Letter: Who Doesn't Understand?

This time, though, there is a twist. All this fuss about the environment, she complains, is the product of so much bad journalism. Americans are being duped, she argues, and they will continue to be "until the media stop quoting charlatans and quacks, and until respected scientists speak up." "There was a time when experts were believed," she laments. "It was a time of optimism and progress." But alas, she says, the media today tend to quote the misfits of our profession, scientists who "have a mission or `cause.' " If only the public had a chance to listen to "respected" scientists - whatever that means - people would see the error of their ways, and live happily ever after. That may be Ray's idea of a solution to our environmental woes, but as they say in the mass media: "I don't think it'll play in Peoria." Here are some reasons why: First, Ray herself is the classic example of a scientist with a cause. She's convinced that once you know the "facts," you will, per force, agree with her views about nuclear and chemical technology. Therefore, her rhetoric notwithstanding, what she really wishes to do is use the media, not so much for education as for propaganda. Secondly, it is true that "experts" were once believed unquestioningly. Today, they are still listened to, but with greater wariness. That is because too many "experts" have been proved wrong. Finally, Ray complains that a "rapport between science and the media shows no sign of developing." Here again, she is so very wrong. For more than a decade, the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) has administered a program that gives graduate students in science a chance to work at a newspaper, magazine, or radio or television station. Each year, these bright young scientists-to-be spend a summer making lasting contributions to, and connections with, this country's most influential members of the mass media. I was one of those lucky graduate students. In 1979, I was placed at KPIX-TV in San Francisco. Afterward, I returned to my graduate studies at Cornell, where I earned my Ph.D. in physics, mathematics, and astronomy. I now teach physics at Harvard, and I am also the science editor for ABC-TV. Last year, my experience as an AAAS Mass Media-Science & Engineering Fellow came full circle. At my request, ABC-TV agreed to host a graduate student in biology for a summer. It worked out so well that the network has agreed to accept another graduate student every summer from now on! But the most important point of all this is that mine is not an isolated experience. Over the years, scores of AAAS Fellows have successfully "infiltrated" magazines like Time and Newsweek, newspapers like the New York Times, and numerous radio and television stations across the nation. Thanks to them, respected scientists are being quoted, and the standards of science reportage are increasing by leaps and bounds. Ray is correct that journalists are often given too little time to report the subtleties of a story. And she is correct that the American people are intolerably scientifically illiterate. But that is not why she and the public disagree. People are concerned about ecological degradation because they have legitimate reasons to be - not because they are stupid. MICHAEL GUILLEN ABC Entertainment New York, and Harvard University Cambridge, Mass.

Letter: Who Doesn't Understand?

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