Episode 20 – Ed Begley Jr. on Science and the Environment

November 3, 2008

Ed Begley, Jr.

In this episode, we talked with Ed Begley Jr. Ed talks to us about science, the environment and his show Living with Ed.

Preview from the Show:

I think when people are armed with good knowledge about science, I think we’ve really got a shot. It’s amazing to me when I talk to people – adults, people my age – about simple things – the boiling point of water, how many planets are in the solar system and in what order they are aligned – people don’t have a lot of knowledge about the basics of electricity and things that really affect their lives. Let me just remove it even from planetary movements and more arcane things like that in people’s lives (that are very meaningful to me) and a lot of people can’t talk about nuts and bolts things like where water comes from and where it goes to, how electricity works, Ohm’s law – things that would really be helpful if they knew it, and precious few people that I know, know much about it.

If you hear claims about something – let’s say an issue like loss of coral reefs, or ozone depletion, or global warming – go online. And I say to you and to the students, stay away from fringe information from anybody. I’m not saying go to environmental sites or some AM talk radio site. Go to good people like National Geographic, Science Magazine, Nature Magazine, Princeton University, Columbia University. Go to people like that – people with Ph.D. after their name. And I’ll roll the dice on that. You need someone good with peer reviewed studies. If it says something other than what I believe, I’m going to listen, because I believe in peer reviewed studies.

In response to: “What do you want our kids of the future to know?”
I want them to develop an interest in science if they don’t have one, to cultivate an interest in science if they do have one, and something that they should continue to pursue the rest of their days. I think it’s a wonderful thing in our pursuit of knowledge to know things about science. I’m all for learning about art and literature… In addition to that, we also need to be grounded in some sense to scientific knowledge, have some modicum of scientific knowledge, and the more the better. I would urge everybody, no matter what your passion is…, to have a bit of your life grounded in science, and you’ll be all the better for it.

Links:

Direct download: LOL20.mp3