Heart

I recently had the privilege of going to the Bodies Revealed Exhibit at the Da Vinci Science Center - for more information or tickets: http://body.discoverlehighvalley.com/bodies-revealed/.  My grandfather and my mother, who are both physicians, went with me and we had an amazing experience. My father, despite being surrounded by all these scientists, had no interest of going, did not want to see the (sneaky) pictures we took, and would rather not hear any of the details.  As a scientist, it’s hard for me to wrap my brain around how someone would not be interested in this.  Seeing real dissected bodies/body parts up close just awestruck me. Humans are constructed in an absolutely incredible way.  On the other hand, as a scientist, it struck me how many people were there who came just to satisfy their curiosity and learn, not being involved in the sciences at all.  Walking around, I realized how difficult it would be to see and learn from the displays if I hadn’t taken physiology last semester (and if I didn’t have two experts walking around with me). At one of the close up digestive system displays, I found myself standing next to a middle-aged couple who were commenting on the display, saying it would be much easier to understand if the display was set up in a way that showed how food would travel to the body from the mouth to the intestines and I agreed with them! Instead, they had dissections of the tongue, esophagus, the stomach, and intestines all separate with short explanations of the body part. So I explained, to the best of my ability, how food would travel and the couple thanked me profusely.  I then mentioned how this semester I would be taking a class dedicated to learning how to write and explain science for the public. The couple could not stop telling me how valuable and important they think this skill is. They said that much of the time, even when people are more educated, science gets complicated and has too many factors (political, social, etc) that go along with it that can lead people to mistrust and question science or blindly follow whatever they happen to read or hear.  That’s when I realized how truly challenging this task of explaining science to the public is. I do not want to lose the essence of science but I still want to be an easy-to-understand, influential, and interesting science writer.  The Bodies Revealed exhibit is supposed to be for the public but even then, everyone’s understanding level differs and the exhibit can always be improved.  That is why, the best thing I think I can do as a science writer, a scientist, and a person in general is to always strive to be fearless in my work, have heart, and never hesitate to improve.  Albert Einstein said, “If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.”  Science writers need first, fully understand what we want to explain. We need to not only understand our point of view but the opposing points of view as well.  We need to learn the political and social influences of the topic on the public and then attempt to tackle the problem. Embrace the skepticism. That makes writing vulnerable and more "human", which will (hopefully) cause people to be more receptive to the writing. I hope to write with a point of view but still be able to incorporate differing thoughts and defend my point of view strongly.  I think having counterarguments shows the writing is fearless and strong.  To be better, we should write our science with heart.  Furthermore, we need passion and compassion – a balance between not losing the spirit of science yet still being able to get the point across to any person.  And after writing, we shouldn't hesitate to go back, revise and improve our work. We want others to have an open mind and influence them so we ourselves should be open to changes in our thoughts. Lastly, I think it’s important to hope to touch and make a difference in the lives of many but accept that there will always be people who think differently and will disagree - and that's okay. Always dream big but helping even one person is a success in my eyes.