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Comments

• [1] simon from brooklyn May 07, 2007 - 11:55AM

  the central problem with science education and awareness is that it has been cast as the anti-religion movement. he religiously inclined feel that the encouragement of scientific education is anathema because it will eventually lead to talking about evolution. this is a politicized issue which needs to be dealt with as such. You can describe the inner workings of a flower, the mechanics of bumblebee flight and the motion of the planets without threatening anyone's idea of God.

  
  
• [2] Ruth Reeves from Brooklyn May 07, 2007 - 12:04PM

  The reason that students find science boring is that it is taught as a body of received knowledge, rather than a set of ideas with which they can engage. Nothing about reasoning or how evidence can be brought to bear with respect to a theory is part of the teaching process. This state of affairs does a disservice both to the students and to science itself.

  
  
• [3] Voltaire from Higher Ground May 07, 2007 - 12:06PM

  Simon, one might with at least equal justice claim that the tension between rationality and religion is a problem for religious education and awareness. This isn't a matter of politics so much as a matter of intellectual conscience.

  
  
• [4] Robert Varner from New Jersey May 07, 2007 - 05:13PM

  I have a MA degree in Molecular Biology. I thought that 99% of my science professors in college were jerks. I recently had the urge to go back to college to take some courses. I went to a local university graduate program open house to "feel out" the professors. OH...GOD....the same jerks are still teaching. I love the subject...but hate the teachers. What to do???

  
  
• [5] perri May 08, 2007 - 04:05PM

  Although I can't do math well, and was never big on science when I was younger (I LOVE the Science Channel now) I'm reading The Physics of Superheroes by James Kakalios.

  The physics professor constantly heard his students groan about the relevance of physics to their everyday lives, so as a way of making the subject interesting he uses it to explain how the laws are applied in comic books with emphasis on comics that get their physics right!

  I just finished reading about the death of Spiderman's girlfriend Gwen Stacey in a chapter that explains "Newton's Law of Gravity." Kakalios explains there's been a debate in comic book circles over what actually caused her death; her fall from atop the George Washington Bridge, or Spiderman's webbing as he tried to save her?