Speaker: Dr. Peter Frumhoff, Director of Science and Policy, Union of Concerned Scientists. Abstract: In an age when science is attacked in the media, what is your responsibility as a scientist? How can your respond to distortions or manipulations of science in the popular press in a way that is effective but also consistent with your values as a scientist? How can you be engaged locally, nationally or internationally to see that science policy is guided by research not politics?

These questions are becoming increasingly pertinent to the individual scientist as science-based issues of policy relevance, most notably energy and climate policy, move to the forefront of the public discourse embedded in a modern media landscape that grows ever more distributed and diverse.

Dr. Frumhoff will address these questions and how the relationship between scientists and the public may evolve in the months and years to come. Opening remarks will be given by Steve Lanou from MIT Earth Week.
This lecture is sponsored by the MIT Program on Atmospheres, Oceans, and Climate, and is hosted by the MIT Science Policy Initiative in conjunction with EarthWeek@MIT, celebrating its 40th anniversary.