'Understanding Science' Website clarifies what science is, is not

San Francisco - Berkeley - Psychologist Jack Block, 85, has died Positive prospects for California's green businesses, study finds Chancelllor Birgeneau announces senior-management transition plans, as Brostrom accepts UCOP position UC to cut fewer freshmen from fall 2010 enrollment NSF grant to launch world's first open-source genetic parts production facility - If you think you know what science is and how science works, think again. A new University of California, Berkeley, Web site called "Understanding Science" paints an entirely new picture of what science is and how science is done, showing it to be a dynamic and creative process rather than the linear - and frequently boring - process depicted in most textbooks. Funded by the National Science Foundation as a resource for teachers and the public, the material was vetted by historians and philosophers of science as well as by K-12 teachers and scientists from many disciplines. "Through this collaborative project, we hope to overturn the paradigm of how science is presented in our classrooms," said Roy Caldwell, a UC Berkeley professor of integrative biology who led the project along with colleague David Lindberg. "The Web site presents, not the rigid scientific method, but how science really works, including its creative and often unpredictable nature, which is more engaging to students and far less intimidating to those teachers who are less secure in their science." "Part of the fun of science is lost when you present it as a linear thing," said Natalie Kuldell, an instructor in biological engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and one of 18 scientific advisors for the project.