Science Is More Than Just a Subject In Schools, It’s a Way of Life
Why scientific literacy is needed more than ever in today’s world
Science is a way of thinking, a way of looking at the world and understanding it as it is. Scientific literacy is as equally important for people of any nation as politics or economy is. But before we move any further. It’s crucial to be clear about what exactly “science literacy” means. Especially for developing countries like Nepal, I believe scientific literacy is as equally important to the general population as it is to scientists, not just for being able to take rational and evidence-based decisions but also for participation in cultural and civic affairs and economic productivity of the country.
Scientific discoveries and developments open up a vast range of possibilities in areas such as space exploration, health and gene technologies, design and construction, communication, alternative energy sources, and transport, to name just a few. We can look at the science of today and predict or even anticipate the way science will shape and direct humanity’s future. As I mentioned earlier, science literacy is also important for taking rational decisions. We’ve got a lot of ongoing problems in our country ranging from water pollution to economic and political instability. The majority of those problems could be solved by rational decision making, decisions which are primarily based upon facts and evidence and not anecdotal opinions of the politicians.
Another major reason why science needs to be communicated and science literacy is important are that we do not know how to handle the information. This is an age of information and/or misinformation, and with so much information being served to us every minute of every day, it becomes difficult for us to process that information and distinguish between what’s right and what’s wrong, what’s legit and what’s false. In addition to that, scientific knowledge helps people to be better informed and make the best decisions possible with the best available knowledge. In the context of Nepal, you cannot imagine taking decisions about pollution or unplanned urbanization, or deforestation based on their own personal opinions. One needs to have scientific knowledge in order to better cope with such issues. And these are the kind of problems that involves the participation of the general populace and they are caused due to the fact that the people are not aware of the consequences of these actions, and they are not smart enough to come up with innovative ideas to solve those problems. Either way, it requires scientific literacy. People can have Ph.Ds and great academic qualifications but would still throw garbage and rubbish on the road out of their fancy cars. That’s because they are not scientifically literate. To be educated is to be intelligent and to be intelligent is to be able to think, doubt, solve problems and be rational enough to distinguish between what’s right and what’s wrong.
Among all the living beings on this earth, humans are the only species who are blessed with a conscience. Philosophically speaking, nature has created an entity that could think for itself. Only humans are capable to grasp the idea that one day we are going to die and yet we go on with our lives until the very end. Looking at the positive side to this idea, we are capable of critically and logically perceiving the workings of nature and yet there is a large demographic of people in this world who take this all for granted.
In a survey conducted in the US, 25% of the total candidates didn’t know that the Earth revolves around the sun. 40% of the candidates believed that the Human species were there side by side with the Dinosaurs. 50% of the candidates didn’t know that Antibiotics are not effective for Viruses. In this day and age of technological advancement, all the information we need is right there on the internet, all we need is a slight click of a button. But the fact of the matter is that the problem arises when we consume the wrong information and don’t have the cognitive capability to critically decide whether the information I’m consuming is correct or not. Scientific literacy simply doesn’t mean that you know all the facts about a certain topic. Still, it means that you are able to analyze any topic presented in front of you critically. It’s a sort of path to becoming an analytical thinker.
Instead of jumping to the conclusions first and then collecting the facts about that topic, a scientifically literate mind first conducts the experiments, analyzes them, and then finally jumps to the conclusions. If we are just looking at the conclusion first and then we’re building a whole canopy of ideas that supports our claim, then we’re falling under the trap of ‘Confirmation bias’. Why are people so hell-bent on the idea of believing the literal meaning of texts written in the Bible some two thousand years ago and trying to build a connection between the texts to the world they live in? Confirmation bias. Why are the people who believe in the fact that the earth is flat so confident in their beliefs that their ideology is unshakable? Confirmation bias. A scientifically literate mind is contrary to that.
Since the dawn of human civilization, we’ve always been curious about everything we see and feel. Thus we started thinking critically in terms of Philosophy, Mathematics, and Science. Among these three topics, we could exclude philosophy because it is the logical interpretation of life but also can be influenced by culture and its meaning doesn’t remain the same over the passage of time. But Science and Mathematics are universal. Critical thinking dawned first under the disguise of trying to solve everyday problems in our lives. Around 6000 BC, say we needed to keep track of the number of cattle that we were raising, so came the concept of counting. In pre-Columbian Central America where there was the famous Mayan Civilization and corresponding to that, and In Mesopotamia, they were the first ones to invent the wheel so that transferring goods would be easy. They were also the first ones with an organized labor force. In the Indus valley in India, they conceptually understood the workings of tides to have tidal locks.
While all these were the ideas looking outwards trying to solve practical world problems, we slowly started having the urge to quench our curiosity about the workings of nature and started thinking more introvertedly. So now, slowly across Greece there started culminating the ideas of Trigonometry and Geometry. Now came the time to question nature. The idea that was once cursed to be Alchemy, would only turn out to be Nuclear physics. As it turns out we could actually change lead into gold but the cost of doing that, it’s not economically viable. Civilizations, in order to thrive also came up with the idea of Urban planning and sanitation for the cities. This is how people and leaders across the civilization were able to thrive across millennia by slowly expanding their horizons on scientific literacy.
What needs to be done to promote scientific literacy then? There are many “systems” that have to be changed, and certain policies that have to be created and brought into practice. The system of education from the very root of the academic journey has to be changed. The sole purpose of education is to make the students think, take action, solve problems and be able to distinguish what’s right and what’s wrong, as I mentioned earlier. The philosophies of schools and colleges need to be changed. The classes have to be changed from being teacher-centered to students-centered and students should be made to think for themselves with the teacher just being the facilitator. They should be made to create their own knowledge rather than just feeding them information. They should be made to take action and create things in order to understand them better. The conventional classes have to change and do the teaching and learning methodologies. In addition to that, scientific thinking can be promoted greatly with the help of the media. Science should be communicated more on social media platforms, television shows, newspapers, and other media publications and broadcast channels.
Contributed by Rishab Karki and curated by the author.
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