An argument showing time is temporal.

[Pyrrho]

Pyrrho, I must contradict. Yes, you are right that a non-physicist may ignore the speculative hypotheses which are discussed without risking accusations of being ignorant of important facts.

However, is that enough? As someone who is passionate about science outreach, I do not see fundamental science and (high) culture as separate things. In fact, I believe that scientific discourse is one of the most important cultural activities. I think it is crucial for laypeople to participate as informed observers, not only in viewing the outcome, but also the process. Speculation is a powerful way of learning, of become intimate with a topic, even if it only serves the purpose of being shown where one went wrong. I don't just say that from the perspective of a professional, but also from that of a layperson, for example in the field of biology.

It would be nice if everyone were able to participate in high culture, but not everyone is able to appreciate Mozart.  Sadly, I think this will always be the case.  You are likewise going to run into problems with people not being able to understand science.

Now, I agree that it would be good if everyone had a basic understanding of the fundamental way science works, as well as knowledge of scientific facts in broad outline, but that isn't going to happen either.  There is some attempt at this in schools, but it is not entirely successful.


One of the points I was getting at with my previous post is the fact that there are many people who have ill-informed opinions about things, and they are worse off than someone who knows that he or she does not know the thing in question.  There are certain subjects about which this seems to happen more often than others.  For some reason, physics seems to be one of those subjects where people (typically men) like to pretend that they know something, and pretend that their opinions have value and are correct for understanding the fundamentals of the way the universe works.  They value their "gut feeling" more than the opinions of people who have actually studied the issue.

For some strange reason, a lack of knowledge and understanding does not prevent many people from forming opinions anyway.

Here is a link to a humorous article related to this topic:

http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~an4m/fun/men-tiles

Here is an excerpt [with a typo corrected]:

Have you ever wondered why:
* Men who have never been west of Kentucky can tell you
about the mentality of the Japanese?
* Men who can't pay their credit card bills have a plan
for dealing with the national debt?
* Men who aren't on speaking terms with their families
know how to achieve peace in the Middle East?
* Men who flunked high school Physics can explain what
went wrong at NASA?
* Men who haven't had a date in six months know what
women really want?