Scientific Awareness Quotes

My sense, talking to the general public around the country, is that most people don't have a very high level of scientific literacy.

Scientific concepts sometimes elude the vast majority of elected officials.

We know Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin as politicians, but they felt that science was something everyone should have a knowledge of.

The need for general scientific understanding by the public has never been larger, and the penalty for scientific illiteracy never harsher… Lack of scientific fundamentals causes people to make foolish decisions about issues such as the toxicity of chemicals, the efficacy of medicines, the changes in the global climate.

We don’t need 1 million nuclear scientists, but we do need 100 million citizens who are knowledgeable about how science affects their lives.

It is very seldom that the same man knows much of science, and about the things that were known before science came.

Hip-hop is my vehicle for scientific enlightenment. It wasn't until my music career matured where I was exposed to science as an intellectual pursuit.

There's no greater sign of the failure of the American educational system than the extent to which Americans are distracted by the possibility that Earth might end on December 21, 2012. It's a profound absence of awareness of the laws of physics and how nature works. So they're missing some science classes in their training in high school or in college that would empower them to understand and to judge when someone else is basically just full of it. Science is like an inoculation against charlatans who would have you believe whatever it is they tell you.

I will go only so far as to say that I knew what an atom was.

The people who work in the scientific field, they need help to convey what it's about.

Have they discovered evolution yet?

We have people who believe they are scientifically literate but, in fact, are not.

Though the parallel is not complete, it is safe to say that science will never touch them unaided by its practical applications. Its wonders may be catalogued for purposes of education, they may be illustrated by arresting experiments, by numbers and magnitudes which startle or fatigue the imagination but they will form no familiar portion of the intellectual furniture of ordinary men unless they be connected, however remotely, with the conduct of ordinary life.

You have people who believe they are scientifically literate but, in fact, are not. And I don't mind if you're not scientifically literate, but just admit that to yourself, so that you'll know, and perhaps you can take a first step to try to eradicate that.

I would like people to appreciate science in the same way they appreciate the arts.

Science surrounds you. It's not something that you can step aside, step over or push out of your way because you were never good at science in school. Science is around you. Once you know and embrace that fact, it might stimulate curiosity within you to learn more about the natural world.

Science literacy consists in the ability and the desire to follow reports of new scientific advances, throughout your whole life.

People think I appear on television to promote my image. That's not fair. I hate filming. I turned down 'Strictly Come Dancing.' But television is a wonderful opportunity to promote scientific ideas. 'Super Doctors' is a very thoughtful piece.

The worst, the most difficult thing I think is that the more you become intrigued by science and the information is out there, the more you are aware of the paucity of your own knowledge.

Why do more than 40 percent of Americans think that the Universe began after the domestication of the dog?

You can't have people making decisions about the future of the world who are scientifically illiterate. That's a recipe for disaster. And I don't mean just whether a politician is scientifically literate, but people who vote politicians into office.

I want to get across that science is something that we all have ownership of and we can all take an interest in. We don't all have to understand complex theories, but we should have a working knowledge, like knowing your way round the engine of your car.

Everything in science depends on what one calls an aperçu, on becoming aware of what is at the bottom of the phenomena. Such becoming aware is infinitely fertile.

People are interested in science, but they don't always know they're interested in science, and so I try to find a way to get them interested.

I hope that my children, at least, if not I myself, will see the day when ignorance of the primary laws and facts of science will be looked upon as a defect only second to ignorance of the primary laws of religion and morality.