Kapitza: Popularizing Science on Soviet TV

Through his activities as a science educator and popularizer, experimental physicist Sergei P Kapitza has become one of the best-known scientists in the Soviet Union. Millions of people watch his biweekly television show on scientific issues, for which he received the State Award in 1980. Kapitza was born in England, where his father, Peter L. Kapitza, was working on low-temperature physics and magnetism at Cam bridge. After graduating from the Moscow Aeronautical Institute in 1949, Sergei Kapitza worked at the Central Aerohydro dynamic Institute and later at the Institute for Geophysics while pursuing his Ph.D. in physics, which he received in 1953. Since then he has worked at the Institute for Physical Problems in Moscow. His research interests include aerodynamics, magnetism, particle accelerators and electrodynamics. A professor of physics at Moscow's Physicotechnical Institute since 1965, Kapitza also is editor of the Russian edition of Scientific American (V Mire Nauki) and serves on the editorial board of the popular science magazine Priroda (Nature). He has been vice president of the European Physical Society and vice chairman of the committees on particle accelerators and on synchrotron radiation and the Committee of Soviet Scientists Against Nuclear War. He was interviewed March 20 in Washington by Tabitha M Powledge, editor of THE SCIENTIST. This is an edited version of their talk. Q: Do you foresee more scientific exchanges between the U.S. and Soviet Union? KAPITZA: I think we are heading for that. Science is international, that you know very well. Scientific exchange is a very important exchange of understanding, of confidence. In the old days when people tried to establish confidence-building measures between nations, they married off the sons and daughters of the kings to the other royal families. And now scientists—I don't want to say that they're today's royalty, but they certainly do have a common sense of values that they observe. Q: Scientists are sometimes successful in get ting across political barriers. Do you have hopes that that will continue? KAPITZA: The negotiations that led to the cessation of atomic bomb testing, the ABM treaty, these were all explored by scientists. I think this pattern should certainly go on to educate people on these matters and de velop public opinion. In fact, our TV pro gram has been an outlet for such discus sions. When we have these international discussions—say, on such subjects as the arms race, the ABM treaty, the nuclear win ter issue, the test ban—we have special pro grams that discuss these issues. Science on Television Q: You have been described to me as the Carl Sagan of the Soviet Union. Can you tell me about the work you do in popularizing science? KAPITZA: For 14 years, I've been in charge of moderating a nationwide TV program on science that is meant for the general public. To describe it in a couple of words, it is a sort of intellectual entertainment. In the beginning it was suggested that I should introduce films on science rather than go into any in-depth discussion. But very soon we started to discuss subjects in depth, mainly by inter viewing any possible authority we could get hold of, and we used films as a background to illustrate the material. It's not so much the illustrative material that's important, but the chance to speak to the people who are really responsible for the development of science. This has been the main idea, and it has really worked. Q: Then it's a discussion program? KAPITZA: It's a discussion program, a conversation. It's not an interview. It's rather easygoing. Our format is one hour every other week through all our time zones. We have the time and the space to have an in-depth discussion. Q: What's the name of this program? KAPITZA: Its Russian name is not easy to translate. It's something like "Believe It or Not," a sort of catchphrase, an idiom that has entered the vocabulary. Q: What's your audience like? Who do you reach? KAPUTZA: Mainly the general public, perhaps the slightly more educated part of the general public. Polls show that we have a stable audience of about 25 million people. We answer a definite cultural demand in the country. Q: What are your goals for the program? Are you seeking to draw people into science? KAPITZA: Yes, that is one goal. We are very happy that we have attracted a good proportion of youngsters to this field. It has some influence on their attitudes towards science and may help them choose engineering or science as their profession. But the main idea is that science is part of modern culture. The broader message we try to get across is that science is a way of thinking about the world, about ourselves. In the framework of our general discussion, we have a special department called the Institute of Man. Thus we treat the broader is-sues of humanity, like education and psychology. For example, we discuss not only the progress of genetics, but what it means for human beings: what are the implications of human genetics, what are the responsibilities of scientists, what it means for Every-man. Scientific Literacy Q: In the West there are problems with science literacy. A great many people know nothing and care nothing about science. Is that of concern in the Soviet Union? KAPITZA: No. I think in general our scientific training in schools is more consistent and systematic. I think we have an audience that is sufficiently educated that they can consume a program like ours. We couldn't exist if we didn't have an audience that we could speak to on a sufficiently sophisticated level. In Britain, you have the same. Consider the effort of the BBC and the British tradition of scientific films. They are very high quality. Nova, in your country, relies to a certain extent on British imports. We've also used their films extensively. Q: So you have the same sort of audience as the Nova audience? KAPITZA: Yes, but perhaps a little more general than that audience. We have the more educated Everyman, not only the professionals. Q: Is there much information about science in newspapers and magazines as well? KAPITZA: Yes. We have a well-developed system of popular science magazines that cater to different interests and audiences. The most popular magazine, with a circulation of about 3.5 million copies, I think, is called Science and Life. They manage to find a very appropriate way of presenting this material. They have rather sophisticated stuff and at the same time they manage to have some trivia and entertainment. It's inexpensive and well produced. Then we have a scientific journal published by the Academy of Sciences for 75 years. It comes up to the level of Scientific American. And Scientific American is published in Russian too. Involvement in Education Q: In this country there is new concern about the inadequacy of science education. There are new programs and new efforts to train teachers. Is anything comparable going on in the Soviet Union? KAPITZA: There are internal efforts on the part of the scientists to keep up the level of these things. We criticize the books by which children are taught. But I think, on the whole, the level of scientific training is rather high nationwide. In fact I think students are trained in science better, maybe, than in the humanities. I'm not sure that the balance in this case is right. Q: How is it possible to balance the very busy life of producing a television show every two weeks with your other public education efforts, and also leading the scientific life? KAPITZA: That's not an easy job. Sometimes I think that maybe I should quit some of these responsibilities, but up to now I've survived. I have a very able man with whom I've developed these programs, Lev Nikolayev. He's a professional science journalist. When we tape and I do these interviews, I listen to his remarks and his guidance on these matters. We work out the approach and go through all the research material he's selected. He has a crew of four or five people working permanently on this program to produce it regularly and on time. So I don't really bother about that at all. I'm concerned with the immediate moderating of the program, and I am responsible, of course, for the general planning and the people whom we invite. But we've worked out a certain philosophy on this program and his effort has been a major contribution to the success of what we've done. Q: Are there other scientists in the Soviet Union who go public like this? KAPITZA: None has become a national thing. Many local stations have programs of their own and I think they've been influenced by our own effort. They find scientists and people who support them and do it on local material. Sometimes they help us. We also have a lot of international collaboration on our programs. I've had many foreign scientists of great distinction on this program. Q: In this country there are complaints that scientists don't get involved enough in these kinds of efforts. They tend to stay in their laboratories and not participate. KAPITZA: I think that depends on how you do it. We built up a certain reputation. In the beginning we certainly did have difficulties getting scientists to appear. Now I am more in demand than they are in my demand! Q: That's a nice position to be in. When you call, they answer. KAPITZA: Yes. Over the more than 10 years that the program has been on, there has been a certain change in the attitude of scientists toward these things. Nowadays scientists are much more responsive. Reaching Out to the Public Q: Recently a well-known American scientist said to me that the problem with Nova is that it has an audience of 11 million people, and those people will watch it whether it's on at 6 o'clock in the morning or midnight. What is necessary is to reach out beyond that 11 million to find the people who are not already friends of science. KAPITZA: It's very difficult within the medium of television to educate people. You can't explain things in sufficient detail. What I think we are doing, and this is what matters, is to try to develop people's attitudes. This is really what people are interested in about science. Is it good or bad, is it useful or not, what it's all about in a very general way—really, the philosophy of these things. Each person, on his own level, wants to develop a complete vision, an outlook on things. This is what we help him to do. Not so much through factual information, but by helping him listen to authorities, whom he is prone to believe, maybe using the magic of names—so as to somehow develop people's attitudes towards science, rather than provide detailed instruction and information on particular subjects. On the other hand, it has to be entertaining for us to capture the minds of people. Q: You're talking about trying to convey a way of looking at the world? KAPITZA: Yes. I cannot say, "Now I am going to teach you how you should look at the world." You should arrive at this message yourself. Q: Is television the best way to reach people? KAPITZA: It's one of the ways. You also have the spoken word, as in radio. In fact, radio is more intellectual than television. Television is a very strange medium. Then of course you have the printed word. They are all different. Q:And reach different audiences? KAPITZA: They reach different audiences, and in different ways. The power of the image is remarkable in television. It comes first. It's not the text that matters, it's the image that is portrayed. Science is a remarkably interesting and important feature of our times. Scientists have not only an educational and investigative mission, but we also have a cultural mission we have to bear in mind. Perhaps we should also think about having some sort of global television program, maybe along the lines we've developed in the U.S.S.R. Maybe I'm too ambitious about that, but it could have a worldwide circulation. A global television system now spans the planet, just as there is a global message in science. We have to think about that possibility of a global communication network in science. People like Carl Sagan, David Suzuki, Nigel Calder and myself might participate in such an effort. Of course, being on television raises some questions. For whom does the scientist speak when he's speaking to the public? It's not an easy question to answer. Some say he's speaking for himself. Or is he speaking for the community of astronomers? Or is he speaking for the community of scientists? Whose point of view is he broadcasting? In matters of controversy, how do you treat these subjects? I always say that debate is not easy in matters of science because you have to be a specialist. How can you speak to an audience of people who have no understanding of the subject and be sure that they can make head or tail of what's happening? Especially if even specialists have difficulty doing it. Speaking One's Mind Q: On your program, when you're dealing with a controversial matter and you're talking with a specialist in an area that is not your specialty, how do you handle that? KAPITZA: I discuss these matters with them. I play devil's advocate, maybe even express opinions that I don't subscribe to simply to help elucidate various questions. But on the other hand, I'm very particular about passing any final judgments. I would prefer to bring the people to whom I speak up to a certain point, and then leave them. I wouldn't press upon them my final solution, where my own position would be more or less obvious. I won't take that last step. It's important for the audience to do that. They have to be engaged in thinking. The worst thing about television is that it's very passive—especially if you use it the way it is usually used, where you sort of hypnotize and impose your points of view on people. That, I think, is one of the most disgusting properties of television, the misuse of its power. But I'm always very careful to avoid it. You do have to have a position on these matters, but you must be careful of using too much power and imposing these ideas simply because of the magic of television. That's the test of your final responsibility on these matters. Q: But there are scientists who would say that if there's a position you believe in, and you have a chance to make your case in a public forum, you should make it. KAPITZA: I know. And a speaker on our pro-gram can take a point of view. I'm speaking of myself as the moderator of the program.! do have positions on these matters, and the people I speak to are free to express their opinions. Only I think in their case they also have a great responsibility in what they're saying, because they will be believed. That's because of the magic of television, the magic of their name and their prestige. They carry the people away. Or a discussion can become a contest involving the expository power of the speak-era. Take as an example the sort of things that can happen in discussion between an astronomer and an astrologer. Say you bring out the best astronomer, an expert on solar physics. And you bring out a slick astrologer who has all the superstitions to support his point of view. This chap doing solar physics is uneasy about a complicated problem in solar physics. In simple words, you can say that he isn't really sure why the sun shines, and he is not comfortable discussing these matters. On the other hand, you have this slick astrologer who knows all the right words and knows how to speak to his public and who wifi certainly win in a discourse like that. It can also be the other way around, of course. You can say that Darwin's theory was propagated at a British Association meeting when Bishop Wilberforce discussed this matter with Huxley. Huxley said he would rather originate from an ape than from such a person. Here, the public relations man was Huxley, who beat Bishop Wilberforce! A Climate for Science Q: Is there much of that kind of feeling in the Soviet Union? Are people devoted to astrologers and other occult matters? KAPITZA: It may have increased over the last decade or so. I think it's a symptom of public uneasiness and disillusion and loss of bearings when people start believing in these things, like ESP or flying saucers. Each age has its superstitions. In the last century it was the mediums, and before the French Revolution it was Mesmer. Q: Is part of what you are doing contending with those ideas, trying to present an alternative view? KAPITZA: Certainly. We have to develop these views, regain public attention. It's rather futile to fight these issues directly. Q: You do much better by finding another Huxley. In this country, of course, scientists have an economic reason for wanting to be more in the public eye. It helps create political pressures for higher science budgets. KAPITZA: And you have to generate these feelings. Q: That not being the case in the U.S.S.R.? KAPITZA: I think in every country you have to develop attitudes toward science. And it's strange how it often works. It does work. You have to create a climate of understanding. Q: Where science is well thought of? KAPITZA: Is well thought of. You have to protect scientists. They are like these panda bears.

Kapitza: Popularizing Science on Soviet TV

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