We would like to talk about what our values are, what we are currently doing, and where we are going in the years to come, and why we support reddit.

Our Core Values

Our overarching goal is to bring science education to the public. We have set up outreach programs that help to get more people involved in science and to bring science to a level that can be understood and appreciated by people from every educational background.

To this end, we have invested enormous amounts of time working with scientists, working with science advocates, talking with public policy groups and so on; all with the intent of setting up a platform where people can come, discuss and learn about science. We are trying to break down the 'ivory towers' of science, so that those that are practicing science aren't living outside of the public. While this is no easy task, we are fortunate to be enabled by reddit as a platform. We are not here, spending this much time day-in and day-out just because we love science or because we care about reddit alone, but more because it is an incredibly powerful tool that we have that allows us to really make a difference. How often can you say that you are able to just go in and ask a question of Monsanto scientists? Or read about the newest, hottest research and see people from every walk of life discussing it, and explaining its scientific intricacies and real-world applications? Nowhere else on the internet offers that, and it's something we worked very hard to achieve - hence why we care so much and why we strongly support reddit.

We believe in the scientific method. As such, we support the peer-review process which provides the most basic test of validity through testing of ideas and speaking through data. We are not the arbiter of science, simply a venue for the presentation of peer-reviewed research.

We believe in authenticity. In this day of information availability, the truth always comes out, it’s best to speak honestly about what you know and make your case from that.

We believe in civil discussion. The issues brought up by scientific findings aren’t always what people would like them to be, and controversial topics abound. We believe that civil conversation is the best way to understand other’s point of view. One can disagree without being disagreeable, in the end we all agree far more than we disagree, and it isn’t always a win-lose situation.

How We Promote Outreach

Links

We allow our users to post links to summaries of peer-reviewed scientific journal article from the last 6 months. Science journalists are professional communicators of scientific information, and they are able to put the research findings into context for the reader who would otherwise struggle to follow the jargon and other technical language found in the primary literature. Our users are then able to engage in conversations about the research findings in the comment section, asking questions and answering them so that we can all better understand the significance of the research (or insignificance as the case may be.)

Science Discussions

Active posters in /r/science who have formal training or conduct research in some scientific disciplines have the opportunity to confirm their expertise with the forum moderators. We 'flair' these users so that you can identify (a) their academic degree and (b) their self-proclaimed research discipline and expertise. In exchange for acknowledging these users, we expect them to contribute constructively to the community. We allow our flaired users to post their own summaries of a particular subject they believe to be worthy of discussion. The flaired user/scientist can then directly interact with other users and answer questions they may have in order to put research into better context. This is useful if a particular field of science is generating important findings, but they are not easily encapsulated by one particular publication. This also allows for the non-scientist users to actually engage with a scientist working in that field, something they might never get the chance to do in their normal life.

Ask Me Anything

AMAs are well known on reddit, but in /r/science we seek to bring scientists from many different fields who perhaps have no exposure to reddit. This gives our scientist users a chance to ask complicated technical questions of people who are making news in their field, and for non-scientist users to ask questions they have always wondered about, as well as reading about how scientists approach a problem and what science actually is (the continual testing of ideas.)

Where We Are Going

Industrial Scientist AMAs

Professional scientists typically work in three sectors: Academia, Government, Non-profit organizations and Industry.

We have had the good fortune to have access to many people from academia, non-profits and government labs, but the public discourse with industrial scientists has been virtually non-existent. Many in society discount the views of industrial scientist because of the bias caused by having a financial stake in the research, and many in industry are concerned about public disclosures for legal reasons, be that the threat of being sued or being fired for saying the wrong thing. Evidence can be presented for both of these sides, and that is why we find ourselves where we are now: a huge portion of the scientists in our society being closed out of conversations.

We would like to change this, and bring more industrial AMAs, however it will take bravery and understanding on the part of everyone, but we think that the benefit of having an open discussion about the science of the products and services we interact with the most in life is worth it.

You saw this beginning with our hosting of an AMA with Fred Perlak from Monsanto, who came answer your questions in as forthright manner as possible. We know that a large number of people mistrust a Monsanto employee, and assign nefarious motivations to him. We were pleased to read a civil discussion between concerned people, which did not concentrate on the bombastic extremes that are so often found in these interactions.

In the coming months we hope to bring you more scientists from companies that make the things you use, so that you, our readers, can better understand what it is they do and how they do science; we hope that people will reserve their judgment and listen. Likewise, we hope that businesses will realize that cutting off communication with the public has not been good for our culture, and a different way forward is not to be feared due to hypothetical legal concerns.

Current and Future Employment

Many of our readers are students, and a big concern for students in science is finding their place in the world. For employers, having new graduates with the skills that are needed is critical. Properly identifying the current and future needs for skills in the sciences and related fields (like engineering and math) is important for everyone. Having skilled people who can’t find a job doesn’t help anyone. We will seek to bring AMAs and other related content to our readers, that way they can help figure out exactly what they should do. Sometimes it helps to just ask someone! While some students have the opportunity to ask people around them, and the large majority don’t. (I know I didn’t!) We would like to do something about this.

/r/science Supports reddit

I mention all of these things because we can't do any of it without the platform that reddit provides. This is a unique place that has allowed us to connect people interested in science, scientists and even random people who just show up. Without the reddit platform, it would not be possible to fulfill our goals of scientific outreach and we would not be able to communicate science to the broader internet community effectively.

We welcome your civil input on this, and we are listening to you.