• Question: what changes would you make to science and why?

    Asked by anon-234516 to Phill, Liam, Kohinoor, Karolina, Jack, Debbie on 15 Nov 2019.
    • Photo: Jack Joyce

      Jack Joyce answered on 15 Nov 2019:


      Great question! I’d work to make it more inclusive and diverse. Science has traditionally been done by privileged people (who also happen to be mostly white, and male) and that gives science a very narrow perspective. I think it’s important that science is open for everyone — for the benefit of science having those different perspectives, but also for the benefit of people as it can give opportunities that wouldn’t have had otherwise.

      That change has been happening but there’s still work to be done, and all scientists should be working to make science accessible for everyone regardless of who they are, or what their background is.

    • Photo: Liam Wignall

      Liam Wignall answered on 16 Nov 2019:


      Agree with Jack – provide more opportunities for scientists to be from a range of backgrounds. It’s important that we have different perspectives in science, particularly in the social sciences. An individual’s personal history will influence how they view the world and make them ask different questions.

    • Photo: Debbie Kinsey

      Debbie Kinsey answered on 17 Nov 2019:


      I agree that we need to make science more open and inclusive. I think there are 3 main ways we need to do this:
      1. Support people from a wider range of backgrounds to become scientists (for all the reasons Jack and Liam talked about)
      2. In health research (which is my area), include more people effected by the illness or issue in doing the research. Researchers might have lots of knowledge about how to do research and what other research has said, but people affected by the issue also have lots of important knowledge that can get missed when they’re just included as research participants and not as co-researchers.
      3. Getting research knowledge out there in a way that makes sense to people who aren’t experts in it. This is getting better (I’m A Scientist is one good way!), but I think we could also do more to include more people and share more research.

    • Photo: Karolina Urbanska

      Karolina Urbanska answered on 20 Nov 2019:


      I agree with the previous responses from Jack and Debbie and I would like to add more. One of the big issues in science is that we get a lot of popularity by publishing flashy findings as opposed to findings that are boring. Media love big headlines like “X causes cancer” or “social media is dangerous” and any research that reports such negative findings is likely to be known about. However, sometimes researchers do not put enough effort to ensuring that the findings we publish are true.

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