Just back from a brief sabbatical to study the "Speckled Monster" and I'm
embarrassed that I missed it.
Not the "completion" of the genome, of course. You couldn't miss that
anywhere on this planet. There were tons of articles and the week was a real
bonus to those who believe the performance of science should be measured in
column inches of press coverage and verbiage of Radio 4 presenters.
But I missed the debate, at least any real debate. I saw and heard lots of
journalists and scientists commenting. But no real national debate. Is Lord
Jenkin (or at least his report) dead? Have we not missed a unsurpassed
opportunity to engage in that post-Jenkins dialogue to which most of us now
subscribe? After all, there was nothing new announced. It was an elegantly
artificial date when an arbitrary amount of the genome had been licked and
posted in the stamp book of life. The date was reasonably predictable but we
seem to have missed it.
Why was this not a momentous occasion to engage the public in the biggest
debate of our lives? Why are we now not engaged in a year long programme to
celebrate the genome by helping understand our attitudes to how it will
change our lives?
Is it that we have become too comfortable in our public understanding
bunkers? Do we too much love the set piece events, the science centres, the
controlled press release? Are we more comfortable at engaging the public on
our terms not theirs?
Andy
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