Making The Connection: Are We Forgetting To Communicate?

As a neurophysiologist, talking about my research in non-scientific environments,I face a sort of dualistic reaction: there is an innate curiosity and interest in my interlocutors, which is often followed by a general worry/disbelief about the technologies we are now able to use to manipulate, at least in rodents, the brain functions. Given all the efforts every single researcher puts into his studies, and considering that science is for the whole world, I started wondering... what if, in all these efforts, we are forgetting something? Life sciences, more than other fields, are closer to the everyday life: to think about the body physiology, the brain functions, the immune system function is more ‘human-sized’, more familiar, than debating about subatomic particles or galaxies.This sort of ‘proximity’, however, sometimes leads to the belief that everybody can be in charge to formulate his own theories, but science is not based on democracy,and the consequences of these are recapitulated in the paradigmatic case of the anti-vaccination group.Unfortunately, too often the scientific community is seen so far away by people,and it is easier to follow non-scientific, accommodative conspiracy theories thangetting closer to the realism of science. I think that this is, first of all, a point lost for the scientific community. And that is why, from higher to lower levels, each person involved in a scientific career should make an effort and reconsider the vital importance of an effective and capillary divulgation system.

http://edelweisspublications.com/edelweiss/article/Making-The-Connection-Are-We-Forgetting-Communicate-NPR-17-e104.pdf