POPULAR SCIENCE

''For the magazine and film short series, see Popular Science''
'Popular science', sometimes called 'literature of science', is interpretation of science intended for a general audience, rather than for other experts or students. Popular science differs from science journalism in that the latter generally focuses on recent scientific developments, while popular science is more broad-ranging and is often written by scientists rather than journalists. It is presented in many formats, including books, television documentaries, and magazine articles.
As a bridge between scientific literature (the professional medium of scientific research) and the realm of popular political and cultural discourse, popular science shares some of the purposes of both but is in many ways distinct from either. Popular science generally attempts to wield the authority of science, sometimes even on social and political issues, but scientific content—the facts and arguments of professional science—changes considerably in translation, with some aspects lost and others gained. For this reason, many science-related controversies play out in the public realm, where political, philosophical and ideological contexts can mix more freely with the formal elements of science—for example, the long-running debates over biological determinism and the biological (especially racial) components of intelligence, spurred by popular books such as ''The Mismeasure of Man'' and ''The Bell Curve''.^[1]
One important difference between popular and professional science is in purpose. The purpose of scientific literature is to persuade other specialists of the validity of observations and conclusions and the efficacy of methods— in terms Aristotle's classification of rhetoric, it is forensic. Popular science attempts to convince scientific outsiders (including scientists in other fields) of the significance of data and conclusions and to celebrate the results, with their validity taken for granted—epideictic rhetoric. Statements in scientific literature are often qualified and tentative, emphasizing that new observations and results are consistent with and similar to established knowledge; other qualified scientists are assumed to recognize the relevance. By contrast, popular science emphasizes uniqueness and generality, taking a tone of factual authority absent from the scientific literature. Comparisons between original scientific reports and derivative science journalism and popular science typically reveals at least some level of distortion and oversimplification, often quite dramatic, even with politically neutral scientific topics.^[2]
Some common traits of popular science productions include:

★ Foremost providing entertainment value or personal relevance to the audience

★ Providing generalized, simplified science concepts

★ Omitting qualifications, limitations, and uncertainty in scientific results

★ Generally forgoing mathematical formulas or complicating details

★ Emphasizing uniqueness and radicalness

★ Bridging the is-ought gap

★ Assuming the audience has no science background, therefore explaining concepts more thoroughly

★ Exploring ideas that have been overlooked by specialists or that fall outside of established disciplines

★ Synthesis of new ideas that cross multiple fields and offer novel implications for various academic specialisms
Some popular science can be very misleading. Some is produced by people with limited understanding of the subject they are interpreting. Some is produced by people who are extremely biased. Unfortunately, it can be hard for the non-expert to identify misleading popular science. In the case of medical research, results are often presented in the press without adequate context. Popular science may also blur the boundaries between formal science and pseudoscience.

Contents

Notable popularizers of science

Some sources of popular science

Notes and references

See also

Notable popularizers of science

★ Isaac Asimov, author and biochemist

★ David Attenborough, broadcaster and naturalist

★ David Bellamy, broadcaster, author and botanist

★ David Bodanis, author

★ Bill Bryson, author

★ Robert Bud, curator of bioscience at the Science Museum, London

★ Jack Cohen, reproductive biologist

★ Paul Davies, physicist, author and broadcaster

★ Richard Dawkins, evolutionary biologist and author

★ Jared Diamond, evolutionary biologist, physiologist, biogeographer and author

★ Sir Arthur Eddington, astrophysicist

★ Peter Fairley, journalist and broadcaster

★ Richard Feynman, physicist and author

★ George Gamow, physicist and cosmologist

★ Martin Gardner, mathematician and author

★ Stephen Jay Gould, paleontologist, evolutionary biologist and science historian

★ Brian Greene, physicist

★ John Gribbin, astronomer and author

★ Mary Gribbin, author

★ Heinz Haber, physicist and author

★ Don Herbert, aka Mr. Wizard, broadcaster

★ Jay Ingram, broadcaster and author

★ Steve Jones, evolutionary biologist and author

★ Michio Kaku, theoretical physicist and author

★ Stephen Hawking, theoretical physicist and author

★ Douglas Hofstadter, computer scientist, cognitive scientist and author

★ Horace Freeland Judson, historian of molecular biology and author

★ Olivia Judson, evolutionary biologist, broadcaster and author

★ Lawrence Krauss, physicist and author

★ Karl Kruszelnicki, aka Dr Karl, broadcaster

★ Richard Lewontin, evolutionary biologist, geneticist and author

★ Robert A. J. Matthews, physicist, mathematician, computer scientist and journalist

★ Bob McDonald, CBC journalist

★ Fulvio Melia, physicist, astrophysicist and author

★ Sir Patrick Moore, amateur astronomer and broadcaster

★ Tor Nørretranders, author

★ Bill Nye, broadcaster and mechanical engineer

★ Steven Pinker, experimental psychologist, cognitive scientist and author

★ Robert Pollack, biologist and author

★ Fred Pearce, journalist at New Scientist

★ Magnus Pyke, author

★ Matt Ridley, zoologist, journalist and author

★ Steven Rose, biologist, neurobiologist, broadcaster and author

★ Oliver Sacks, neurologist and author

★ Carl Sagan, astronomer, astrobiologist, broadcaster and author

★ Kirsten Sanford, neurophysiologist and broadcaster

★ Simon Singh, physicist, mathematician and author

★ Ian Stewart, mathematician and author

★ Julius Sumner Miller, broadcaster

★ David Suzuki, broadcaster and environmental activist

★ Colin Tudge, biologist and author

★ Neil deGrasse Tyson, astrophysicist and author

★ Robert Winston, scientist and broadcaster

★ Lewis Wolpert, developmental biologist, author and broadcaster

Some sources of popular science

★ BBC Horizon - TV series

★ Cosmos Magazine - Australian magazine

★ Diffusion Science Radio Show - Science radio program and podcast

★ Discover (magazine)

★ Discovery Channel - Cable/satellite television channel

★ Explorations in Science - Michio Kaku radio program

★ Exploratorium - Museum in San Francisco

★ Frontiers of Science - Comic strip

★ HowStuffWorks - Website

★ Mr Science Show - Radio show and podcast from China Radio International

★ New Scientist - Magazine

★ Nova - Television show on PBS

★ Popular Science - Magazine

★ PopSci.com - Website

★ Popular Science - Website on books and authors

★ Popular Science Historic Film Series - Film shorts

★ Reasoned Cognition - Web comic

★ Science Fantastic - Michio Kaku radio program

★ Science Friday - US radio show on NPR

★ Scientific American - Magazine

★ Smithsonian (magazine) - Published by the Smithsonian Institution

★ This Week in Science - US radio show and podcast

Notes and references

1. Murdo William McRae, "Introduction: Science in Culture" in ''The Literature of Science'', pp 1-3, 10-11
2. Jeanne Fahnestock, "Accommodating Science: The Rhetorical Life of Scientific Facts" in ''The Literature of Science'', pp 17-36


★ McRae, Murdo William (editor). ''The Literature of Science: Perspectives on Popular Scientific Writing''. The University of Georgia Press: Athens, 1993. ISBN 0-8203-1506-0

See also

★ Science by press conference