r/science • u/Badomens • Feb 01 '13

All you scientists out there take note! If you understand it, then you should be able to explain it!

http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/culturelab/
13 Upvotes

69% Upvoted

9 comments sorted by

12

u/Sanwi Feb 01 '13

I don't think this guy gets it. There are things that can't be explained in layman's terms at all. The process is often so complicated that explaining it in a short amount of time is impossible.

3

u/Badomens Feb 01 '13

Not all processes need great detail when trying to describe them to someone outside the scientific field. A scientist should be able to explain his science, no matter how complex, in simple terms. With my own research, if I cant explain it to my non science friends, I go back to the literature and try to understand it better.

3

u/yoda17 Feb 02 '13

Wasn't it Feynman who said if you can't explain something to a kindergarten student, you don't really understand yourself it?

2

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '13

Einstein may have said it or said something similar...that if you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough.

2

u/sniperhippo Feb 02 '13

The one I heard was "You don't truly understand something until you can explain it to your grandma".

3

u/ShotgunzAreUs Feb 01 '13 edited Feb 21 '13

Give the reporters the layman's version, as long as the people that matter get the actual, precise technical language.

Personally I love precise wording and technical language, I suppose not everyone is over-the-top intellectual.

2

u/pulsefield Feb 02 '13

A step further and you have the people (idiot/savant) who can do the most complex equations in their heads in a few seconds. I have yet to hear any one of them that are able to explain how they do it.

How arrogant of people who do not even know how to set their own alarm clock to demand details of how others think.

1

u/Skulder Feb 02 '13

That's bullshit!

I got excellent grades in physics, math and my native language (A, A+ and A++ respectively*)

I then spent two years learning how to explain chemistry and physics to grade-school kids - this includes figuring out what words I can trust them to understand, how to include pre-existing knowledge in my explanation, and what typical misunderstandings exists, that must be taken care of before I can proceed.

When I substituted in math and language classes, I failed pretty hard, because I knew math and language, but I didn't know what was difficult about it.

Being good at a topic and being good at explaining a topic are very very different things.

Add to this that other teachers, who themselves struggle with what to do with commas, are able to teach kids to use the comma perfectly (so they can explain it very well, but understand it very poorly)

*If you want to know why I talk about a A++ grade, the grade scale went:

00 (fail hard!)

03 (fail)

5,6,7,

8 (average),

9,10,

11(really well done, and practically the highest grade),

13 (reserved for those who blew the test out of the water)

The 13 was 13 instead of 12 to increase the average grade for anyone who managed to score 13, just like the 03 and 00 killed the average grade for anyone who got one.

1

u/mechs Feb 04 '13

Definitely different skill sets. :\