Charles Babbage Quotes

You have people who believe they are scientifically literate but, in fact, are not. And I don't mind if you're not scientifically literate, but just admit that to yourself, so that you'll know, and perhaps you can take a first step to try to eradicate that.

People are interested in science, but they don't always know they're interested in science, and so I try to find a way to get them interested.

Scientific concepts sometimes elude the vast majority of elected officials.

You can't have people making decisions about the future of the world who are scientifically illiterate. That's a recipe for disaster. And I don't mean just whether a politician is scientifically literate, but people who vote politicians into office.

Lack of scientific fundamentals causes people to make foolish decisions about issues such as the toxicity of chemicals, the efficacy of medicines, the changes in the global climate. Our single greatest defense against scientific ignorance is education, and early in the life of every scientist, the child's first interest was sparked by a teacher.

The need for general scientific understanding by the public has never been larger, and the penalty for scientific illiteracy never harsher… Lack of scientific fundamentals causes people to make foolish decisions about issues such as the toxicity of chemicals, the efficacy of medicines, the changes in the global climate.

I want to get across that science is something that we all have ownership of and we can all take an interest in. We don't all have to understand complex theories, but we should have a working knowledge, like knowing your way round the engine of your car.

I hope that my children, at least, if not I myself, will see the day when ignorance of the primary laws and facts of science will be looked upon as a defect only second to ignorance of the primary laws of religion and morality.

It probably helps that my background is in the sciences and I can speak the scientists' language.

Science is you! It's your head, it's your dog, it's your iPhone - it's the world. How do you see that as boring? If it's boring, it's because you're learning it from a textbook.

People don't learn science in movies. You don't go to the movies thinking, 'I hope I learn some quantum mechanics this afternoon.' But on the other hand, movies are instrumental and influential in getting young people interested in science.

I like to believe that science is becoming mainstream. It should have never been something that sort of geeky people do and no one else thinks about. Whether or not, it will always be what geeky people do. It should, as a minimum, be what everybody thinks about because science is all around us.

Science literacy is the artery through which the solutions of tomorrow's problems flow.

All writers are going to have to learn more about science, because it's such an interesting part of their environment.

The people who work in the scientific field, they need help to convey what it's about.

General writing about science, even if we do it badly, helps us to see our work in perspective and broadens our vision.

I suggest that the introductory courses in science, at all levels from grade school through college, be radically revised. Leave the fundamentals, the so-called basics, aside for a while, and concentrate the attention of all students on the things that are not known.

If scientists could communicate more in their own voices - in a familiar tone, with a less specialized vocabulary - would a wide range of people understand them better? Would their work be better understood by the general public, policy-makers, funders, and, even in some cases, other scientists?

Science would lead you to a more interesting life than something else.

But perhaps the rest of us could have separate classes in science appreciation, the wonder of science, scientific ways of thinking, and the history of scientific ideas, rather than laboratory experience.

I would like people to appreciate science in the same way they appreciate the arts.

I was a terrible science student, and for a long time, I thought I just didn't understand science. It turned out that I didn't understand post-Newtonian science. I could actually understand how people thought scientifically about the world in the past.

My sense, talking to the general public around the country, is that most people don't have a very high level of scientific literacy.

I don't know anything about science.

We are more dependent on science and engineering than at any other time in history. However, there is plenty of evidence that far too many people are scientifically illiterate, often having been put off science at school.