Major Endorsement for Framing Science Thesis

Fair enough, but such arguments ignore the clear distinction between spin and framing....

It might be helpful if certain practitioners of 'framing' would stop breaking down that distinction whenever they feel piqued.

Caledonian: It might be helpful if you could get the whining, defeated tone out of your voice.

Caledonian, hon, the only people I have seen in all the conversations on ScienceBlogs who break down the distinction between "spin" and "framing", are the ones deliberately equating the two in order to discredit the notion of "framing" -- an ironic incidence of spin by those who claim to loathe spin.

You've been smacked over the head with the real difference between the the two a number of times, by those who advocate effective framing. If you think that these advocates or practitioners of framing dip into "spin", then you should demonstrate specific examples of where or how facts are distorted or ignored in order to manipulate opinion. Can you? Or is this a deliberate misrepresentation of framing by the people who are offended by the notion that scientists should ever actively try to influence opinion?

Since most of the people here are either actively involved in science or are fans of science -- a complicated business in which one cannot ignore subtleties of data and interpretation -- it doesn't speak well for anyone here, you included, to ignore or obfuscate what Nisbet and Mooney actually say in favor of inventing what you think they say. I mean, so much for the idea that simply presenting evidence and an idea will get you a fair hearing.....

Sorry, but I still don't see anything new here.

Principles of good communication are well-established, and entreaties to scientists to become better communicators by being more aware of their audiences are also nothing new.

What has changed is society and the pervasive influence of "marketing." Public engagement for scientists is now considered a political task, rather than an educational one as in the past. In fact, the article opens with this:

In a speech at this year's AAAS meeting in San Francisco, Google cofounder Larry Page proclaimed that "science has a serious marketing problem." As a solution, he suggested that tenure and grants be tied to the media impact of research.

Because of that societal change, scientists need to think more about persuasion in their communication than they used to. Their task has become more than simply informing or educating, at least in some venues.

Unfortunately, when the task is to persuade rather than to merely inform, scientific objectivity suffers, at least a little and perhaps a lot.

The emphasis on framing treats science as just another product to be marketed, and scientific framing is just a special case of marketing. That is important at the intersection between science and politics, but we need to be honest about the cost. Emphasizing marketing necessarily leads to de-emphasizing objectivity.

I can think of nothing more harmful to university and nonprofit research than Page's suggestion that tenure be tied to "media impact." Public service, including K-12 outreach and dissemination of knowledge to the general populace (which includes speaking to the media), have always been a part of the tenure decision. For at least 20 years, the NSF has explicitly required an outreach component in its grant applications.

We can argue over how much that component ought to be weighted. But giving any weight to "media impact" puts science in the same category as Madonna, Paris Hilton, K-Fed, Tom Hanks, Oprah, and a whole list or "personalities" who may or may not have intellectual depth.

I refuse to be part of that. In my chosen venue, writing for young readers, my goal is to change lives for the better. I want kids to care about science and to become excited about certain phenomena. I want them to understand science so that they can grow up to be well-informed citizens in a high-tech world.

Fortunately, I can still do that by writing to inform and leaving the explicit persuasion to others. I would be abusing my platform, which I have worked 20 years to build, by becoming an advocate of a particular political position.

As an example, I think we need to act with prudent urgency to mitigate AGW, but I don't state that in my work for young readers (click my name for the full list of my published books).

In one work in progress, I focus on how Earth came to be as it is today. If kids understand that, they can begin to deduce for themselves the extent to which human activity can change it.

In another recently published book called Astrobioloigy, my middle-grade readers discover the interplay between geology, chemistry, and biology that has led to both simple and complex life on Earth. Evolution becomes not only a mechanism on Earth but a requirement for complex life anywhere in the universe. Evolution and its consequence, adaptation, allow life to withstand the natural changes on any world. I don't advocate for Evolution; I just explain it, equipping my readers to make critical judgments about it when the time comes.

In summary, I don't dispute the idea of framing, but I don't see anything novel about it. More important, I recognize the need for some--I repeat some--scientists to become persuaders as well as educators. But when those scientists take on the role as advocates, they need to be aware that their communications are no longer strictly objective.

Perhaps the heat of the debate stems from the fact that those who advocate framing seem to advocate it for all, rather than for the subset of scientists who choose to engage in "marketing."

As a fellow scientist with somewhat different views of prescriptive policy than Fred I never the less agree with his well written post on framing.

When a scientist makes the decision to become an advocate his credibility as an objective observer is necessarily impugned.

Perhaps the scientist must make this decision based on his personal moral imperatives, but his credibility is impugned just the same. Dressing the issue up with the neutrally named "framing" is just a crude attempt to give the scientist cover.

It seems to me that the need for framing arises as soon as you move from dealing with science as an educator, as Dr. Bortz is doing, into the arena of using science to inform policy decisions. It matters little if "policy" is developed at a personal level, a family level or a global level.

When a scientist says 'the world is like this' the non-scientist is likely to say "so what?". As soon as you realize that the answer to "so what?" is important, then you can not escape the need for framing.

Fred - Did you ever read, "The Right Stuff"? There's a great anecdote about when Gus Grissom, who was shy and of few words, was asked to say something to the workers at a rocket factory. He hesitated, then finally uttered, "Well ... do good work." Everyone looked at each other for a moment, then began saying among themselves, "yeah, do good work!" And it became their motto and inspired them.

Don't you think they already knew they were supposed to do good work? It's not always a matter of coming up with new ideas and approaches. Sometimes it's just a matter of repackaging. And yes, you are probably right if you choose to denigrate framing as just repackaging. There's no doubt Nobel Laureate P.B. Medawar was addressing the same topics in the mid-sixties with his essays about the scientific paper being a hoax.

But the simple fact is, scientist are bad, bad, bad communicators. I'm sorry to say that, but I took part in an AGU symposium in SF last December titled, "Communicating Science Broadly," which had some of the top climate scientists of today including James Hansen and Michael Oppenheimer, and I guess, according to the plan, they were supposed to be role models for how to communicate science broadly.

I don't want to go into detail on how bad their presentations were, but suffice it to say, even if the session had been titled, "Communicating Science Academically," it still wouldn't have been good. One major journalist I spoke with who was there told me she's gotten to the point of just plain calling these guys, "stupid."

It really is hard to believe at times that people so highly educated can be so incredibly bad at communication, but they are. And if you want a detailed breakdown of cerebral versus visceral dynamics of communication, and why academics do end up being handicapped at this skill, I can tell you about what I've learned in film school and acting class. Spending twenty five years in a laboratory just doesn't equip you to connect with a large audience.

I'm not sure you grasp the severity of the problems. You are an academic. You have a different perspective from the general public who are trying to comprehend things. You need to talk to people on the street in Kansas or in New Orleans (as I did last month). This global warming issue is being billed as the most important problem facing humanity, yet the public can't make heads or tails of it. Is it a catastrophy or just over-blown -- most people aren't certain.

The need for improved science communication is apparent everywhere. And the sad news is, technology isn't the solution. There are no communicato-trons that can be built. The only clear solution is for communication to be upgraded in terms of priorities. The way that this happens is by getting the topic on the cover of major magazines -- that's the sort of endorsement that sends a signal that this is important. And if it takes coming up with a relatively recycled concept to do that, then that's what needs to happen.

I really hope you are aware of how bad the problems are. Your post above reads like the standard, "I don't see what's wrong, everyone I work with listens to me just fine." The problems are larger than that.

Thanks, Randy, for a provocative response.

Actually, I'm not an academic but a full-time writer with a focus on middle-grade science books.

Even when I was in academe--I left in 1996, I was not on the tenure stream and I was never conventional.

I'm not denying the problem at all. I am saying, "It was ever thus." To me, framing is just the latest flavor in the better-science-communication arsenal.

My main point is this: Not everyone has the same skills. If a scientist is able to communicate to other scientists, that's a fine way to advance the profession and knowledge. A few scientists are able to communicate well to the general public, and I think they should use those skills to educate and inform.

Other scientists are good marketers, and they are most likely natural framers.

Everyone should communicate to their natural audiences, and everyone should learn skills that enable them to communicate better, especially if they want to broaden their audience.

But "framing" seems to be barely different to me than the discussion of science communications from the early years of my career in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Perhaps you would appreciate my thoughts on having a natural audience extracted from my acceptance speech for the 2002 American Institute of Physics for books intended for young readers at a summer meeting of the American Association of Physics Teachers. (Click my name for details on the book that won the prize.)

No one, not even I at first, understood the depth of connection between me and my young readers. It took me years to realize that each of us has a natural audience, and mine is the kids with hormones raging, full of questions, and eager to challenge anything adults tell them -- those dreaded, threatening, terrifying, barely human creatures we call adolescents.

Why they're just like -- gasp -- physicists who, hormones or not, question the obvious and challenge everyone else's perspective. My writing for that audience was my way of questioning the obvious notion that physicists should share discoveries with colleagues and leave the kids in the hands of people like most of you.

Now, don't get me wrong. I appreciate enormously what physics teachers do. I stayed in touch with my high school physics teacher until he died, and I dedicated To the Young Scientist in his memory. But the job that I have carved out for myself is different: not teaching a curriculum, but inviting exploration beyond the curriculum by sharing what has excited me about science for more than fifty years.

I hope this helps to move the discussion along.

Randy Olson,
Of all the people I read in ScienceBlogs, except perhaps for Sheril, and Chris too, I always understand you the best.
Besides the need for better Science communication, I think there is a most pressing need for better communication in general.
You have an easy flow of B follows A when you write, and it makes such good sense.
To reach a mass population with truth and facts, it needs to be conveyed this way.

What Randy Olson and Wes Rolley said. Yeah.

If I could add a couple of thoughts...Fred Bortz said:

In one work in progress, I focus on how Earth came to be as it is today. If kids understand that, they can begin to deduce for themselves the extent to which human activity can change it.

To which I say, wonderful...they can. But will they?

For many, many people, there is no automatic leap of understanding or even curiosity. And that's something I want to come back to, as being incredibly important and way too underrated. But the point for this paragraph is, if you are dealing with a time-critical and important issue such as climate change, where you actually need a large-scale public will to tackle the problem, then you can't either assume or just wait around and hope that simply presenting all the facts and letting people draw their own conclusions is going to get us anywhere useful. To the people who have seriously studied the issue, the extent of the problem and the need for change might be bleedin' ruddy obvious, and the honest and respectful thing to do might be to let people see what they can and reach the conclusion on their own. But against that, you have the political, ideological and monetary interests which are engaged in active "marketing" (not to mention spin) which are far more interested in getting people to support their own short-term goals, and these are people who are expert at manipulating public opinion. And the non-science public themselves put a startlingly low value on the accuracy of fact vs. emotional/ideological "truth". So unless you -- or someone! -- explicitly lays out the conclusions to be drawn, and why these are important and require action, then the "education" part of the exercise goes nowhere and does nothing.

That brings me to the second part of this. I have worked an interesting variety of jobs, from really crappy office, retail and hotel jobs when I was paying for university, to high-tech jobs in industry and academia. In every venue I have found the natural -- but wrong -- assumption by the people who have worked in that field over a long-term period, that most of the people in the world are like the people around them in their own lives, in terms of level of curiosity about things, general understanding of how things work, and what is important in life -- and they feel that the people who show up in the news who patently aren't like that represent a fringe minority who can safely be regarded as crazy.

If you regularly deal with intelligent, curious people, you probably think that most people are reasonably intelligent and curious.

The predominance of Paris Hilton stories in the news should tell you that this is folly.

Yeah, this sounds horribly arrogant and elitist. But my experience is (sadly) very similar to American Splendor: "I dunno, man. Average is pretty damn dumb." I've run into a lot of people in the "average population" who consider themselves to be intelligent and well-educated, and who regard Rush Limbaugh as a sound source of fact. This is the voting public. Many of these people have absolutely no curiosity about the inner workings of nature -- or the outer workings of nature, or the nature of deep time, or anything which involves more than two links in a chain of causality -- none whatsoever, and they just aren't interested in why you might be curious, either. To many, "scientists" are just eggheads who obsess about trivia and don't understand them. Unless you draw a link between what you study and what has meaning for them, you will be ignored. Period.

Visit the Yahoo message boards, fer heaven's sake. This internet thing gives a lot of people room to express their beliefs and opinions; go places you wouldn't normally go.

You probably have an easier time reaching kids than adults -- kids are naturally curious about how things work, most of the time. But you are fighting a pernicious cultural influence of utter indifference as they grow up.

So, yes, framing is just good communication, repackaged. And advocates of framing tend to push the idea that all scientists, but especially the ones who are working in fields with time-critical problems or who put themselves forward as being the "face" of any given issue, need to be able to hook people into understanding the relevance of work and possibly need for specific action. There is a danger there that we shouldn't oversell and we can't dip into spin -- everything still needs to be accurate -- but getting people to think about this a little more, and to be aware of how words are used and how people react in real life, is not a bad thing.

Of course as soon as we start advocating any action, we risk losing "objectivity". But, well...when it comes down to things like climate change, species loss, or fishery collapse, to name a few, then trying to maintain "perfect objectivity" by not advocating an action is not only insufficient, it's wrong. When atmospheric researchers discovered the hole in the ozone layer and the link with CFCs, did it impugn their scientific objectivity to push for a ban on CFCs? The objective science indicated a specific, actionable problem, and equally indicated a specific policy response. How that response was implemented was a matter for politicians, industry leaders and policy-makers, but the specific need for a specific action (banning CFCs) was frankly just as objective as the ozone hole itself. Similarly, but less well addressed, the current collapse of various large fisheries is an objective fact, which calls for a specific and objectively sound policy response -- cut back fishing drastically! But in this case, there hasn't been a lot of public outreach, the public will doesn't exist, and not a lot is being done. Speaking as someone who loves sushi, a lot of people are going to end up suffering for that. People who could frame the issue to the media a lot more effectively than is being done would be a blessing.

Interesting split among critics: framing is either so bad it's evil, or so mild that it's not new.

Chris and Matt have done a great job of framing framing. They've raised the profile of the issue, set the terms of the debate, and provoked reactionary opponents into being...well..obviously reactionary.

From the discussion will emerge a new synthesis, with framing considered more important than it was a year ago. Nice job guys. (Now, I want to see the grand road map to figure out how much of this was actually planned)

BTW, I agree with Chris's post, and offer an "Amen" to Randy Olson, a guy who really knows how to communicate science. Thanks for weighing in Randy!

Luna_the_cat wrote:

Unless you draw a link between what you study and what has meaning for them, you will be ignored. Period.

Science will get you laid and make you look ten years younger! Go science!

I don't think you are wrong about this, but part of me fears the kinds of things that will be said. If people want to hear it, and average is pretty damn stupid, do we really want to say it? I admit freely, the whole thing rubs me the wrong way because the message isn't simply "talk about the economics of science when addressing economists". It's "whore yourself to an unthinking, uncaring public." And as someone who cares very much about transparency and integrity in science, I find that leaves a very bad taste in my mouth.

You know, I'm not going to say other people shouldn't do it, I just don't think I could respect it in the same way I can respect what someone like Fred Bortz does. I'd be happy to be wrong about that, though.

Leni, if you really feel so superior, then I suggest you put yourself in the background and don't reach out to the public. Nobody is going to want to listen to you. You can't hide such a superior attitude.

OMG! This is soooooo cool. With my new convert-a-couch potato framing machine I really can reach out to J.Q. Public. And with my scorch-a-skeptic adapto-thingy I can mow down deniers like nobody's business.

Mark Powell said: Interesting split among critics: framing is either so bad it's evil, or so mild that it's not new.

To the extent that framing means spinning, it's evil. To the extent that it means tailoring one's message to one's audience, it's mild BECAUSE it is so not new. It's more dangerous than interesting, because promoting multple criticisms from multiple sources as some sort of virtue dips one's tootsie into the pool of cranks.

And yes, I read the whole article, word for tedious word. I even read some sections twice, just to make sure the nothing I saw was really there. Of COURSE we should tailor our message to our audience. OF COURSE we should should, as Neal DeGrass Tyson said to Richard Dawkins, show some sensitivity to our audience's state of mind. Of COURSE we should emphasize the benefits of the science in question to which the audience can relate. This is news to anyone? This warrants a Nobel Prize? I can't express what that does to the respect I have for that award.

The catch is this: exactly how am I to frame the fact that the earth is 6,000 years old, that all life did not poof into existence all at once, and therefore that cherished two chapters in that quaint old book are wrong? See, this is all too easy to talk about after the fact (as Nisbet and Scheufele do ad nauseum in the article), or in the abstract. But what EXACTLY are we to do here? There is little practical value in which to frame this issue. It's simply a matter of facts. Until I start seeing some specific solutions to these real problems, "framing" will remain so much verbose, self-aggrandizing navalgazing.

That is, if it doesn't have the unintended side-effect of changing the public's perception of science to be entirely connected to what is practical at the moment, and to hell with discovery for it's own sake. Then it will become WORSE than beating them over the head with the facts.

NOT 6,000 years old obviously. Never blog while celebrating with champagne...

I'll be interested to read the article. Though I do remain cautious about the practical implementation of fraimng, of which I have yet seen little, and I can't help commenting that the parts of framing that are uncontroversial never actually were controversial. It's that outlying grey area with it's overzealous focus on "New Atheism" that gives me pause. It appears to be quite unneeded. While I'd never believe Chris would ever advocate spin and so I don't worry about such claims, I do worry about many assumptions that come along with fraiming that have yet to be truely highlighted. So until I see strong evidence for these assumptions, it does seem to be putting the cart before the horse in making certain claims. Does, in fact, atheism hurt the cause of global warming? Do those scientists who do the most public speaking actually have awful communication skills? To simply show that the public doesn't have the strongest grasp on science is not in itself a critique of science communicators. Nor does the public distain for atheists in general dictate that outspoken atheists damage the interests of science. I hope sometime soon we'll see studies on the scientists themselves. It is these questions that I'm looking to see hard and fast evidence on. I hope the new article delivers and I can't wait to read it!

I have to admit, i'm new to the great framing debate...I haven't followed every post and comment thread. I just read the article in The Scientist. Sure, it all makes sense to me. Is it a thesis or new paradigm? I don't know if those words necessarily apply. Fred and Randy's exchange above is helpful to me to understand some of the different perspectives on this.

Like I said...I don't know every little back and forth exchange that has occurred within the context of the framing discussion.

Now, isn't this reassuring?
Come on, everybody sing along...

We will all go together when we go,
every Hottentot, every Eskimo,
When the world becomes...carboniferous,
it will make all the difference,
yes we will all go together when we go!

We will all frame together when we frame,
as we look all around for whom to blame,
When we have found no solution,
and the earth becomes Venutian,
They'll be nobody left to play the game!

--with more than a nod to Tom Lehrer

Caledonian, hon, the only people I have seen in all the conversations on ScienceBlogs who break down the distinction between "spin" and "framing", are the ones deliberately equating the two in order to discredit the notion of "framing" -- an ironic incidence of spin by those who claim to loathe spin.

You haven't spent a lot of time reading Nisbet's comments on PZ's site, have you? He says he's doing framing, when he's actually spinning. You'd think he of all people would be interested in distinguishing the two...

Leni says:

... I admit freely, the whole thing rubs me the wrong way because the message isn't simply "talk about the economics of science when addressing economists". It's "whore yourself to an unthinking, uncaring public." And as someone who cares very much about transparency and integrity in science, I find that leaves a very bad taste in my mouth.

I don't particularly care what the "unthinking, uncaring" public thinks of, say, RNAi or the search for Higg's boson, except in so far as they elect politicians and politicians make funding available (or unavailable). In the case of biodiversity/habitat loss, however, there really needs to be a public awareness of the importance of it and a public will to regulate industry with regards to it, and if I need to "whore myself out" to the unthinking and uncaring public in order to do this...you know, I will, but I disagree with you that it means there couldn't or wouldn't be an equal amount of transparency, integrity and honesty about the science of ecology than if we toiled away our lives in complete obscurity and without ever having to speak to the public. Quite possibly the opposite, in fact. I've said it before and I'll say it again: yes, "framing" is about not just tailoring your message to the audience, but working to create a link between their interests and yours -- but it is not, and should never be, spin. It MUST be completely honest.

Like I said elsewhere, this is a matter of pragmatism. Am I willing to wait around while people work out the philosophical ramifications of evidence and rationalism, if this means more species extinctions in the meantime? Well, no. I'm not. Within the limits of honesty and accuracy, I will do whatever works to preserve the planet in the best state possible, so that the long-term debate has something to work with.

On a side note, Caledonian -- here's this "evidence" thing again. Point to a specific example, if you can, please. You are making a definite statement about something I do not recall seeing, and yes, I have read PZ's site. If you cannot give me specific evidence, then this is simply you making another unsupported opinion statement in the apparent belief that "your opinion"=="reality". I wish you would apply your "rules" for other people to yourself.

Huh, sorry. I was sure I put Leni's statement in a blockquote, but that doesn't seem to have shown up.

Having trouble getting through to other people?
Contrarians got you down?
Need to reconnect with that "special someone?"

Try RONCO'S new FRAME-O-MATIC!

Guaranteed to sway at least one person's opinion someday, or your money back.

Also sheds unsightly pounds!

"It's a hobby for dad...a craft for the kids...a great gift for mom. And don't forget Grandma!"

(If SSTs rise for more than 4 hours, see your doctor)

On a side note, Caledonian -- here's this "evidence" thing again. Point to a specific example, if you can, please. You are making a definite statement about something I do not recall seeing, and yes, I have read PZ's site.

You don't recall Nisbet calling PZ and Dawkins an "atheist noise machine" that needed to be silenced? You don't recall Nisbet calling PZ a slanderer and spinner? And suggesting that his site was nothing but a staging ground for syncophants that PZ would direct to spread his message on other sites?

Mark Powell wrote:

Leni, if you really feel so superior, then I suggest you put yourself in the background and don't reach out to the public. Nobody is going to want to listen to you. You can't hide such a superior attitude.

Well Mark, I'm not in public outreach, so you needn't worry...yet. You'll be singing a very different tune when I become the King's Alchemist, though ;)

Listen, I am "in the background". Not only am I happy to stay there, but I don't suspect I have much choice in the matter. I'm just one little person voicing my discomfort with what looks to me like advocacy for appealing to not what is true, but what is most attractive to a hostile audience: in this case, that appears to also be the lowest common denominator.

And let's be honest, it hasn't really worked so far. Stem cell advocates, for example, have always framed their arguments as beneficial and life-saving measures for the express purpose of not only conveying the truth, but of countering some popular religious beliefs which hold that it amounts to murder.

Unfortunately it's not working. Even though the stem cell advocates are right and have framed their arguments in the best way possible, it ignores the root cause of the problem. It is not that scientists have not presented themselves in appealing enough ways, it's that people think a lot of stupid things, and some of those stupid things are encouraged (and sometimes required) by their religious leaders.

A science advocacy that neglects this very real issue is an advocacy that is neglecting reality. Even if they are successfully framing it in a more palatable way to a hostile audience!

Because we are advocating science, which is the method by which we apprehend the natural world (i.e., reality), it's particularly poignant, ironic and disappointing to me.

Last: I'm not saying because I think I'm superior. I'm saying it because I think it's true.

Luna_the_Cat wrote:

Leni says:

... I admit freely, the whole thing rubs me the wrong way because the message isn't simply "talk about the economics of science when addressing economists". It's "whore yourself to an unthinking, uncaring public." And as someone who cares very much about transparency and integrity in science, I find that leaves a very bad taste in my mouth.

I don't particularly care what the "unthinking, uncaring" public thinks of, say, RNAi or the search for Higg's boson, except in so far as they elect politicians and politicians make funding available (or unavailable). In the case of biodiversity/habitat loss,...

Wait right here! So you don't care about what an uncaring public thinks about science in general and public perception, except when you care about it?

Wow. Well that's good to know. If I ever need an actual science advocate I probably won't ask you. Not even if it's about biodiversity. Actually, especially if it is.

I think this conversation is done because I think you've pretty much hung yourself out to dry with that remark, but I'll read through the rest of your comment anyway.

Oh look, you wrote:

Like I said elsewhere, this is a matter of pragmatism.

No kidding?

Wow.

Again, that's good to know, especially since I'm not sure I would have guessed that from all the whorish whor-...I mean pragmatism.

...So I guess you missed the bit where I said except in so far as they elect politicians and politicians make funding available (or unavailable).

As for the interpretation, could I simply point out the other thing that you missed: biodiversity loss requires public sign-on to action -- and a widespread action, on multiple fronts, to combat it. If you can demonstrate where the study of RNAi or Higg's boson requires the same thing, then I will happily include them in my areas of concern and step up efforts to teach people how these things are relevant to ordinary life.

Did I make that clear enough for you?

Incidentally, if you consider me a whore for wanting to get the public concerned about certain things, what exactly DOES this say about your own attitudes towards outreach?

Actually, it occurred to me, there is a simpler way to explain this difference to you, Leni.

RNAi, Higg's boson, etc. --
it would be good if the public were able to understand how fascinating this stuff is just for its own sake, but they should also be aware that even the most abstract pure research can end up in major real-world technological advances. Look at lasers, for instance. For these reasons they should be willing to let public money go to support these things.

tackling biodiversity loss and climate change -- Not only do we need funding for research, at the very least the public will probably need to change their buying patterns, and there may well be a need to change other aspects of lifestyle in the long term.

Do you see how these are going to require very different approaches?

Oh, yes (and very sorry about the multiple posts here!)

Caledonian -- Do you actually have an example, a specific example anywhere that you can link to, where either Nisbet or Mooney deliberately say something which is not true? Can you explicitly state why it is not true, and why it is spin?

I'm not talking about PZ and Nisbet calling each other names. There is a lot of namecalling around, and considering how much of that you do I'm inclined to think you shouldn't criticise. But I'm talking about Nisbet saying that PZ did something that PZ didn't do.