The center line of science literacy - which not many people tell you, but I feel this strongly, and I will go to my grave making this point - is how you think.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
The fundamental essence of science, which I think we've lost in our education system, is poking something with a stick and seeing what happens. Embrace that process of inquiry.
Science is a way of thinking much more than it is a body of knowledge.
Science is a wonderful discipline, to which we are deeply indebted.
I always say that keeping abreast of science should never be seen as a chore. It should be something you do naturally. I don't sit there reading 'New Scientist,' putting post-it notes next to ideas.
Science is far from the center of the world for most people: even for many with highly sophisticated tastes, interests, and accomplishments.
Almost everyone shuts down when science becomes too technical; you've got to infuse it with entertainment and storytelling to make it effective. From high school on, science is taught in a very dry manner, which isn't as potent.
I really do think that science has an internal structure, and it makes sense, and we can test it.
You can't train kids in a world where adults have no concept of what science literacy is. The adults are gonna squash the creativity that would manifest itself, because they're clueless about what it and why it matters. But science can always benefit from the more brains there are that are thinking about it - but that's true for any field.
We think scientific literacy flows out of how many science facts can you recite rather than how was your brain wired for thinking. And it's the brain wiring that I'm more interested in rather than the facts that come out of the curriculum or the lesson plan that's been proposed.
I think what a life in science really teaches you is the vastness of our ignorance.