The Rake: A Gentleman’s London | #9 – Davidoff of London
52 minutes ago
Friday, February 06, 2015
The divergence between public and scientist's thinking
Fascinating infographic from the Scientific American shows big gaps between what scientists believe and what the public think. Jeepers. A lot of people (both public and scientists) must spend a lot of time worrying. I never give food safety, human evolution, nuclear power, world population growth, space exploration funding, offshore drilling or fracking more than a passing thought. When inexpert I tend to trust scientific consensus. A poll of difference between what the public and social scientists think would be more up my alley.
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1 comment:
As is becoming almost the norm with these type of surveys its all in who you select and ask in the scientific community..
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/01/30/87-is-the-new-97/#comment-1847581
If you a layperson subscribe to Science magazine then you are a "scientist" for the purposes of this survey. Also the "scientists" selected for interview are heavily weighted towards the biomedical and social sciences. There's a breakdown of who was asked in the first comment under the article above.
My experience of reading sciency things on climate, food, alcohol from experts has pretty much disabused me of any notion that scientists has more credibility than a well selected sample of the general public.
JC
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