Vivat Libertas

I happen to think pop science gets a bad rap. It's regarded as dumbed-down science at best, or unreadable if not dumbed down (but seriously, how is Scientific American considered unreadably technical?). I can see how this bad reputation comes about; it's difficult to balance the deep technicality of science with the ability to entertain and inform a public largely unfamiliar with these technicalities. This isn't to say that the average person is stupid - in fact, patronising your audience makes for terrible science communication and angry reactions - but to say that science is heavily specialised. Writing about specialist concepts for a general audience is hard , and it takes time. So most of the people doing it aren't the people who have been working in these fields. In fact, they're unlikely to have any scientific training whatsoever. In an age where most people won't go a day without using some kind of scientific achievement, good popular science is more ...

This is the story of how two things I never thought had anything in common actually helped me. I'm a science communicator. I think I've earned that title now, after 5 years of giving talks, volunteering with children and writing things that actually get published in reputable magazines. (Okay, I sound better than I actually am, but I have actually done all of those things alongside my studies!) Recently, I also started writing for a satirical online news outlet. It's still tiny because it started in late April, so it's not famous...yet. I'm also ashamed of how I started writing for it in the first place; it's not because I'm talented, it's because my boyfriend is a co-founder and the sole editor. If the articles I submit are published, it's because he thinks they're funny. Now, I don't consider myself a particularly funny person, so when I was asked to write an article about black holes being found at the Clinton residences I just sor...

Despite the best efforts of science communicators everywhere, quantum woo is still prevalent, mostly peddled by annoying snake oil sellers and very much even on the fringes of pseudoscience. In that regard it's less harmful than, say, anti-vaccination propaganda or GMO scaremongering - which both have a far bigger platform. Unfortunately, its supporters are no less rabid. To them, quantum mechanics is a mystical tool which can allow you to do anything, and if you don't believe them, you're a fed. Yes, every practising physicist is now a fed. I was quite surprised by this as well. Quantum mechanics is actually fairly old and has its roots in the 19th century. Even what we think of as modern quantum mechanics was actually born in the 1920s and is at this point nearly a century old. Still, classical electromagnetism, which is about 150 years old, doesn't really have any accompanying woo (even if electricity and magnetism can be conceptually very difficult until you...

I get a lot of anxiety over whether I'm employable and doing the right things to become employable. A source of great shame for me is that I didn't get a placement last year. So trying to write my letter of motivation for my exchange programme wasn't the most comfortable of experiences. Trying to write it in my third language didn't help either! (I might suck at being employable, but I speak four languages with designs on improving at least an extra three beyond "bullshitting" levels. That counts for something, right?) For anyone who hasn't written a letter of motivation, it's basically a page of showing off and explaining why you want to do something. So in my letter I had to show off more than just my love of black holes and why I want to go on exchange to this particular university; I had to show off things I'd actually done . I think I'm a particularly lazy person with a patchy employment history. My history disagrees with me. I...

One of the reasons I really, really like doing physics is because it gives you an amazing bullshit filter, if you let it. All of a sudden the world becomes clear and sharp and deep, described by the beautiful and powerful language that is mathematics. Hopefully you learn the tools to tell the plausible from the just plain nonsense and try to base things on evidence. Because physics is shiny and wonderful and leaves people speechless, the awe of physics is popular and widely publicised. By and large, this is a good thing; I believe that everyone deserves the opportunity to learn not just for utility but for pleasure, and to learn whatever the hell they please. Unfortunately, because most people are averse to maths (this is an utter travesty; numbers aren't scary), most popular science books gloss over or ignore the mathematical foundation of physics, giving people misconceptions. Now add that to the wave of stupid people promoting things like quantum woo and what do you get? A bun...

I really hate it when TV presenters are the face of science programmes. You might be wondering why I actually care enough to make an entire blog post about that. Firstly, I should probably put things into perspective and combat the ills of society, and secondly, I should probably get a life. That said, this post (hopefully) develops into something vaguely important. The thing is, as a general rule TV presenters know nothing, or very little, about science. A programme may try to remedy this by interviewing actual scientists working in the field, but it still seems to come off as some Z-list media personality talking to the token egghead that they have to put in because it's about science and they have to make sure that it's factually correct, if grossly oversimplified. This does really not help public understanding of science - which is already sorely lacking. It's absolutely infuriating: people who know nothing about science get to show off some "gee whiz!" ...