Science and Society in a Runaway World

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Matthew C. NisbetAssociate ProfessorNortheastern University

Boston 2030: Our Climate Change Future?

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Political Polarization and Gridlock

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From Keith Poole’s Vote View blog

Sputnik – Apollo

NEPAGH BUSH

Geographic Sorting by Partisanship and Ideology

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Major Ideological Gaps Between Scientists, Public

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Selective Attention to Science and Society Debates

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Nisbet, M.C. & Markowitz, E. (2015). Expertise in an Age of Polarization: Evaluating Scientists’ Political Awareness and Communication Behaviors. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 658, 136-154..

Rapid Transformation of News & Political Discourse

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Politicizing Perceptions of Swine Flu and Ebola

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Nisbet, M.C. & Markowitz, E. (2016, March). Americans’ Attitudes About Science and Technology: The Social Context For Public Communication. AAAS Leshner Leadership Institute. Washington, DC: American Association for the Advancement of Science.

The Sputnik Era: Low Levels of Science Literacy and Science News Consumption

@MCNisbetNisbet, M.C. & Scheufele, D.A. (2009). What’s Next for Science Communication? Promising Directions and Lingering Distractions. American Journal of Botany, 96(10), 1767–1778.

In true/false questions specific to polio, fluoridation, radioactivity, and space satellites only 15% could answer all four correctly.

Following Sputnik, understanding of scientific purposes of rocketry and space exploration only increased from 20% to 25% of Americans.

Pre- and post- Sputnik, no increase in the proportion of Americans who reported reading scientific works or news of scientific events.

Looking to the future, what would you say is the real meaning of Sputnik to us here in America?

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Behind Russia,Security

Propaganda Nothingsignificant

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Nisbet, M.C. & Scheufele, D.A. (2009). What’s Next for Science Communication? Promising Directions and Lingering Distractions. American Journal of Botany, 96(10), 1767–1778.

Wicked Problems in a Runaway World

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o Wicked problems like climate change, pandemics, and social

inequality span national borders and class distinctions, disrupting entire economies, political systems, and ways of life.

o They are rooted in our own success as a modern society, tangled up with industrialization, free trade, scientific advances, global communications, and higher standards of living. They have no single cause and no clear solution. Can only do better or worse at managing over time.

o Yet our inability to effectively manage these transcendent threats has created new sources of public doubt and anxiety, eroding trust in government and expert authority, creating a deep sense of social malaise.

Nisbet, M.C. (2014). Disruptive Ideas: Public Intellectuals and their Arguments for Action on Climate Change. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews Climate Change, 5, 809–823..

Political Control in an Age of Post-Normal Science

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o Controversies over climate change, food biotech, and nuclear

energy are debates over political control.

o Appeals to scientific authority obscure competing views of nature, government, the market, justice, progress, autonomy and community.

o Which values, interpretations, and worldviews matter and who gets to decide?

o Focusing on the translation of scientific evidence often fuels polarization, since such evidence is often sufficiently tentative enough to indefinitely support the values-based arguments of competing sides.

Nisbet, M.C. (2014). Engaging in Science Policy Controversies: Insights from the U.S. Debate Over Climate Change. Handbook of the Public Communication of Science and Technology, 2nd Edition. London: Routledge (pp. 173-185).

Brexit: Globalization, Resentment and Distrust

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America’s Toughest Places to LiveCounties ranked by SES, unemployment, disability, life expectancy, and obesity

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Partisan Sorting, Social Insecurity & Climate Beliefs

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Optimists or Pessimists?American Views on Science and Society

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