Recently, my inbox has been filling up with emails about new online resources that bring you up to speed on the science policy positions of the candidates. The AAAS has a website, as does Popular Mechanics, Physics Today, and Scientists and Engineers for America (the SHARP Network, which also looks at congressional candidate science policies).
And I'm sure there are other ones out there that I've simply missed.
In my latest Science Progress column, though, I canvass these sites and find, understandably, that most are based on information from campaign websites, candidate speeches, press releases, or in some cases secondary sources. And while I really appreciate the labor that has gone into these resources, at the same time, I'm convinced that they're not enough:
...these informational catalogues are geared towards those who are scientists or and those who care about science--not the general population, who largely aren't and often don't. Insofar as they process information about science at all, most American's aren't going to process it in this format, or from these sources. So if we believe that science matters to all of their futures, and that they deserve to know and appreciate that--and I certainly do--then they have to be reached in a different way entirely.
In short, while much valuable labor has definitely gone towards sciencey voter's guides of various sorts (and I'm sure this column has missed some of them), that's not sufficient. We need to change both the medium and the messenger. We need candidates themselves discussing science policy, and we need them doing it on the national television airwaves. In that way, not only can we get past carefully sculpted answers and science policy information written by campaign staffers, rather than the contenders themselves. At the same time, we can bring that information before audiences who, in a massively over-saturated media environment, wouldn't even dream of going to look for it.
This of course leads up to another plug for ScienceDebate2008...but you can read the full column here.
- Log in to post comments
This very point - a lack of discussion beyond the interest group directly affected - makes all the endorsements by science groups a tale full of sound and fury. Why should an average American care that AAAS has endorsed ScienceDebate2008? Maybe they'll care if the League of Women Voters or the NAACP or the other civic organizations that they know about make a similar commitment.
You've done a fine job of convincing groups that candidates might pay attention to that ScienceDebate2008 makes sense. What has been done to make sure that if there is a televised debate, that voters are going to care enough to tune in about such a narrow topic like science?