<story><title>What I learned as a hired consultant to autodidact physicists (2016)</title><url>https://aeon.co/ideas/what-i-learned-as-a-hired-consultant-for-autodidact-physicists</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>lumost</author><text>This was such a common problem in my undergrad.  I&amp;#x27;d say over half of all incoming majors had at least some form of miss-understanding of what physics was and how it really worked coming off of pop sci.  Even those who stick it out through Grad School and post docs often lament that they toiled away always believing that the grandiose visions of research presented in pop sci would eventually come true for them.&lt;p&gt;While pop-sci has been radically successful at making physics concepts &lt;i&gt;appear&lt;/i&gt; accessible, it has woefully failed at making actual physics accessible.  It&amp;#x27;s no wonder that Americans increasingly view science as either the tony stark like practice of wizards - or as a ceremonious endeavor practiced by those whose beliefs are no more testable than a TV pundits.&lt;p&gt;We need to do better at Science writing.</text></item><item><author>overthemoon</author><text>Wow, I love this. What a thoughtful, empathetic project. This passage really stuck out to me--&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;A typical problem is that, in the absence of equations, they project literal meanings onto words such as ‘grains’ of space-time or particles ‘popping’ in and out of existence. Science writers should be more careful to point out when we are using metaphors. My clients read way too much into pictures, measuring every angle, scrutinising every colour, counting every dash. Illustrators should be more careful to point out what is relevant information and what is artistic freedom. But the most important lesson I’ve learned is that journalists are so successful at making physics seem not so complicated that many readers come away with the impression that they can easily do it themselves. How can we blame them for not knowing what it takes if we never tell them?&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;Of course, this writing often isn&amp;#x27;t for the layperson, it&amp;#x27;s for an audience who can tell the difference between diagram, artistic license, and metaphor, but even so, it&amp;#x27;s good to think about, especially when communicating science to the general public.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>blablabla123</author><text>For me pop sci documentaries were quite a motivation to study Physics though. But yeah, after having studied it I have zero interest in pop sci anymore. It&amp;#x27;s unfortunately not really explaining things but more show casing things. But what I also learned while reading text books, listening and reading lectures: often the most concise explanations are very close to every day language. (In the lines of &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.motionmountain.net&amp;#x2F;9lines.html&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.motionmountain.net&amp;#x2F;9lines.html&lt;/a&gt; which was recently also posted on HN) Would be great if such things could be included more into pop sci. Maybe in a way that at least the common notations are put in. That doesn&amp;#x27;t enable you to do meaningful calculations but at least it would be way closer to relevant literature. Unfortunately there&amp;#x27;s also quite a barrier to university literature in terms of pricing and some stuff is just not published on the Internet. E.g. lecture notes are only sporadically available but tend to be more readable than most books. FWIW Feynman&amp;#x27;s lectures on Physics really stand out here</text></comment>
<story><title>What I learned as a hired consultant to autodidact physicists (2016)</title><url>https://aeon.co/ideas/what-i-learned-as-a-hired-consultant-for-autodidact-physicists</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>lumost</author><text>This was such a common problem in my undergrad.  I&amp;#x27;d say over half of all incoming majors had at least some form of miss-understanding of what physics was and how it really worked coming off of pop sci.  Even those who stick it out through Grad School and post docs often lament that they toiled away always believing that the grandiose visions of research presented in pop sci would eventually come true for them.&lt;p&gt;While pop-sci has been radically successful at making physics concepts &lt;i&gt;appear&lt;/i&gt; accessible, it has woefully failed at making actual physics accessible.  It&amp;#x27;s no wonder that Americans increasingly view science as either the tony stark like practice of wizards - or as a ceremonious endeavor practiced by those whose beliefs are no more testable than a TV pundits.&lt;p&gt;We need to do better at Science writing.</text></item><item><author>overthemoon</author><text>Wow, I love this. What a thoughtful, empathetic project. This passage really stuck out to me--&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;A typical problem is that, in the absence of equations, they project literal meanings onto words such as ‘grains’ of space-time or particles ‘popping’ in and out of existence. Science writers should be more careful to point out when we are using metaphors. My clients read way too much into pictures, measuring every angle, scrutinising every colour, counting every dash. Illustrators should be more careful to point out what is relevant information and what is artistic freedom. But the most important lesson I’ve learned is that journalists are so successful at making physics seem not so complicated that many readers come away with the impression that they can easily do it themselves. How can we blame them for not knowing what it takes if we never tell them?&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;Of course, this writing often isn&amp;#x27;t for the layperson, it&amp;#x27;s for an audience who can tell the difference between diagram, artistic license, and metaphor, but even so, it&amp;#x27;s good to think about, especially when communicating science to the general public.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>nullc</author><text>I bet the bad science writing sells much better-- readers enjoy the Feeling of Knowing.  You&amp;#x27;re not going to get much of that feeling from an honest article on a complex subject.</text></comment>