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Blog
Asking for Evidence at the British Science Festival and beyond...
Posted by Victoria Murphy on 20 September 2011
I started at Sense About Science on Monday 12th September as the new Events and Campaigns Officer, and it’s been a baptism of fire. Síle Lane and I went to Bradford on Tuesday to launch the Ask for Evidence campaign and run some events. I helped run the press briefing Síle delivered – she encouraged them to ask for the evidence behind claims, introduced them to all the wonderful campaign supporters, and reminded them of our past evidence hunting adventures.
Then we ran a session called ‘“Scientists say…” – But how do they know?’ with a really lively audience, and had fantastic contributions from the panel. Síle chaired the session while I took calls from press and supporters, and photographed the session. The audience quizzed the panel on how to ask for evidence, ensure quality peer review, and why doing this is important.
Chatting afterwards with people from the session’s audience, we heard some great stories about evidence hunting, and on the cusp of the launch of the campaign met many new supporters.
Síle and I felt like hot property throughout the day, being pulled from place to place to talk about the campaign. Síle squeezed in an interview for the Guardian Science Podcast, then spoke in a dynamic and passionate debate for the motion that ‘ this house believes the same level of evidence should be applied to CAM as to conventional medicine’ – and won! Meanwhile, Professor Hardaker and I were excited to be asked to be part of the Festival’s xchange podcast (day 3), talking about why evidence matters and the nature of science and evidence. It was a fun end to an exciting day, and an excellent way to spend the eve of the launch of Ask for Evidence.
Back in the office as part of an amazing first week I was involved in drumming up support for ‘Ask for Evidence’, writing a ‘For the Record’ piece, and getting to know an amazing team of passionate and energetic people. I think is a perfect introduction to campaigning for critical thinking about scientific evidence, and celebrating this progress with a series of events.
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