Chris Wiggins: Science is social

I had the pleasure of watching my friend and professor of applied physics and applied math Chris Wiggins give an excellent short talk at NYC’s social media week at Google. The video is available here: http://livestre.am/BUDx.

Chris makes the often forgotten point that science is inherently social. If discoveries aren’t publicly communicated, and hence added to our stock of knowledge, it isn’t science. He notes reproducibility as a manifestation of this openness in communication. (As another example of openness, Karl Popper suggested that if you’re interested in working in an international community, become a scientist.) Chris showcases many new web-based sharing tools and how they augment our fundamental norms, rather than changing them, hence his disagreement with the title of the session “Research Gone Social” in the sense that science has always been social.