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Science!

Posted at 3:15 PM on August 11, 2009 by Bob Collins (3 Comments)
Filed under: Science

Last month, MPR's Midmorning tackled the question of why Americans are comparatively down on the American scientific community. Just 17% of the public thinks that U.S. scientific achievements rate as the best in the world, according to a Pew Research study.

"Fully 85% see the public's lack of scientific knowledge as a major problem for science, and nearly half (49%) fault the public for having unrealistic expectations about the speed of scientific achievements."

Clearly, we're not blowing up enough stuff.

More science here.

(h/t: Open Culture)

Comments (3)

That makes me think of this shirt.

Posted by MR | August 11, 2009 3:51 PM

Great video. I'll have to watch it again when I have more time to get a sense of what they are doing. I had a professor in college who taught that the audiences interest in a demonstration is directly proportional to the possibility that the demonstrator will be injured.

As a long time volunteer in the Science Museum of Minnesota's Experiment Gallery we can't do things quite so vigorous as what's in the video. But we do get interest when we crush cans and squish Peeps(r) with just a little air pressure.

Posted by JackU | August 12, 2009 8:56 AM

Oh man that was fun to watch!!!!

Thanks MR for the link to xkcd, I had never heard of it but am a fan now!!!

Posted by BJ | August 12, 2009 10:22 AM