Future Perfect What next? And other impossible questions

2. The Future of Science – The White Trash of the Pacific?

My father announced, ‘You’re going to do science.’ So that was that. It was the way things were done 50 years ago. I was thirteen and my life’s course was set.

Gwyn Williams was clear in his reasoning. Science was the means to build the Promised Land, and the British education system made you choose your specialty around puberty. Arts or sciences: the great divide. Accordingly, I joined the nerdy stream at my traditional grammar school, forsaking subjects I was best at-languages and art-to struggle with Wheatstone bridges and titration.

Gwyn’s reasoning wasn’t entirely askew. It was just four years after Watson and Crick (as well as Perutz and Kendrew) had published their sensational papers on the chemicals of life (DNA and haemoglobin), thus inventing the entirely new field of molecular biology; and it was 1957, when Sputnik was launched, starting the Space Age. Not a bad time to take up your test tubes. New Scientist magazine had just been launched, and the BBC carried science programs with the unmistakable brio of making history.

I coped with science at school. It was obvious who the ‘brains’ were. They seemed to know everything automatically. Author Bryan Appleyard has written of his own fury at the way his father would casually glance at problems set for homework and not only know the answers instantly but also imply that anyone with balls or gumption should do so too. Gwyn was the same. He had come first out of 2000 students at Cardiff University while at the same time working down the mines. I still remember my pink haze of panic when I was first asked to solve a problem-thinking it through didn’t arise. This was a macho test.

Years later I was aghast to hear the great chemist Professor George Porter say that his own, similar education ‘crippled’ his mind for much of his life. But how can you say you were disadvantaged when now you are a Nobel laureate, president of the Royal Society of London and member of the House of Lords? I asked him, dumbfounded. Because, he answered, from the age of fourteen he was given only chemistry. It was the narrow specialisation of our era. It took him years to try to put it right.

None of this mattered to me. I intuitively took my science education to be a preparation for life and not a job ticket. Scores of my friends have done the same. We I are well equipped to be journalists, broadcasters, in business, administrators, publishers and investors because we are grounded in a real world and not one entirely of cultural constructs.

In the 21st century much has changed. Science has been sidelined, whatever lip service politicians pay it. Science courses have been turned into box-ticking travesties, as ‘knowledge’ is tested on the conveyor belt of exams instead of through ideas-based essays, and the teachers struggle. How amazed I am now to recall the succession of Cambridge men with first-class degrees we had routinely placed before us as teachers at our humble red-brick Tooting Bee Grammar. In future, then, science needs to be rescued.

There are five reasons why science is essential to the nation. They are:

1. Wealth creation.

2. Democracy.

3. Fun.

4. Quarantine.

5. To tell us who we are.

To elaborate…

Wealth creation

This is the heading politicians think of first, so I’m putting it at No. 1. Many surveys have been done on the relationship between state-funded scientific research and patents registered. I tend to go by the one published through the National Science Foundation in the USA, which says 72 per cent of these ‘innovations’ are scientifically based. This is roughly the figure other surveys offer as well.

It’s a lot. Most authorities also believe that the best way to harness brilliance is not to tell scientists to go forth and make a better mousetrap. The best way is to foster basic research and encourage those clever enough to do it brilliantly. Results will follow. Two fellows whose work I admire have said as much: Tom Barlow, in his exciting book Australian Miracle, and Bill Gates, boss of Microsoft, who said ‘Hire the best people you can find and let them do what they want.’

This seems too much of a free ride for scientists so it doesn’t happen-especially in these times dominated by accountants sans frontières.

Democracy

Since I came up with my list of five a few years ago, this second reason, which once puzzled the men in suits, has become more obvious. The Toowoomba debacle, in which residents, faced with an ill-conceived plebiscite, rejected the option of recycled water, is the most notorious example of democracy foiled by ignorance of science. Toowoomba faces a desiccated future. We citizens are also required to understand and make choices about everything from GM crops and stem cells to smart cards and nuclear power.

In the face of this brave new world of uncertainty, many are retreating into bovine credulousness, New Age ‘alternatives’ or a religions-based wholesale rejection of scientific ideas. It is not a coincidence that this rejection has parallels in the Middle East.

Unless the populace, here and abroad, gets wise enough about science to be able to choose its future, then, as the lady said, we’re in for a bumpy ride.

Fun

Personally, I’d put this category first. How much delight is there in observing a starry sky, watching a bird make a tool, growing a crystal, curing warts, identifying a snake, using a microscope when you know what’s going on?

Science is dealing with what is around you-and inside you-not just a matter of curriculum. Curriculum is to science what a timetable is to the railways-a useful facet, not the main deal. Science is yours, not theirs. Your gut, your brain, your view of the cosmos, your understanding of how gravity makes a falling pudding splash.

Joining the scientific establishment is always an option, to increase your understanding. But no one thinks an appreciation of music automatically requires you to become a concert pianist or conductor. We all enjoy music in various ways. In the same fashion we can all enjoy nature. Doing so in an informed way is the essence of science.

Quarantine

‘I say, chaps, let’s do some hunting. There aren’t any foxes in Australia, so let’s import some. Gadzooks!’

They did the same with cane toads, rabbits, stoats in New Zealand-and those dreaded Australian possums- lantana, killer grasses, exotic bivalves and much else, with awful consequences. The cost of weeds and feral animals has been astronomic.

Then there are the new products of science-the genetic engineering, the psychological treatments, the energy systems, the IT gear, the vaccines for pandemics, the surgical techniques. Who will decide whether they should be let loose in our society or kept away? If we do not have a cadre of experts and informed laypeople covering the field in these unpredictable times we shall be left vulnerable.

To tell us who we are

Put it another way: science can tell us who we are not. We are not a separate creation from animals; blacks are not a different species; women are not stupider than men.

Our modern picture of who we are is fundamentally set by science. We no longer believe in witches, possession by the devil, an Earth-centred universe or miracles because science has alternative, deeply tested explanations. Our relatively recent understanding of Aboriginal history in Australia, going back 50,000 years instead of 5000, has helped changed the law, giving us the Mabo and Wik judgments, making Australia different, for better or worse.

We can also now be more forgiving about madness, even criminality. Brain states produced by chemicals or injury can produce predictable maladies. We know the forensic nature of ‘evil’.

Knowing who we are is essential to facing the future.

These five reasons for doing science are unarguably vital to the national interest and crucial to each individual. How odd, therefore, that science is languishing both in the public mind and in terms of government support. Nearly every day brings another grim stat or gloomy pronouncement.

The first few days of 2007 offered the following. ‘Science scores mock clever country’ was the headline in The Australian on 2 January, over a story proclaiming that science courses at our universities are so unpopular that entry scores are below those for macramé and fashion design. Chief scientist Dr Jim Peacock was quoted as saying, ‘It’s depressing and worrying. We have to be concerned about the replacement of ageing researchers.’ This followed science minister Julie Bishop’s statement in 2006 that in five years we shall be 20,000 scientists short. ‘All this reinforces the need for a fundamental overhaul of the way science is taught in this country,’ editorialised The Australian. ‘Science is more than a cultural construct, it is a disciplined way of thinking that has the power to change the world.’

Two days later we were told, ‘The number of school students studying science across the nation has dropped by one-third in five years and the proportion of university graduates with a maths qualification is less than half the OECD average.’ The National Report on Schooling for 2005 indicated that the number of high schoolers opting for a science degree fell from 147,000 in 2000 to 107,000 in 2005.

‘What will happen if we fail to invest appropriately in higher education?’ I asked Dr John Yu, former Chancellor of the University of New South Wales and Australian of the Year. ‘We shall become the white trash of the Pacific,’ he answered without hesitation. (The increases announced in the federal budget are a welcome boost-a start, perhaps?)

None of this should be remotely surprising. I remember tripping along to the Cabinet room in Canberra twenty years ago at the invitation of Bob Hawke’s science minister Ross Free (himself a former science teacher). It was to discuss what became known as the ‘Nerds and Losers’ survey on the state of science in Australia and its future, so called because that’s what Australian school kids dubbed those few weirdos who opted for Science. Chuck Chunder!

At the turn of the century four of our major scientific organisations-the RACI (chemists), AIP (Sciences Council), Institution of Engineers and Maths Council- issued two statements:

‘If the current rate of university losses continues, there will be no Chemistry, Physics, Mathematics or Engineering to support innovation after 2020 AD.’

‘If the current rate of secondary school participation in Chemistry, Physics and Advanced Mathematics continues, there will be no enabling science in secondary schools beyond 2020 AD.’

They are referring in both statements to the ‘enabling’ sciences that turn the wheels of industry.

Of course kids don’t want to do science. It’s difficult; it seems like an Everest of knowledge you have to climb-all the way or nothing. And you end up, even if you keep scoring mega marks, with twenty times less money than the snots who cruise straight into commerce courses-and wait an extra decade to get there. Nothing has changed. Primary school teachers of science have scant qualification in the subject; the average age of science teachers in high schools the last time I checked was 58 (oddly, the same as for program-makers at ABC Radio National), and starting salaries for science graduates would be funny-if they weren’t tragic. The last time I dared find out how many intending science teachers graduated with physics in a year in New South Wales the answer was two.

I could go on.

The strange thing about discussion of either broadcasting or science education in Australia is that it is so repetitive and the assumptions are so old-fashioned. TV becomes a matter of ratings competitions instead of a discussion of how fresh talent can use the digital technology to produce ultra-cheap original material (remember Mike Rubbo’s Race Around the World or Race Around Australia for ABC-TV?) rather than globalised co-productions costing $2 million an hour. With science the lament is that somehow Jack and Jilly don’t want to study flat out until they are thirty so they can get a job at the CSIRO or at a university (half the geology departments around Australia have been closed, and chemistry is at risk) to earn about the same as a cleaner.

Mortgage consultants, fashion-model etiquette advisers (I kid you not), luxury-goods experts, fifth-layer management meeting attenders, consulting consenting consultants, marketing gurus, lifestyle coaches, people to help you rearrange your clothes cabinet and knicker drawers-these are the earners of our age, often scoring twice the salary of a Nobel Prize winner and ten times the earnings of a post-doc lab researcher with three degrees.

I could go on.

An ABC science reporter with a PhD and six years’ experience (or maybe a five-year, first-class-honours veterinary science degree) will earn the same as a freelance office cleaner and a third less than a truck driver. Not that a truck driver shouldn’t be properly compensated, but the time he spends qualifying is not, shall we say, commensurate. (As I write I see an ad for an ABC science programs commissioning editor requiring plenty of experience. Salary $83,000.)

What’s the answer? How do you convince young Australians-or young Americans, for that matter-that science should be studied? Well, it won’t be by following the example of Education Minister Julie Bishop when, after the latest crisis erupted, she popped up on ABC-TV and earnestly, beseechingly, gave the traditional oration asking Australian kids to commit to a lifetime of hard toil and penury.

There are, of course, degrees with built-in job tickets: dentistry, medicine, computer science and vet science. Student numbers are maintained here, even though the extra cost of the training and apparatus these courses demand requires foundations to be set up to support them. Even forensic science degrees have received floods of applicants, although the paucity of jobs at the other end belies the impression given by CSI and Silent Witness. Fortunately, the courses are ideal preparation for work in environmental jobs so they turn out to be worthwhile as career preparation. But we all need science like everyone needs music. If you are keen on singing or piano, you are not expected automatically to go to the Conservatorium, do concerts as a soloist and conduct a symphony orchestra. Most of us just have an iPod and a record collection. So what if there is no direct job ticket?

Science must be studied at schools, from primary level onwards, because it is essential to life. Aside from the five I gave at the start of this chapter, there is a much more immediate reason that might convince youngsters and their parents. Every job of the 21st century needs some science. Judges and lawyers have to know about DNA and forensic evidence, farmers must understand genetics and chemicals, cooks must be au fait with nutrition, Salmonella and botulinum, business people need to know about IT, and architects about energy and water. Teachers need psychology, prostitutes prophylactics, sportspeople pharmaceuticals, stockbrokers bio-investments, cleaners recycling, carpenters forestry, fishers ichthyology (before fish all die out), and beauticians health care. And everyone needs to know about the environment. Or else!

But is this not a confidence trick? Yes, we all bump into science and technology along the way, but surely it can be left to the boffin in the dreary coat. And surely the professions use only a gloss of science that their practitioners can get by without knowing about.

No, what I am prepared to assert is that you make a far better professional with a solid scientific acculturation. You do not need expertise in rocket propulsion or brain surgery to run a business, but it will help to be scientifically literate and to know how to analyse proposals. This is why it is not a surprise to find people with geophysics or biochemistry degrees in investment banking.

But what about English, French translation or Latin? Science helps with each one. In English there is a way to put word patterns into a computer to tell whether Shakespeare really did write Shakespeare’s plays. Someone decided to do this with Iris Murdoch’s novels and found that her last book used language differently from her others, indicating the onset of Alzheimer’s disease long before the doctors picked it up.

Fiction writers often utilise science as material-Peter Carey in Oscar and Luanda , Ian McEwan in Saturday and Margaret Atwood in most of her books. Michael Crichton (himself anthropologically trained and a doctor) made a big hit with Jurassic Park and did science a disservice in State of Fear, with its bizarre line on climate change.

It is when you talk to writers-or actors-that you learn how deeply they need to understand science. David Williamson’s last few plays-to take just one example- were a tour de force on the uses and abuses of psychology. Williamson studied both that subject and engineering, on which he later lectured.

French translation? Surely not? In fact my brother, at the University of Nantes in Brittany, uses IT, dubbed TV news reports and cognitive science to give his students an interactive way to practise conversation. It can be done from English to French or vice versa-or in any other languages they might choose.

Latin humanism Professor Yasmin Haskell at the University of Western Australia has discovered a trove of poems from renaissance Italy in which medicine (hypochondria; chocolate therapy) is discussed. They give new insight into the thinking of that era. And although habits are changing, doctors and botanists still need Latin to some extent. The point is that the disciplines intermingle.

So what is the lesson for schools and universities? That science must be attached to every subject. As chair of the National Commission for Environmental Education, I visited several campuses (ANU, Murdoch, Macquarie) to propose that teaching about the environment be incorporated into every faculty. None of the deans we met objected. This is not a quixotic idea. Professor George Seddon, for example, one of our greatest thinkers on the environment (he’s been professor in four distinct disciplines, no less: English, Environment, Geology and Philosophy!) has written brilliantly about the influence of literature on how we think of nature and landscape and how we care for both as a result. Science could similarly be linked to law (as it already is at UNSW and Melbourne University), building and architecture, commerce, the arts and sport.

If other universities follow the example set by Vice-Chancellor Glyn Davis at the University of Melbourne and favour general degrees, with specialisation coming only at postgraduate level, this universal distribution of science will be straightforward. What would that do for recruitment to scientific professions? According to a former federal education minister, John Dawkins, it can only do it good. Dawkins says the top science performers will always select themselves; others, having been allowed to study science to tertiary level without feeling a white coat must follow, may opt for one anyway.

Money incentives help too. The former speaker of the US House of Representatives, Republican Newt Gingrich, himself a keen dinosaur man, has proposed that American high schoolers choosing science in Years 10-12 be paid the equivalent of a McSalary-what they would earn serving fast food. In Australia one sensible measure would be to reduce university science students’ HECS debt, which is now punitive and exceeds, on average, the amount owed by other students (can anyone really be surprised that labs are emptying?)

At school, why not pay science teachers more? It takes a generation to train new ones, so in the meantime we should try to recruit retired science professionals, as well as engineers, to fill the gap. This measure did not frighten our Council on Environmental Education either, though I thought it would. Implementation is another thing. But it is already happening in some places, so examples can be learned from.

As for what actually happens in schools and universities, it is plain that many students, like me 40 years back, are bored to jagging sobs. Science in class looks like a vast edifice of arcane information, clear to the Rain Man but tough going for everyone else. This is what students say. What they need is more practical problem solving. The discussion of ideas would also help. It takes many tutorials to free the minds and mouths of youngsters never before required to be articulate.

What of the future of science itself? Should it simply be allowed to find its own way untrammeled? Is there any point in putting up ‘flagships’, or trying to ‘pick winners’, or ‘waging wars’ on targets such as cancer or drought? Science costs lots of money, which is one reason it is in disfavour: politicians do not often want to spend millions, or even billions, on vast bits of boffinry that might, just might, bring results in twenty years’ time.

And those results are not predictable. Tom Barlow in Australian Miracle tackles the question of picking winners by citing President Nixon’s failed war on cancer. Billions of dollars and decades later, not much had changed. Compare this with the Australian Lawrence Bragg’s seemingly obscure investigation of the shape of molecules with his A-team in Cambridge -basic science on stilts. The result: the modern drugs industry, the human genome and the future of medicine, genetic engineering and- who knows?-the creation of new forms of life.

But one thing is clear: our future is dreadfully uncertain. Australia alone could face severe climate change, drought, the possible collapse of biodiversity together with soil depletion, water crises and much else. Try tackling those without a scientific infrastructure or a populace informed about what’s happening to them.

The blood chills.

The Hunches of Nostradamus

2008 Student recruitment in Science falls below that for Cake Decoration and Psychic Massage. Minister calls for national campaign.

2009 CSIRO is restructured. Two new ‘flagships’ proposed: Universal Happiness and Biofools. Typist sacked.

2010 Professor Melvin Schwartz (MIT) wins Nobel Prize. He is claimed as Australian because he once changed planes in Brisbane.

2011 Barrier Reef dissolves. Minister promises it will recover.

2012 CSIRO restructures.

2013 ABC-TV Science outsourced to Beyond Productions. Beyond sold to Time Warner.

2014 Science studies at Australian universities offered only as online courses-to save expenditure on apparatus.

2015 Australian researcher at University of Melbourne confirms means for wiping out malaria parasite. Immediately offered posts in Geneva and Baltimore.

2016 Minister identifies crisis in science student recruitment. Sends out press release from 2008 unaltered except for date change.

2017 Cairns destroyed by cyclone. Toowoomba goes dry and is evacuated.

2018 Remaining university Geology and Physics departments closed. Subjects offered as part of first-year Commerce.

2019 Australian Museum becomes dinosaur theme park. Its scientific research ends.

2020 CSIRO restructures. Science Minister renamed as ‘Minister for Restructuring’. Calls for…