Australians prefer science to sport
Jason Major
TechNyou
An Australian National University poll found that far from being a sports-obsessed nation, Australians prefer to hear about health issues, medical discoveries and the environment in their news bulletins.
When I was working at CSIRO communication we consistently found a similar attitude.
What I found more relevant to TechNyou was that the poll also found a large number of people feel poorly informed about science; that Australians remains divided and unsure about climate science, both in terms of what climate scientists think is happening with climate change, and its causes; and Australians are positive about the benefits of science, but believe that science is not solving the problems of poverty and hunger around the world.
Poorly informed, or informed poorly
Probably both, but I suspect there is a lot more going on here that warrants further investigation.
Either way, based on this finding, TechNyou, as an information service, should be overwhelmed with enquiries, but we are not.
OK, I am pretty confident that most Australians don’t know we exist, which will have a lot to do with it. This is a marketing issue we need to deal with. However, lot of anecdotal stuff has poured in over the last few years relevant to the need for information and the quality of the information people get or seek.
If people want more information it is all out there. They just need to spend a small amount of time hunting for it. But, I know myself there are lots of issues I think I should be more informed about: the war in Afghanistan, the issues surrounding Indigenous Australians….and so on. There are only so many hours in a day, consequently I rely on the 60 second stories on TV news and the occasional spare hour or two on the weekend when I get to read the paper. Obviously, my lifetime experiences that have helped shape my personal values have a powerful influence on how I interpret these news items, but my information from the media is scant, at best and barely adding to my ability to form an informed opinion.
I suspect this is a similar situation for most Australians. We are poorly informed, not because the information isn’t available, but because we don’t have time to get it, read it and digest it.
It is no wonder that Australian are divided on the issue of climate change, GM foods, some of the nanotechnologies and most likely many other emerging technologies that have yet to hit our radars.
As mentioned I am basing this on anecdotal evidence only and doubtless, there are loads of other reasons influencing why we are poorly informed – or informed poorly. I could blame the media, but the media works in a particular way to get you to read the story, so it can sell it story. That doesn’t mean it is inaccurate (though it can be), but in the case of science, and especially in the case of climate science and GM crops, it can often be present a misleading picture about scientific consensus. To get that proper understanding you need the time to read and discuss, which we don’t possess, at least not for anything outside our specific few interests.
Scientific solutions
As for science solving all the world hunger and poverty, few recent posts have mentioned this. Simply, science can only ever be one part of the solution. War, corruption, education, infrastructure and the host of social/ethical issues need to be sorted as well. Science does not operate in a vacuum. It is an integral part of society, indeed it underpins much of our daily lives, but it operates within the confines of human values. I guess the issue for us as members of society, is which human values will or should science operate under.
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