Science communication in unexpected places

The World Music Festival, Womad, hosted a science pavilion this year. It's the latest attempt to reach non-scientific audiences by bridging the gap with the arts. But are such initiatives successful ? The pavilion's inauguration follows criticism by some, such as science writer Simon Singh, of the cost and effectiveness of some public science engagement.

From the embedded link :

During his talk, Dr Singh, author of seven books on sciences and maths, said that such a project’s value for money should be compared with the cost of a science teacher.

Mmm, possibly. The difference is that teachers are a long-term solution whereas outreach events like this are generally aimed at adults. Since the tax-paying adults aren't going to go back to school, both are needed to maintain a public interest and engagement in science.

Also from the link :

Dr Singh criticised a number of projects, including a 2005 ballet inspired by the theory of relativity that was launched to celebrate the centenary of Albert Einstein’s most seminal breakthroughs. “People hate physics, they hate ballet; all you’ve done is allowed people to hate things more efficiently,” he told the 2:AM Amsterdam conference about alternative metrics on 7 October.

I'm not a ballet fan but I can't see any reason to provoke ballet enthusiasts, it's not as if they've done anything to me. I rather like the idea of combining science and the arts, for obvious reasons.

"There are a lot of intellectually curious people here, probably not coming to learn about science, but it's a great way of talking to them," says Prof Jones. "Many of them are tax payers who fund what we do and it's important that they understand what their taxes are delivering." "What we do is help people bridge that gap themselves by stimulating them," says Mr Large. "The trick is communication. Music is about communicating emotion. Science is about discovering facts, but if you can't communicate them there is little point in discovering them."

I also think that having science in unexpected places reinforces the often-overlooked fact that the entire freakin' modern world is utterly dependent on scientific discoveries. You don't have to ram this down people's throats, but making it easy for people to go to a science outreach event who wouldn't otherwise do so (a.k.a. "nudge" theory) just sounds like a thoroughly sensible idea to me.

Perhaps the best attended event is the Q and A with Steven Moffat on the science and sc-fi of Doctor Who, with the audience overflowing onto the grass outside the pavilion. Despite this, Moffat, who is the BBC series' head writer and executive producer, says he knows nothing about science.

Ironically, the latest seasons of Doctor Who have had far more of a sci-fi leaning than previously, albeit a certain type of sci-fi. Lots of explorations of "what if ?" concepts, which is at least as essential to sci-fi as the nitty-gritty details of how the spaceships are supposed to work. If not more so : the social impact of technologies and discoveries is often what makes them interesting, not necessarily the science itself.

"Putting science alongside music is the correct and proper way to apprehend science," he tells the BBC. "It's not a separate thing. They're not for different kinds of people. They're for exactly the same kind of people."

Damn straight.
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-36943937