Restoring trust in science - 6 Minute English

94,115 views ・ 2022-06-30

BBC Learning English


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00:07
Hello. This is 6 Minute English from BBC Learning English.
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I’m Sam. And I’m Rob.
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Once in a while along comes a scientist who captures the 
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public imagination and communicates 
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their passion for science in an exciting and understandable way.
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In this programme, we’ll be meeting one of America’s best-known 
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popular scientists. Astronomer Neil deGrasse Tyson. He’s a man with a 
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gift for communicating and inspiring people with his television shows and 
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books on cosmology – the study of the origin and nature of the universe.
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In his day job he runs the Hayden Planetarium in New York’s American 
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Museum of Natural History, but Neil’s real mission is to encourage 
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scientific thinking among the American public.
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We’ll be hearing from the famous astronomer, and learning 
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some new vocabulary, soon. But first I have a question 
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for you, Sam. Science is ever-changing with new discoveries updating our 
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understanding all the time. For centuries, the Earth was 
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thought to be the centre of the Universe - but who was the 
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first astronomer to have the correct idea that, 
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in fact, the Earth and the planets revolve around the 
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Sun? Was it a) Nicolaus Copernicus 
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b) Isaac Newton c) Galileo Galilei
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Hmm, I’ll say it was c) Galileo.
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OK, Sam. I’ll reveal the correct answer later in the programme. 
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Recent events like 
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the Covid pandemic and climate crisis have put scientists under 
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pressure from critics motivated by political views. Neil deGrasse 
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Tyson thinks facts are not dependent on politics, 
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but should be established with the scientific method, a 
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process of finding the truth through testing and experimentation.
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Here’s Neil explaining more about the 
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scientific method to BBC World Service programme, HardTalk.
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If you have a brilliant idea and you test it and it unearths so 
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much of what has been known before, we’re gonna double-check that 
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– the rest of us – we’ll say, ‘But did he do it? Did he cross 
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his t’s and dot his i’s? Did he … Let me check the power 
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that’s driving his experiment, you know, the wall current, 
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let me check how that was conceived and done’. 
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And if no-one can duplicate your results, it’s not a result.
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Before scientists can confirm the truth of an experiment, 
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their findings must be doubled-checked - making certain 
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something is correct by carefully examining it again. This 
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process is called ‘peer review’ - other scientists double-checking 
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the experiment to make sure everything was done correctly. 
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One way they do this is to duplicate, or repeat, the 
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experiment to see if they get the same result.
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In other words, Neil wants scientists to have crossed 
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the t’s and dotted the i’s, a phrase which means paying 
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attention to the small details of whatever you are doing.
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A scientific approach requires an open mind and critical thinking, 
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but Neil believes the most important thing is to know the difference 
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between fact and opinion. People have opinions about all kinds 
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of things but that doesn’t make what they believe a fact.
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Yet fact and opinion are becoming harder to separate. As protests by 
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anti-vaccine groups and climate change deniers have shown, many Americans, 
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even presidents, seem suspicious of scientific fact. It’s a worrying trend 
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that Neil thinks is a result of the US education system, 
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as he told BBC World Service programme, HardTalk.
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It has to do with how science 
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is taught in schools. It’s currently taught as a body of information, 
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a satchel of facts that are imparted upon you and then you regurgitate 
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that for an exam. That’s an aspect of science, but it’s not the most 
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important part of science. The most important part of science 
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is knowing how to question things and knowing when 
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an answer has emerged that represents an objective truth about this world.
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Neil says that science is taught by encouraging students to regurgitate 
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facts - to repeat information without properly understanding it.
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Knowledge is important, 
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but what’s also needed is a questioning attitude than can 
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recognise objective truth - a truth about the natural world 
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which is not influenced by human bias, opinions or emotion. 
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Without that, anyone is free to call whatever 
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they like a ‘fact’, which only leads to chaos.
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Right. No matter how hard I believe that the Moon 
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is made of cheese, or the Sun goes round around the Earth, 
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believing it doesn’t make it true.
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That sounds like something Neil deGrasse Tyson would 
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agree with – and maybe Galileo too!
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Yes. In my question I asked who first came up with the 
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idea that the Earth revolves around the Sun.
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And I said it was Renaissance astronomer, Galileo.
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Which was the wrong answer, I’m afraid. Galileo knew the 
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Earth revolved around the Sun, but the first person 
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with the idea was Polish astronomer, Nicolaus Copernicus, 
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in 1543 – unfortunately, centuries before the invention of television 
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could spread the news of this objective truth – a provable 
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truth which is uninfluenced by human bias or opinion.
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OK, let’s recap the rest of the vocabulary from our chat 
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about American scientist Neil deGrasse Tyson and his 
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love of cosmology - the study of the Universe.
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To double-check something means to make certain it’s correct by 
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carefully re-examining it. One way scientists do this is to 
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duplicate, or repeat exactly, an experiment.
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The idiom ‘cross the t’s and dot the i’s’ means to pay close 
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attention to the details of what you are doing.
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And finally, if you regurgitate facts, you just repeat them without 
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properly understanding them – something a true scientist 
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would never do!
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Once again, our six minutes are up. Goodbye for now!
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Bye!
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