First Mistake

I went to a lecture by Edward O. Wilson last night about the future of life. The lecture was quite good, and I intend to mine it for a few posts (hey, so my life *is* pretty boring) but what really impressed me was his answers to questions. The questioners were young people, probably students at the U, and their questions were somewhat unfocussed or even a bit incoherent, but he always managed to turn the question into a good question, and give a better answer in a way that was both flattering and encouraging to the questioner.

The first questioner asked if it was inevitable that scientists who got involved in policy debates lose their scientific credibility, and how could that be avoided?

His answer: Do the science first, and concentrate on that. When you have the scientific credibility, you can take on policy. His involvement, he said, was like that of an astronomer who had detected the track of a ten mile wide asteroid headed for Earth.

Do the science first! Darn! That's where I went wrong!

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