Dr. Free-Ride's Advice to Non-Scientists

Interesting article by Janet Stemwedel at:
http://scienceblogs.com/ethicsandscience/2006/07/things_nonscientists_can_do_to.php#more

"Rather, I think what I'd be happy with is a population which:


has a sense of the kinds of questions science can answer -- and the kinds of questions science cannot answer

has a reasonable understanding of the methods scientists use to try to answer these questions

has a reasonable understanding of the types of "qualitiy control" to which putative scientific findings are subjected

This kind of basic grasp of science puts the non-scientist in a position to get something more from reports of scientific findings than an updated set of facts to take on someone else's authority. My hope, anyway, is that a better feel for the way science works will help people be more critical consumers of science reporting -- an audience that will read past the headline to the "fine print" that provides the qualifiers about the precise conditions the scientists examined and the strength of their conclusions. An audience that knows something about how scientific knowledge comes into being can ask questions about what kinds of assumptions were made in studying a particular question, how widely applicable the findings are, and what questions remain unanswered."
There is much more and also some concrete advice in the article.