For its first edition, it is an honour for Science & You to be endorsed by three great names in French science: Brigitte Kieffer, Etienne Klein and Cédric Villani. Three professors, three different disciplines, but a shared engagement in drawing society closer to science, and vice-versa.
A world-famous neurobiologist, Brigitte Kieffer studies the mechanisms involved in drug addiction, pain and mental illness. Her findings earned her the L’Oréal-Unesco Award in 2014. This honour has made her a recognised voice in the media on the subject of the representation of women in science. She speaks out against the difficulties that aspiring female researchers have to face, and uses the example of her own motivation as a ticket to success.
Etienne Klein is a physicist, but also a radio presenter, essayist, philosopher and teacher. He does science and talks about it, as can be seen in his contribution to the designing of the LHC (Large Hadron Collider) and his impressive bibliography. With him, physics no longer hides behind abstruse formulas, but opens up to the general public through anecdotes about discoveries. Deeply involved in questions of science and society, he particularly calls on scientists to get more involved in communication, and on the general public to “make an effort to transform the right to know into a desire for knowledge”.
In 2010, Cédric Villani was awarded the prestigious Fields Medal, the “Mathematicians’ Nobel Prize”. As with physics, maths is not the most popular of disciplines. And yet Cédric Villani fills the lecture halls. He campaigns actively to give people a taste for maths, or restore it, through giving conferences for the general public and making himself available to the media. He highlights the lack of public figures of scientists and explains how he got involved: “It wasn’t inborn, but there was a role of representative to be filled. People expected it of me.” And the public asks for more.
Watch the interview of Cédric Villani and Etienne Klein:
Discover a fine portrait (in French) of Etienne Klein on Universcience.tv.