杏吧原创

BRITISH scientists often complain that the public does not understand
them. Those who worry professionally about the public understanding of science
come up with all sorts of theories. Usually they end up admonishing scientists
for failing to put their theories over in a simple fashion鈥攐r for not
making their work seem 鈥渞elevant鈥�.

If you are Lewis Wolpert, professor of biology at University College London
and chair of the Committee on the Public Understanding of Science (COPUS), you
blame a lot of things, including the 鈥渋mage of the scientist as a bearded,
stooping, obsessional, dull, prematurely aged male in a slightly dirty,
ill-fitting white coat鈥�. Writing in the Independent on Sunday, he also
blames the media and the class system.

We have a simpler theory: the telephone system. British scientists are
actually misunderstood because it鈥檚 impossible to get in touch with them.

Try making a call to a typical university science department. Usually, no one
answers at all because secretaries and receptionists were long ago made
redundant. Very occasionally, someone does answer, but ten to one they will be a
part-timer, shared with two other departments who comes in every third Wednesday
and who will either not have heard of the person you are trying to contact, or
if they have, they will not know how to forward calls to their extension.

Some departments, recognising that technology can boost productivity, have
gone for automatic call forwarding systems which seem to be designed to make you
suffer pain yet more slowly. The University of Nottingham鈥檚 Queen鈥檚 Medical
Centre provides a delightful example. Call its number and a synthesised voice
tells you that if you know the extension you require 鈥減lease enter it now鈥�,
otherwise 鈥渉old for an operator鈥�.

Of course, if you take option two, you are tortured in the traditional manner
by being transferred to a phone which no one answers. But you still have a
chance鈥攚hy not dial a random extension number? You鈥檒l eventually find
somebody, or so you think. But the system turns out to reply to a random
selection of 2, 3 and 4 digit numbers with the message 鈥淚鈥檓 sorry, that
extension is not available鈥�. Are their extension numbers encrypted? Are there no
humans at all behind the automatic system. Is it just an electronic
蹿补莽补诲别?

After this experience, it鈥檚 good to dial a place like the British Antarctic
Survey where a more ancient school of helpfulness lives on. Here the
receptionist did not know who the director was and so couldn鈥檛 connect us to
him. How about any scientist? The receptionist explained that there was actually
no one there, adding 鈥渢hey all seem to work half-days here鈥�. True, it was just
past noon and long exposure to the perpetual Antarctic sun can lead researchers
to confuse midday and midnight. But at least our receptionist had an excuse,
鈥淚鈥檝e only worked here for ten minutes,鈥� he confided.

If COPUS really wants to help the communication of science, it should require
all scientists to carry mobile phones at all times. Their numbers should be
entered in a central registry. Those scientists who fail to comply should be
electronically tagged in the style favoured by Home Secretary Michael
Howard.