Patrick Middleton describes a new initiative
 
Next year, 2009, the world will be celebrating Darwin’s bicentenary. It will also be 150 years since the publication of his most famous work, On the Origin of Species.

As this landmark year approaches, we can look forward to hearing a lot about Darwin. Much will be a historical look at his life and work. Indeed, a quick search on the Internet reveals countless Darwin sites. Some, which look at evolution in more recent times, tend to focus on Darwin’s unfortunate, and unwarranted, association with movements such as Galton’s eugenics in the 1860s or the Nazism of last century. But very few, if any, report on his legacy for modern research. Even fewer will give the public the opportunity to engage in a dialogue about what they understand and would like to explore about Darwin’s ideas and contemporary research.

Opportunity to engage

This lack of information about the relevance of evolution in today’s world belies the simple fact that Darwin’s theories are being studied, tweaked and applied in a vast array of research, and not just biology. Research projects spanning subjects as varied as understanding complex social interactions and language, conservation and art all draw heavily on Darwin’s thinking.

The fact that there is a clear under-representation of websites focused on evolution’s importance to modern society, culture and science, suggests there is little public appreciation of the contemporary importance of Darwin’s theories. Darwin Year obviously presents a great opportunity to capitalise on the anticipated interest in all things Darwin to really engage the public in evolution research, and perhaps go some way to redressing this imbalance.

The UK’s Research Councils, working together under their partnership, RCUK, are in a unique position to pick up this challenge. Not only do they collectively fund a massive amount of evolution research, they also fund work right across the country. 

New website

With this in mind, RCUK will run a public engagement programme of activities that aims to reach across the UK by facilitating a range of local projects throughout England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

The diversity of evolution research presents a problem: how is this vast and disparate body of contemporary work best communicated? RCUK has recently setup a website, Darwin Today – www.darwin.rcuk.ac.uk – which showcases modern research and actively invites visitors to get involved in discussions. Topics focusing on particular subject areas are published monthly and come packaged with video podcasts, magazine style articles and discussion facilities. The stream of new content and the interactive nature of the site are all designed to maximise the dialogue between the researchers and the public.

The topics have been chosen to span the range of research areas in which evolutionary theory features and include: Evolution and Society; Humans – how are we affecting other species?; Directed Evolution; and The Evolution of Resistance. Future topics will feature work on the application of Darwin’s theories to robotics and art. 

Shaping engagement

While Darwin Today will hopefully engage visitors in modern, cutting-edge research, it will also serve a second, perhaps more important, role: that of influencing the public engagement activities that RCUK is planning in 2009. There is, of course, limited gain in telling people how important Darwin’s theories are if those people aren’t engaged in the subject. The Darwin Today site aims to start a conversation with the UK public and find out what people know about, think about and what interests or puzzles them about evolution. This conversation will shape RCUK’s Darwin Year public engagement programme.

By basing its engagement activities on the discussions generated online, RCUK should have two advantages. First, and most simply, the ability of visitors to ask their own questions should provide a wealth of ideas for projects. Second, the avenues the discussions take will allow RCUK to adopt an effective approach to a subject by designing activities that enlarge on the public’s interests. For instance, discussions might concentrate on the ethics of directed evolution and barely touch on its applications. Knowing this will allow RCUK to develop an engaging activity that draws people in to explore all facets of the subject.

2009 is an ideal and timely opportunity to use the publicity of Darwin Year to engage and enthuse people about Darwin’s theories and their importance to today’s science, society and art. The nature of RCUK’s engagement activities will be shaped by those it is aimed at.

See also www.darwin.rcuk.ac.uk and www.rcuk.ac.uk
 
Dr Patrick Middleton is Head of Public Engagement at BBSRC