Attention: The future needs you

Across the great divide:science writers are needed, says Weldon, to make sense of a changing world -and to interpret it to lay people and philosophers alike

Wanted:Science Writer to win prize. Group -16 to 19. Need not be young scientist. Could be all-rounder drifted into the arts by mistake. Or natural classicist skulking in a physics lab because Latin wasn't on the menu. Or failing in maths because as with Einstein the questions don't add up. Or falling behind in creative writing because though she can write -everyone says so -she can't make upstories, or the teacher 's nuts anyway. (The battle starts young.) Or dropped out, played out, after AS levels, and now wanting in again. Or has a whole lot of brain not necessarily measured by exams, and be getting a depressed view of himself, herself.

This option does not appear in career booklets. BASF / Daily Telegraph Science Writer, science journalist, communicator extraordinaire. Could be you. Sounds male - but fifty per cent is not, should be not.

Could be you - if you 're all round interested, prepared to find out, do the mental legwork, and pass on what you've found out to others, with rationality, verve, energy and delight. Five hundred pounds. A trip to America. One in the eye for the others. Think of it. Do it.

Wanted: Science Writer -20-28. So what happened to you? Stuck in a blind alley, chafing, more to say than anyone lets you? Or when you do they look at you blankly? Per-haps you 're really interested in how genetics shapes the world stage but somehow all you know about is the cosmos. Perhaps the interlapping of all things gets to you? Or the public's ignorance of statistics horrifies you, or lack of funding for renewable energy sources -in which case do not keep it to yourself, or bore your friends, enter this com-petition now and put your thoughts, and your knowledge(having done due research if it 's outside your normal field) and your energies on to paper.

Write, leave a day, look again, rearrange paragraphs, tidy up, and deliver. The money and trip to America may not be yours (though again, it maybe) but you've made a start. Learn from the winner, read the science columns in the few nationals that carry them (a scandal) give it a local twist and try your local paper. Your country needs you.

After decades of Two Culture thinking - (Arts that way, Science this way: never the twain shall meet), society's in a parlous state. (OK, you had to look that word up, many do: too bad: someone's got to dumb up this country - could be you.) Our scientists are unable to argue their case convincingly; our politicians unable to understand what 's going on; our media failing to take notice when it should react, because it all sounds a bit too complicated to sell papers, or going the other way and creating scare stories out of nothing.

C P Snow, the novelist, invented the Two Culture term in the Fifties. He was a novelist as well as a scientist, following in the great tradition of HG Wells, he of the great speculative mind. Wells started out as a humble student at Imperial College and went on to write Kipps , and then, baffled by the public's ignorance of scientific possibility, the The Time Machine, The War of the Worlds, and soon. The Snow debate went underground but the reality did not go away. The divide got worse. Writers of speculative novels were dismissed as producing ''science fiction ''and received no critical acclaim, finding their work downgraded to ''genre ''fiction. The extraordinary Philip K Dick -whose work is now exploited by Hollywood, in films like Blade Runner and Minority Report -was dismissed at the time for having too many ideas by half.(Even now, one of our best contemporary writers has to write under two names -Iain M.Banks for when he sets novels in the future; Iain Banks for when he's in the here and now-if he's not to hopelessly con-fuse his readers.)The elite of the present simply could not take the future seriously.

In the past 10 years science has been fighting back. A new race of science writers found anew field to work in -not fiction, but journalism, if only because fact was rapidly becoming so much stranger than fiction. See it in New Scientist , no longer the dull, dense magazine it was, but full of the pictures and head-lines and the mental space that its subject merits. But the circulation of New Scientist is a quarter what it should be. Readers trained in the humanities just look past it. It is this we are asking you to rectify.

Science leaps ahead into the new century, creating life, defying ageing, altering mood, travelling in time, miniaturising weapons -so fast turning science fiction into science fact that the powers and possibilities of the future are immense. But so are the urgent responsibilities of the here and now. Science, ''finding out ''for too long its only morality, leaves society to cope, to make ethical decisions -and society finds it hardly knows where to begin, such is its ignorance of scientific matters. All that stuff happened in another department at school, another building at college, nothing to do with ordinary folk.

Nowadays thinking moves slowly: science moves fast. Society sets up its ethical committees only to find them irrelevant by the time they've delivered. Science writers, science journalists, science popularisers, are needed to bridge the gap, to interpret the scientists to the philosophers and vice versa. Though science appears to be victorious, it is in fact in danger. New advances so baffle the outsider we see a backlash born of ignorance. Say ''cloning ''to the layperson and he thinks you 're talking about babies. Say ''genetic engineering ''and he thinks it 's something new and dangerous. Say in a headline ''a fifty per cent increase ''in a certain cancer, and he doesn't think that 0 ·3 goes up to ·45 out of 20, 000, but that we 're talking half the population. We witness an alarming, almost religious retreat into irrationality, into ''naturalism '', in which nature is seen to know best, and whose interests must be served by destroying crops, burning labs and killing doctors.' 'Nature ''becomes God, without the benefit of sacred texts, rules of conduct, or the interpretation of learned priests. Do not think that creationism or worse could not happen here.

From these dangers we look to the science writers, the communicators across the divide, to save us. Also to invoke public opinion, so that science does proceed with proper caution, with necessary checks and balances, thinking it natural to police itself, and ethics to be part of its ordinary remit, so that a hundred, two hundred, five hundred years from now we end up with a decent society half way to paradise, not slipping down into hell. It may sound a tall order, but start here, now..

Fay Weldon is the writer in residence at The Savoy

David Bradley , 1991:'' Winning for my article 'Not every sperm is sacred '(sex sells, as they say)gave me such a boost. At the time, I had written a few pieces for New Scientist and a couple of trade magazines but after that I was 'an award-winning science writer ', which gave me a lot more confidence to think seriously about becoming a professional science writer. I am now a full-time freelance having published n all the major science publications and The Daily Telegraph. I've even got a couple of book contributions under my belt now and run several webzines-www.sciencebase.com.''

Nick Flowers , 1996.''I got to join science press packs at the UK and US annual science festivals. Animal behaviourologists, sociologists and off-the-wall physicists expounded their latest theories at press conferences, and -with a press badge on my lapel -I got to bombard the labbites with my own dumb questions afterwards. A real eye opener to the world of turning science into readable journalism -and a great experience.''

Paula Gould , 1997, freelance science writer and editor, based in Chester.'' The Daily Telegraph's Science Writer competition gave me the motivation I needed to stop talking about science journalism and have a go. I gained tremendous confidence from winning and, perhaps more mportantly, my first newspaper clipping.

Elizabeth Tasker , 1999: ''The Science Writer Awards has to be one of the best competitions to enter. Entering proves that you have a talent for, and enjoy, science writing for the public -a vital asset in today's society. If you win a top prize, you will have the opportunity to meet scientists and journalists from around the world. Not only does this give you an insight into the world of journalism and science, but you will also almost definitely make very useful contacts. For me, winning marked a real start to my career. I had something on my CV which lifted it above others and enabled me to get my first studentship with the European fusion project. This started a chain which led to more student placements and, ultimately, my postgraduate place at the University of Oxford, where I am now studying for a doctorate in astrophysics.'

Lynn Dicks , 1999. ''Becoming a Science Writer was a massive boost to my career and confidence. I was studying for a PhD in ecology, which I have since completed, but I yearned to be a science journalist. Through the competition, I found myself enjoying canape´s and curries with some pivotal people n the science press. It 's far easier to make it as a writer when you know how the media functions, and you've already been published in The Daily Telegraph! I now work from home as a freelance science writer and I love it.''

Lewis Brindley, 2000, now at Manchester University studying Chemistry with Patent Law. ''Whatever you do, don't enter the awards this year. You could end up in one of the '50 places to see before you die '. I ended up in San Francisco, having to shop and picnic under the Golden Gate Bridge. Other drawbacks include meeting famous scientists and attending cutting-edge science conferences. Besides, I 'd like to win again.''

Kate Ravilious , 2000. ''I entered on a whim, probably because I was a bit bored of staring down the microscope for my PhD and wanted an excuse to have ago at something different. Writing my entry made me realise that I was much more passionate about communicating science than actually doing science! Winning gave me the confidence to have a go at science writing as a career and was a definite asset when trying to seek commissions. Now I work as a freelance science writer and feel lucky to have discovered a job that I really enjoy doing.''

04 Dec 2003