Questions asked by 13 and 14 year old kids at a science lecture yesterday.

[NNadir]

I went to this lecture yesterday:

Science On Saturday: How Diet and Obesity Shape Our Immune System’s Ability to Kill Cancer

There were 13 and 14 year old kids asking questions that blew my mind, for instance, asking to explain the differences in lysozymes and granulocytes in NK killer cells and how their distribution in cytoplasm was affected by obesity.

I can't remember all the questions kids asked, but I was impressed.

It is a terrible thing, with these fine young minds, we are destroying science in this country.

The lecture should be available as a recording on line in a few weeks.

It was rather amazing, I have to say. Dr. Lynch when asked what teacher inspired her, said her teacher was a nun in Catholic High School who taught evolution, albeit claiming it was inspired by God.

This got a hearty laugh from the audience.

Dr. Lynch is an immigrant, from Ireland.

In former times, the world sent their best and brightest to the United States. No more....

[lastlib]

1. Now, under EptRumpstein, WE are sending OUR best.....

to the trash heap. We are becoming a society where mediocrity is excellence.

[Delphinus]

2. Wow!

Those are impressive questions from such young minds. Thank you for sharing!

[RainCaster]

3. I see this every year at the science fair

I've been a judge at the state science fair for 15+ years now and I am privileged to observe such interactions each time. I still have faith in our future based on what I see among the youth.

[Submariner]

4. When I was 13, I asked Sister Johnette

how the National Geographic glossy color photo of the dinosaur fossil could be described as over 200 million years old, when you have been teaching us the world is only 6 thousand years old?

She cleared up my misunderstanding. I erred in thinking the dinosaur fossil was real, when it was explained to me that it was actually fake. God put the fossil there to test my 'faith'.

When I came back with a followup question and said ..."but"..I was quickly reminded of the sin of blasphemy that I was currently skirting and should think hard about pursuing.

I can't see a nun teaching evolution. There is no such thing in the Catholic Church I grew up in. That line of thought is not compatible with the whole Adam & Eve kicking off this crap show.

I'm glad to see were in a day and age where you can take their questions without having to threaten and attack them with catholic doctrine.

[NNadir]

5. I'm an atheist, and in general, I have no use for religious doctrine, however it is notable that the discoverer...

...of genetics and the author of the heliocentric view of the solar system were both monks, Mendel and Copernicus respectively.

I worked with a post doc, an excellent chemist, once who was a catholic priest, and another excellent chemist who was a fundamentalist. The latter was great at organic synthesis, very creative. (He didn't "believe" in evolution, even though the reality of evolution is not subject to "belief." It exists and is easily explained on a molecular level. One either accepts science or one doesn't. The universe operates independently of any book, particularly one written thousands of years ago by sheep herders.) The former, the priest, was an excellent interpreter of bioinorganic chemistry, protein metallomics.

People can, and do, compartmentalize.

We are lucky, given the important work of Dr. Lynch, that she had a science teacher, a nun, who taught her in such a way as to be cognizant of reality.

I fully concede that religion is a problem, but as I noted over in the atheist forum here, the atheist Nobel Laureate Roald Hoffman expressed a certain toleration for religious faith, more, perhaps, than I do, but his commentary was quite rational:

Roald Hoffmann, basically an Ann Frank who lived, on his atheism, and some ruminations on the question of ethics.

From the text from the part of the interview that turned toward philosophy and Hoffmann's atheism, again, with a twist:

A final and more personal question: You defined yourself as “an atheist who is moved by religion” (6). Looking at the tenor of your life and the many goals you have achieved, one wonders where your inner force comes from.

The atheism and the respect for religion come form the same source. I observe that in every culture on Earth, absolutely every one, human beings have constructed religious systems. There is a need in us to try to understand, to see that there is something that unites us spiritually. So scientists who do not respect religion fail in their most basic task—observation. Human beings need the spiritual. The same observation reveals to me a multitude of religious constructions—gods of nature, spirits, the great monotheistic religions. It seems to me there can’t be a God or gods; there are just manifestations of a human-constructed spirituality.

I added the bold in this case.

[Martin68]

6. I believe science will survive, although perhaps less well-funded, in spite of Trump. What drives science is, as you

so nicely illustrated, is curiosity and the drive to answer questions. When the Democrats regain control on of their first priorities will be to restore funding for research.

[NNadir]

7. Science itself will survive; the question is where will it survive.

Scientific truth does not respect international borders, but access to it can be denied within borders.

There are students right now about to receive their undergraduate degrees in this country. Many of them will not be funded for research positions.

The best of them may be tempted to go overseas. Some of them surely will. (One of my son's ex-girlfriends, a Mexican American, is now in Geneva.)

Research programs now underway will lose, have lost, funding, grants being rejected. The NIH cannot function under brain worm boy.

Science is not a spigot you turn off and turn on again at will. In my experience, it requires continuity.

This increasingly has the feel of 1930's Germany, which of course, ultimately led to the scientific preeminence of the United States, at that time, a beacon of freedom. The best scientists in Germany left.

When David Hilbert died in 1943, only 13 scientists were left to go to his funeral.

I'm noting currently world scientific leadership heading to China, at least in the journals I monitor.

China may not be a "free" country, although my son, who spent last summer there said it didn't feel oppressive, but at least they respect and do science.

I advise high school students to study Chinese. They may well need it.