of the New Atheism movement on the public's trust and image of science?
What about sources of authority when it comes to bioethics? Who is a bioethicist and what does expertise and expert consensus mean in the field of bioethics? How will bioethics be communicated to the public? How should it be covered by journalists?
Is there a realistic future for science journalism, the traditional vehicle for science communication?
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Why do you keep on harping about "new atheism" and its threat to science?
The "new atheists" are just saying out loud what most people already know - that there is a disconnect between science and religion, since science keeps proving more and more relious doctrines wrong. There is nothing new about that, and saying it out loud won't change peoples' opinion about science.
You live in a country where most of the population reject evolution in favour of religious doctrine - these people will never trust scientists, since they don't listen to and /or believe in them anyway. How can a bunch of atheistic authors change that for the worse?
You don't like the message of Dawkins et al - fine. But that has nothing to do with framing, though you keep trying to connect those two things together. That attempt is what several of us criticized about you and Mooney's op-ed.
I like Dawkins and Myers's style, Hitchens perhaps less so (although you have to admit he's a great wordsmith), and I agree that we should aim for a world where religion has gone the way of human sacrifice or the divine prerogative of kings, but I don't think this can be achieved simply by promoting the arguments for it.
Across the world, there is a huge discrepancy in the success rate for secular ideas. I live in the UK, where 63% said No to the question "are you religious" in a recent poll (after a lifetime of dissent, it's a little odd to feel so patriotic about something). This pattern is common in northern Europe, but much less so in southern Europe and the States.
Apparently, research tends to show that the forces of religion are discouraged by education, political freedom, a strong Welfare State, especially free publicly funded health care, and geographic mobility.
If this is so, a political program suggests itself. If there is one thing we have plenty of it's professional researchers, and a secular, scientific political movement ought to be able to collate research, apply proper statistical analysis and publish the results. If it turns out that liberal societies really are inimical to religion, as it seems it might, that would be an interesting direction to explore.
All belief - God/atheism/correct method - has something to do with a material living thing coming to grips with tomorrow. I accept Jon's final sentence with some degree of enthusiasm. But tomorrow is always a fiction. Once universal healthcare is assured for all upon the planet, there will still be a material living thing coming to grips with the tomorrow.