6 ms·

One of the problems is that facts are usually presented in the most boring ways, think lectures. Facts, should be spread the same way. Using propaganda, using s

by fffrad 11y ago

One of the problems is that facts are usually presented in the most boring ways, think lectures. Facts, should be spread the same way. Using propaganda, using sex, using means as creative as those who decide to spread false information. Next time you watch a speech by Donald Trump, don't look at him, look at the faces of the people behind him. He is winning them emotionally, not factually. Maybe all scientists and researchers should take classes in creative writing, fiction, and speech.

Swizec 11y ago
As many people have said: Good stories are true, not factual. True. Not factual. A lot of us in the sciences forget that the distinction exist. Or worse, want to pretend it doesn't.
- davidwihl 11y ago
  As Farley Mowat, the Canadian novelist, said: "I never let the facts get in the way of the truth!" Also relevant: Lee McIntyre's book on willful ignorance in the Internet age. With so many facts readily at hand, the flip side of agnotology is an audience who decides to stay ignorant in the face of contrary facts. http://www.amazon.com/Respecting-Truth-Willful-Ignorance-Internet/dp/1138888818 http://www.amazon.com/Respecting-Truth-Willful-Ignorance-Int...
- TeMPOraL 11y ago
  I'd like to think of it as general population operating under a different definition of the word "truth".
  - Swizec 11y ago
    No, it's deeper than that. For instance: the fact is that 32,727 people died from terrorist attacks worldwide in 2014. The truth is that this is number is insignificant. Over 55 million people died in 2014. The truth is also that we fear what we feel is random more than what we feel is the result of our actions. We are disproportionately afraid of black swan events. This is why terrorism is so effective despite being an irrelevant statistical blimp. Facts are just facts. Truth is the interpretation of facts.
    - TeMPOraL 11y ago
      I see your point and I agree. I understood your wrongly. Thanks for the clarification. So another example would be relative effects in medical and nutritional studies. That the red meat was correlated with 3-fold increase of cancer in some tests is absolutely meaningless. What matters is the absolute size, because the 3x increase from 0.0001% chance to 0.0003% is something not worth even pausing a breath about.
      - trhway 11y ago
        >because the 3x increase from 0.0001% chance to 0.0003% is something not worth even pausing a breath about. you must be kidding - http://www.cancer.org/cancer/cancerbasics/lifetime-probability-of-developing-or-dying-from-cancer http://www.cancer.org/cancer/cancerbasics/lifetime-probabili... The risk of getting only colorectal cancer is almost 5% and dying from that cancer - 2%. The total risk of getting any cancer is about 40% and dying from a cancer - 20%. Many of the cancers are significantly affected by healthy (or not) lifestyle/eating/drinking/etc.. I'd say your post is a perfect example of spreading of ignorance even when the Google is just one click away. To the comment below: it seems you again ignored the chance to google for the info, in particular for the link between prostate cancer and red meat/obesity/etc. The same goes for breast cancer too. Even when specifically pointed out to easy available source of clear info, you still continue to spread ignorance.
        TeMPOraL 11y ago
        I didn't imply I was using actual numbers. I was trying to clarify an issue. But since you ask. The last study that made people panic about meat[0][1] estimated an increase of 18% of the chance you'll get colorectal cancer. Using your data, it means the rate of getting that cancer rises from 5% to 5.9% and the risk of dying from it rises from 2% to 2.36%. That is not a significant increase. > The total risk of getting any cancer is about 40% and dying from a cancer - 20%. Many of the cancers are significantly affected by healthy (or not) lifestyle/eating/drinking/etc.. Well, it's important to qualify precisely. The list you provided shows that the dominant part of the 40%/20% stat is prostate (15%/2.7%) and breast cancer (12%/3%), followed by lung cancer (7%/6%). That's about 1/2 of your the risk of developing and dying from cancer accounted for in stuff not directly related to food and beverages. The rest is spread among other cancer types (turns out there's quite a lot of them) with most of them having rates below 3%/1%, so still, even 2-fold increase in risk of getting a particular type of cancer doesn't mean much. [0] - http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2015/10/26/451950828/processed-and-red-meat-could-cause-cancer-your-questions-answered http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2015/10/26/451950828/pro... [1] - http://mashable.com/2015/10/31/processed-meat-cancer-risk/ http://mashable.com/2015/10/31/processed-meat-cancer-risk/
- mobiuscog 11y ago
  The film 'Big Fish' is a great example of this.
TeMPOraL 11y ago
That's why I think Gravity, Interstellar and The Martian are the best things that happened for space popularization since 1987 (Star Trek: The Next Generation). They cleared out tons of misconceptions people have about space, while introducing very little of their own (Gravity being the biggest offender) - and they did it in a way that captured the interest of general population. I like the trend of making realistic science fiction, and I hope it continues. > Maybe all scientists and researchers should take classes in creative writing, fiction, and speech. There's a risk with going too far with that though. A scientist who makes their writing too creative can do more harm than good to the domain, and to public perception of science. The risk increases exponentially if the work is being managed by a creative director - they'll likely take liberties with accuracy in order to make the work more general-population-friendly. Science is a hard thing to explain right. Yes, quite a lot of even the most advanced concepts can be presented simply, but it's a very delicate and precise work, if you want the simplification to be right, and not misleading. -- As for space education, Kerbal Space Program is absolutely the best thing ever. It's hard to even count the number of people 12 y.o. and less who are proficient in basic orbital mechanics, math included, thanks to this game. Seeing kids talking about Δv budgets and orbital transfers really warms my heart. The game's realism, combined with fun setting and identifiable characters, makes it a perfect vehicle for teaching physics intuition that is hard to acquire even for professionals. And the best thing? It even teaches hard math the right way! You don't have to know or learn any math to play KSP and have fun. You can literally eyeball your Mun mission. But as you play you quickly discover the benefits of learning a bit of theory. It makes your rockets more efficient. It makes your maneuvers better. It helps you understand why your ship seems to go away from your space station when you accelerate towards it. Soon, your game turns from this[0] to this[1] (via mods, and yes, all those numbers and plots mean something to you). [0] - http://i.imgur.com/72XNY9q.jpg http://i.imgur.com/72XNY9q.jpg [1] - http://i.imgur.com/AcpcCqS.png http://i.imgur.com/AcpcCqS.png

by fffrad 11y ago

Swizec 11y ago

As many people have said: Good stories are true, not factual. True. Not factual. A lot of us in the sciences forget that the distinction exist. Or worse, want to pretend it doesn't.

davidwihl 11y ago
As Farley Mowat, the Canadian novelist, said: "I never let the facts get in the way of the truth!" Also relevant: Lee McIntyre's book on willful ignorance in the Internet age. With so many facts readily at hand, the flip side of agnotology is an audience who decides to stay ignorant in the face of contrary facts. http://www.amazon.com/Respecting-Truth-Willful-Ignorance-Internet/dp/1138888818 http://www.amazon.com/Respecting-Truth-Willful-Ignorance-Int...
TeMPOraL 11y ago
I'd like to think of it as general population operating under a different definition of the word "truth".
- Swizec 11y ago
  No, it's deeper than that. For instance: the fact is that 32,727 people died from terrorist attacks worldwide in 2014. The truth is that this is number is insignificant. Over 55 million people died in 2014. The truth is also that we fear what we feel is random more than what we feel is the result of our actions. We are disproportionately afraid of black swan events. This is why terrorism is so effective despite being an irrelevant statistical blimp. Facts are just facts. Truth is the interpretation of facts.
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    I see your point and I agree. I understood your wrongly. Thanks for the clarification. So another example would be relative effects in medical and nutritional studies. That the red meat was correlated with 3-fold increase of cancer in some tests is absolutely meaningless. What matters is the absolute size, because the 3x increase from 0.0001% chance to 0.0003% is something not worth even pausing a breath about.
    - trhway 11y ago
      >because the 3x increase from 0.0001% chance to 0.0003% is something not worth even pausing a breath about. you must be kidding - http://www.cancer.org/cancer/cancerbasics/lifetime-probability-of-developing-or-dying-from-cancer http://www.cancer.org/cancer/cancerbasics/lifetime-probabili... The risk of getting only colorectal cancer is almost 5% and dying from that cancer - 2%. The total risk of getting any cancer is about 40% and dying from a cancer - 20%. Many of the cancers are significantly affected by healthy (or not) lifestyle/eating/drinking/etc.. I'd say your post is a perfect example of spreading of ignorance even when the Google is just one click away. To the comment below: it seems you again ignored the chance to google for the info, in particular for the link between prostate cancer and red meat/obesity/etc. The same goes for breast cancer too. Even when specifically pointed out to easy available source of clear info, you still continue to spread ignorance.
      - TeMPOraL 11y ago
        I didn't imply I was using actual numbers. I was trying to clarify an issue. But since you ask. The last study that made people panic about meat[0][1] estimated an increase of 18% of the chance you'll get colorectal cancer. Using your data, it means the rate of getting that cancer rises from 5% to 5.9% and the risk of dying from it rises from 2% to 2.36%. That is not a significant increase. > The total risk of getting any cancer is about 40% and dying from a cancer - 20%. Many of the cancers are significantly affected by healthy (or not) lifestyle/eating/drinking/etc.. Well, it's important to qualify precisely. The list you provided shows that the dominant part of the 40%/20% stat is prostate (15%/2.7%) and breast cancer (12%/3%), followed by lung cancer (7%/6%). That's about 1/2 of your the risk of developing and dying from cancer accounted for in stuff not directly related to food and beverages. The rest is spread among other cancer types (turns out there's quite a lot of them) with most of them having rates below 3%/1%, so still, even 2-fold increase in risk of getting a particular type of cancer doesn't mean much. [0] - http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2015/10/26/451950828/processed-and-red-meat-could-cause-cancer-your-questions-answered http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2015/10/26/451950828/pro... [1] - http://mashable.com/2015/10/31/processed-meat-cancer-risk/ http://mashable.com/2015/10/31/processed-meat-cancer-risk/
mobiuscog 11y ago
The film 'Big Fish' is a great example of this.

TeMPOraL 11y ago

That's why I think Gravity, Interstellar and The Martian are the best things that happened for space popularization since 1987 (Star Trek: The Next Generation). They cleared out tons of misconceptions people have about space, while introducing very little of their own (Gravity being the biggest offender) - and they did it in a way that captured the interest of general population. I like the trend of making realistic science fiction, and I hope it continues. > Maybe all scientists and researchers should take classes in creative writing, fiction, and speech. There's a risk with going too far with that though. A scientist who makes their writing too creative can do more harm than good to the domain, and to public perception of science. The risk increases exponentially if the work is being managed by a creative director - they'll likely take liberties with accuracy in order to make the work more general-population-friendly. Science is a hard thing to explain right. Yes, quite a lot of even the most advanced concepts can be presented simply, but it's a very delicate and precise work, if you want the simplification to be right, and not misleading. -- As for space education, Kerbal Space Program is absolutely the best thing ever. It's hard to even count the number of people 12 y.o. and less who are proficient in basic orbital mechanics, math included, thanks to this game. Seeing kids talking about Δv budgets and orbital transfers really warms my heart. The game's realism, combined with fun setting and identifiable characters, makes it a perfect vehicle for teaching physics intuition that is hard to acquire even for professionals. And the best thing? It even teaches hard math the right way! You don't have to know or learn any math to play KSP and have fun. You can literally eyeball your Mun mission. But as you play you quickly discover the benefits of learning a bit of theory. It makes your rockets more efficient. It makes your maneuvers better. It helps you understand why your ship seems to go away from your space station when you accelerate towards it. Soon, your game turns from this[0] to this[1] (via mods, and yes, all those numbers and plots mean something to you). [0] - http://i.imgur.com/72XNY9q.jpg http://i.imgur.com/72XNY9q.jpg [1] - http://i.imgur.com/AcpcCqS.png http://i.imgur.com/AcpcCqS.png