The Culture of Science

Culture, as defined by Nieto on page 129, is "the ever-changing values, traditions, social and political relationships, and worldview created, shared, and transformed by a group of people bound together by a combination of factors that can include a common history, geographic location, language, social class, and religion." I tried to think back to one of our first classes and remember discussing some of the aspects of science as a culture. I believe the definition of the culture of science would be quite similar to this definition. The culture of science is constantly changing as new discoveries are made or as previous discoveries are disproved, for example, the fact that Pluto is no longer considered a planet. Science is a culture in which all people share a common history and are bound together based on this shared history, language and interest. For example, I wouldn't consider myself an active participant of the science culture and often I feel uncomfortable around this culture because I don't understand the language. I am exposing myself to science more in order to become more comfortable with this culture, but since it really has a language of it's own, it is difficult to be a part of this culture if you do not understand a lot of the vocabulary and subject matter, which is similar to the culture discussed in the article. It is difficult for people to be parts of many cultures because they do not speak the languages or have the same interests and common bonds with all cultures.

On page 138, Nieto explains that culture is usually learned through interactions with families and communities, which I believe is similar to science. Many science concepts are learned at a young age through discussions with parents about observations made by children. For example, kindergarteners at my inernship notice how leaves are changing colors and ask their parents and teachers how and why this happens. They also notice that it is getting colder out and wonder why that happens as well. By having discussions like this with their families and others in the community, they are constantly observing and explaining different concepts, many of which deal with science. People also use many of the process skills in throughout everyday interactions. For example, we are always planning our schedules and predicting what will happen in upcoming interactions and communicating our ideas to others. Because of this, I believe the culture of science may be learned through family and members of the community, as well as ethnic and religious cultures.