‘Not some weird elitist class’: the scientists bringing an urgent message to the streets of Hobart

The chances of bumping into a scientist are higher in Hobart than any other city in Australia, largely thanks to its role as a hub for marine research.

At the start of National Science Week, which wraps up this weekend, you would have been even more likely to recognise them, because they were wearing LED name badges with their name and research keyword.

These “roving scientists” populated the Beaker Street science and arts festival in the city centre, chatting with attenders and trying to break down the misconception that science is done behind closed doors.

The festival has expanded in the six years since its inception so that the conversations take place beyond the festival hub in Hobart. Attenders can go out into the field with scientists as part of the festival’s Road Trip, from a guided walk around Cradle Mountain’s ancient plants to the dark skies of the east coast.

The point of Beaker Street, according to festival executive director, Margo Adler, is to share the fact that “science is not just people in labs with test tubes – there’s science in everything”.

“We have a panel of deaf people who are experts in nonverbal communication … we have a conductor from the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, talking about the science of baton waving,” Adler says.

By combining science with bars, live music and art, Adler says, “we’re really trying to invite in an audience who doesn’t maybe normally engage with science, or doesn’t think of themselves as science enthusiasts”.

“It really bothers me how exclusionary science can be. You’ll have a university that brings, every week, some interesting researcher to give a talk to some departmental seminar for 30 people. And the public is not invited.

“Instead, you’re just talking to the same people over and over and over.”

Adler says a lack of accessibility in science is also a missed opportunity for scientists who can end up “stuck in a tunnel”, missing out on ideas that could be generated by speaking to people who think in different ways.

“I think it’s really important to put non-scientists together with scientists, and have people challenge their ideas and come at them with completely out-of-left-field suggestions,” she says. “Sometimes those are the best suggestions.”

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Zoe Kean, a science communicator and MC of the Road Trip, says engaging in scientific ideas gives people a greater understanding of the beauty and complexity of the universe, but also has a more immediate and pressing function.

“In the last couple of years, we’ve seen how dangerous it can be when communities haven’t been given the tools to understand science; it can put those communities at risk, like with the spread of antivax messages,” Kean says.

Karl Kruszelnicki, who has been at the forefront of bringing science to wider audiences for decades, reiterates the importance of scientific literacy for interpreting the news.

“Science is a way to not get fooled, so [people] don’t get tricked into lies about Covid vaccines, or flat Earth, or climate change,” he says.

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But “we need to have a higher background knowledge of science, purely for the selfish goal of putting pressure on our politicians to do what is economically good for our country”.

One Australian study has shown investing in health research and development offers a $5 return for every $1 spent.

But Kruszelnicki says he is frustrated by the insecurity of funding for jobs at government research bodies including the CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology.

Adler says making people understand that scientists are “not some weird elitist class” helps restore public trust.

An insight into scientific processes helps the public understand that acceptance of evolution, or climate change, is not a matter of belief but “an understanding of the way the world works”.

“The divisiveness in our culture now, it’s really a problem, and I think part of what we’re doing in the festival is trying to combat that.”