just a thought...

[Guest Frink]

I know I am not alone on this one, but there are obviously different levels of agreement on it...

 

How do most of you feel about the scientific field these days? Do you think quality of science and thinkers is going down? It seems to me that more and more I find myself rolling up my eyes when talking science to colleagues and even supervisors. It boggles me how ignorant and at the same time how cocky the scientific community appears to be.

 

Maybe the reason for it is just because I am actually learning and realizing I/we know nothing about the world/how nature actually works, or maybe it's a result of overpopulation taking an effect in the scientific community (bigger population, less quality)... I am not sure, but I am curious to know how other people feel about it.

 

My parents and family, who's contact with science is through the media obviously don't see that side of it, to them scientists and doctors are the brains of our society. But after being in this community for over 8 years I am starting to feel very skeptical about how advanced we think we are...

Am I alone on this one?

[ed84c]

Less people care about science these days.

[Hellbender]

Less people care about science these days.

 

yup. Some people tend to even have a hostile view of science.

[Sayonara]

Fewer people.

 

Tsch.

[Cadmus]

Some people tend to even have a hostile view of science.

It takes far less mental effort and ability to hold a hostile view than to hold a supporting view.

[Hellbender]

It takes far less mental effort and ability to hold a hostile view than to hold a supporting view.

 

Very true, especially when speaking of science.

[Bettina]

If my high school is a remote indicator, then you would be alone. The science class and its books are the most interesting and most of us really enjoy it. We have a good hands on teacher too.

 

I wonder if something is happening after high school to create the lack of interest.

 

Bettina

[YT2095]

from personal observations, I`ve noticed it extends to "Trades" also, many of todays kids don`t want to get their hands dirty anymore, Engineers, Electricians, Carpenters etc...

they all seem to want desk jobs in front of computers

 

Science seems to be learning how to program and run sims.

[RICHARDBATTY]

From my own experience with school I can say that science lessons put me off. I looked forward to taking science through out the later part of junior school as the lessons in junior school were futile as I had already learned everything out of my own interests. Then came in my opinion pointless wasted hours sat in a room with tutors that didn't understand what they were teaching. An example would be a lesson on polymers. Make nylon its a polymer it has long chain molecules. Only the name of one chemical was known and there was no information available on what happened at an atomic level. Pointless.

[Sayonara]

Science seems to be learning how to program and run sims.

That really isn't true at all.

[Vladimir]

I think it depneds on what country and what school you go to. You'll find that the smarter you are (compared to the people around you) the more frustrated you'll be education wise. If everybodys of equal intelligence nothing should be troubling you.

However, in order to understand the sciences you need to develop certain skills, this takes time, and unfortunatly in todays pop cultre, time spent is time wasted.

[YT2095]

That really isn't true at all.

 

I don`t know so much, there`s been several LARGE well established (30+ years) factories that have had to be closed down simply due to the fact that the available "workforce" to fill these new jobs was not available, all the applicants wanted the Computer section of the factory not ONE! wanted to get their hands dirty and actualy handle a machine part.

 

go to College, ALL the Chem and Physics courses are closed because it`s not cost effective to run it for less than 8 students, and yet the same college has a waiting list for almost any computer language or literacy course that you can shake a stick at, no it`s that un-freakin-beleivable, it doesn`t seem at all true. but I can`t argue with facts!

[5614]

I'd agree and say that there are several causes for a seemingly lack of science interest:

 

1) Governments are dumbing down and boring out the ciriculum (for schools!), students are not taught interesting things nor advance things, I say QM and people are like "woa" "too clever" "dunno" and then some people just havent even heard of it (and that's at 16 years old). Out of 12 units for GCSE 3 of them cover the atom structure (as proton, neutron, electron), no one has heard of quarks, an electron has a mass of 0 etc... it's too basic and boring. And then like the best experiment in physics is a van de graff generator, chemistry is maybe a hydrogen balloon explosion or Mg burning in pure O2, biology we've once dissect a heart... it's not really enough to capture the hearts and mind of the younger generations!

 

2) It's hard. I'm chosing A-Level, or at least i just have (I'm doing: physics, chemistry, ICT, maths, further maths - and yes you are only meant to do 3 or 4!!!! but I am allowed to do it, had the interview n all.) anyway, there's soo much to physics that people are kinda scared to do it, they think it'd be far too hard and too much work. People are lazy and go for things like media study which is meant to be an easy A-Level.

 

3) There's a lot of it. In the last 100 years soo much of physics has been discovered, there's enough information in physics alone to make a life of learning. It's a challenge.

 

4) There's maths involved. I find (in a school of 1500 students excluding 6th form) people tend to find maths (and science) the harder subjects, they are academic subjects which require though, cleverness, memory etc. We need to learn about 20 equations for our GCSE, which are just basic stuff like V=IR, f=ma (no one has heard or though about what happens with vectors) and the most complex being KE=1/2 x m x v^2 and people still can't remember those!

 

Summary:

It's (apparently) hard, not many decent experiments are shown, people have little motivation to work for it.

[Sayonara]

I don`t know so much, there`s been several LARGE well established (30+ years) factories that have had to be closed down simply due to the fact that the available "workforce" to fill these new jobs was not available, all the applicants wanted the Computer section of the factory not ONE! wanted to get their hands dirty and actualy handle a machine part.

That's indicative of a highly restricted view of "science", not a characteristic change in the scientific community.

 

 

go to College, ALL the Chem and Physics courses are closed because it`s not cost effective to run it for less than 8 students, and yet the same college has a waiting list for almost any computer language or literacy course that you can shake a stick at, no it`s that un-freakin-beleivable, it doesn`t seem at all true. but I can`t argue with facts!

Historically, colleges haven't generally tended to turn out a lot of scientists.

[Guest Frink]

Wow guys thanks for so many opinions.

 

I think a lot of you are very right in saying that the interest is simply not there... but that is exactly what I am talking about. Governments are dumbing down the curriculums probably because the mass populace Is dumbing down. Science somehow still seems to have become a very popular thing to do (as seen by the increasingly number of undergrads trying finish their Biochemistry degree... although somehow, I still feel that even those who somehow manage to get through it don't have a clue (or maybe just the feel for it) about what their doing. It's as if higher education has become something you just do rather than something you want to do...

Bah, I'm rambling...

[Guest Frink]

If my high school is a remote indicator' date=' then you would be alone. The science class and its books are the most interesting and most of us really enjoy it. We have a good hands on teacher too.

 

I wonder if something is happening after high school to create the lack of interest.

 

Bettina[/quote']

yes that's exactly it... that's the kind of answer I would get from people working with me.