Scientists looking for a cancer treatment have no problem to find general support. But for those who study potatoes, it is a tougher sale.
The Trump administration seems to have benefited from the idea that the public will witness a lot of scientific research as a waste or mysterious. He – she I lower – or The proposed selection Billions of Research Financing.
In the face of this existential crisis, academics are looking for new ways to mobilize public and political support Fight discounts And maintain their financing.
Enter a group of graduate students at Cornell University with an ambitious plan to change the way people think about science. They have recruited more than 500 researchers in all fifty states to write the keys for local news outlets, which will be published next week. Emma Scales, a PhD student at Cornell, participating in this effort, said that the scientists present themselves to the public.
“She is talking to people who are angry at the lack of knowledge of where their money is going,” said Skales. Like, “hey, I am one of these people who use your money. I am sorry that we did not talk, but let me tell you what I do. “
Izako de Tomasi, Hana Frank, Emma Scales and Alex Lando, leaders of Cornell Policy Club organizing McClentok messages. (Emma measures of courtesy)
the McClentok messagesAs known to the project, it is one of the many efforts made by graduate students and faculty members with the same goal in mind.
It reflects an increasing recognition that researchers cannot take general support as a Muslim. If they do not behave now, many have begun to perceive them, then the confidence of the public in scholars will Continue slipping The funding may never return.
Science is to return to the homelandCampaign to write messages, encourage academics to focus on the role the government’s dollars in science plays. FlagIt is a new non -profit organization, plans for a series of demonstrations in the marketing markets and farmers, in addition to education in churches and the open laboratory days this summer. Another new organization, Your neighborhood worldHe publishes articles by researchers and tries to encourage societal talks on science.
Audrey Drotos, a neuroscience researcher at the University of Pennsylvania, who participated in the establishment of your region’s world, sees efforts like a way for scientists to exchange their excitement.
She said, “We don’t just want to add more noise to the system.” “We are trying to give the human nature to scientists – this is the really primary goal.”
De Tomassi, the second of the right, is studying the innate disease that caused the famine of Irish potatoes. (As a compliment, Isaaco de Tomassi)
A source of inspiration was inspired by McClintock in February, when Izako de Tomassi, a doctoral student studying plant diseases, stumbled on the Internet about doctoral loss. Advisor to the US Department of Agriculture after the demobilization of government workers on a large scale this year.
De Tomasi said that some of the online commentators were sympathetic, but one person insisted that the discounts had stopped “stupid research”, and many expressed confusion about what universities were studying. It seems that a few see the value in their work.
De Tomassi and Metaean thoughts with the advanced science and politics club Cornell about what to do in response to the idea that the researchers tell their own stories.
They called their effort after Barbara McClintock, the late nephritis Cornell who won the Nobel Prize, and planned her on her birthday, June 16. research On the genes in the atom changed the understanding of scholars of heredity and I laid the foundation To treat genetic defects in humans.
Barbara McClantok, the leading company in genetics, at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in Long Island, New York, in 1947. (AP)
“Barbara McClantok is famous for the name of Hell, but perhaps not for a specialist because she studied DNA of the atom. So most people will be like,” who is interested in the DNA of the atom? “
But this is the exact point, de Thomasi said: The separation between what the scientific community knows and what the average person understands. She said even worldly experiences that can help fuel medical and scientific breakthroughs.
The researchers registered to write about a malignant tumor of breast cancer, and how memories and sustainable grapes are formed, among other things. They are on the right path to reach 8 million potential readers, based on the rear organizers’ accounts in the size of the audience of each news port.
During an online symposium on June 6, Catherine Xue, a microbiologist at the University of California, Irvin, marched to about 100 people through how to write the opening. I showed them a 2015 OP-Ed from Newt Gingrich Which called for more research funding as a template.
Xue reminded them of avoiding terms and making them personal. She plans to write a newspaper in her hometown in Ok Redge, Tennessee, on how she is interested in internal training of high school.
Xue told NBC News: “As scientists, we are trained to stay unborn and get ourselves out of the equation,” Xue told NBC News. She said there is a negative aspect of this approach. “I think that many people did not meet the scholars and do not know much about what we do and why, which means that it is easy to not trust knowledge as a whole.”
The last ballot supports her point of view. While 76 % of Americans have confidence in scientists, this decreased from 87 % in 2020, and surveys by the Pew Research Center Display. Pio also found that the majority of Americans believe that scientists are not a good parallel, and that half of them believe that scientists look at themselves as superior to others.
Surely ridiculous research projects have always been a political perforated bag. Some members of the Senate Release annual Reports A mark of what they consider to be shed at science.
During Trump’s career Speech to Congress, A list of what he considered ridiculous projects funded by the Biden administration, including research Incorrectly described He also made transgender mice (in reality he looked at hormones in health and fertility). White House motive President’s statements.
In response to questions about research discounts, White House spokesman Kush Desi said they are in line with what voters want. “The American people gave President Trump an amazing mandate to reorganize government spending to reflect their priorities better,” he wrote in an e -mail. “The administration is committed to the delivery of this state.”
President Donald Trump mocked some federally funded research in a letter to Congress on March 4.
For her new book, “Salmon“Carly An York, an animal behavior expert at Linwar Ryan University in North Carolina, gave a handful of scientists who participated directly with the stressors to defend their research.
One of the professors responded to the book mockery From her work, “Shrimp’s Fighting Club” by joining other academics In preparing the small science exhibition in Capitol HillAnd where I participated that the research on how the shrimp battle was born in an interest in designing new types of body shields for humans.
Carly An York was involved in scientific communication after she was struggling to explain the research physiology for a person for several years. (As a compliment Carly York)
York said: “I hope more scholars think this way,” York said. “This is in fact our burden to ensure that the public understands the reason for the dollars of taxpayers to us, and what we do with it, and why we do.”
Will McClentok messages or other campaigns work? Students and faculty who are planning to participate are not sure, but many say this is not the only goal – and I hope they will go further.
Michael Lobel, Professor of Physics at City College in New York and Previous Public Affairs Director For the American Physical Association, their success depends on whether there is a continuous effort to communicate with the public.
Lepel said that they should also meet people personally – in Rotary clubs, churches and temples, or in PTA meetings.
He said: “If you are going to try to do something and make people come to you, you will only get a slice of the population to do this, and I do not think this will move the needle.” “Go to where they are – see what they appreciate. You may be surprised.”
This article was originally published on NBCNEWS.com
