What would you consider "scientifically literate?" Because if it includes regularly reading trade journals, I think you're being zealous.
I agree with you that reading trade journals is beyond ridiculous for the average person. I find it frustrating that so many adults have willfully forgotten pretty much all the science they were supposed to learn in highschool. I really feel that of you stopped a person on the street and asked them to give a brief overview of the scientific method and what it's important most people wouldn't be able to answer and may very well argue that it's not important. So I think my argument is opposite of caeli's. I think there's an over emphasis on teaching science facts and calling that literacy, while there's no real effort to give a solid foundation on how and why science is done. The atomic weight of carbon is useless for most people, but the critical thinking skills that scientists use can be put to use just about anywhere.
You're doing a good job of proving my point... when we get down to it, your frustration isn't so much about literacy as it is about rigor. These are people who, by your reckoning, had a basic literacy but are choosing to disregard it. In other words, it's not their lack of basis that bugs you, it's their adherence to dogma. I'd argue that insisting on reading this paper or that enforces dogma without enforcing the ability to evaluate the underlying subjects of discussion. On the other hand, striving for a basis of not just understanding but the methods of understanding automatically raises the level of discourse. I agree- the atomic weight of carbon is useless for most people. But the ability to judge the veracity of a statement on the revision of the atomic weight of carbon is priceless.
That's what I originally meant in my post, and I probably am being too over-zealous! I just think it's not okay for people to vehemently believe (& spread to other people) something from a field that they have no familiarity with. If someone's going to be shouting their views when there is plenty of empirical research they haven't read, then I think they need to read that empirical research, at the very least a recent review paper. It seems that often when actual primary research is linked in a comment thread, people insist they're still right or just ignore it altogether.
Yeah, that's nonsensical. Sorry. No kinder way to put it. You're saying that people shouldn't be able to discuss that episode of Cosmos about black holes unless they've read Kip Thorne's original research. This is a ridiculous standpoint. Stephen Hawking didn't write A Brief History of Time because he wanted to try something without a lot of math, he wrote it to popularize science. The entire approach of science educators should be to demistify and broaden the appeal of exciting but not-necessarily-accessible research so that people can, say, support the Superconducting Supercollider over the ISS because the SSC would have actually done research. You don't need to read a scientific paper about the likely weight of the Higgs Boson to have an opinion as to whether or not it's worth spending $8b finding it. Primary research is NOT intended for rhetorical pyrotechnics, nor is it intended for policy decisions. Primary research is intended to broaden the knowledge base of experts so that those experts can advise non-experts. Throwing original research into an internet pissing match simply shows that you don't know how to convince your audience - if you did, you'd explain why that original research makes your point instead of writing "RTFM n00b."
I think it's one thing to tell someone a cool factoid about black holes you learned from Cosmos. But it's something else entirely to make strong claims about some aspect of black holes (or vaccines, or climate change, etc) and insist you're right to the death when you haven't read any of the literature. These are the situations I was thinking of when I made the original post. Haha, true! I do have to admit I've been guilty of this (although hopefully with better language ;)). I could certainly stand to improve my public science communication skills.You're saying that people shouldn't be able to discuss that episode of Cosmos about black holes unless they've read Kip Thorne's original research.
Throwing original research into an internet pissing match simply shows that you don't know how to convince your audience - if you did, you'd explain why that original research makes your point instead of writing "RTFM n00b."
Where I'm at: The most important thing is to have a firm understanding of what you know about black holes, where you learned it, and how trustworthy any new information about black holes you hear is likely to be. The trick is to be able to dilute Nature down to 9gag. It can be done, and the winners are the ones who are willing to do it. Be willing to do it.