Re: [Phys-l] Flurry of LHC "End of the world" nonsense

["John Clement" <clement@hal-pc.org>]

While the public has a right, and duty to be concerned about what science is
doing, and how their money is being spent, this does not mean that all
concerns are equally valid.  There is a significant fraction of the public
which is sufficiently uneducated about science that it may be extremely
difficult to explain why the concerns are groundless.  There are also
sensationalists who pander to this part of the public.

We have failed this portion of the public by not properly educating them in
the scientific process.  These people vote for teaching creation science in
the schools, and buy into the idea that more drilling for oil in the US will
solve our energy price problem.  So communicating with them and explaining
things is certainly important, but remember didactic teaching generally does
not change fundamental paradigms.

John M. Clement
Houston, TX

> I don't think the public's questions or concerns about the LHC startup are
> at all inappropriate or stupid. I think they're perfectly legitimate
> questions -- perhaps with obvious answers to a physics PhD, but not at all
> to your common man. If only the public paid this much attention to other
> scientific matters -- of the chemicals in our products and food, of the
> pesticides put on our crops, of the potential consequences of
> biotechnology,
> of the possible ramifications of nanotechnology, or in whom all that
> rocket
> fuel exhaust ends up. Our society would be better off for it.
>
> The public is paying for the LHC. They have a right to ask questions, even
> "dumb" questions. If physicists can't take a little bit of their time and
> explain the situation -- and perhaps spread some physics education at the
> same time -- then I don't see how they're worth spending billions of
> research dollars on.