046 – Activism, a Conversation with Zion Lights

This is an exceptional episode — not only because of my guest,
but also because of the fact that this episode is in English in a
generally German speaking podcast. I might make the odd exception
also in the future. Check the Tags to select English episodes.


Das ist heute ausnahmsweise eine englischsprachige Episode, es
würde mich freuen, wenn Sie dabei bleiben, andernfalls geht es in
Zukunft wieder deutschsprachig weiter. 


In todays episode I am exctited to welcome Zion Lights. Zion
Lights is a science communicator who is known for her
environmental advocacy work. She is Founder of Emergency
Reactor and author of The Ultimate Guide to Green Parenting, the
first evidence-based book of its kind. Zion is an astronomer and
she has given a TED talk on stargazing and she is the former
Editor of The Hourglass, Extinction Rebellion's print newspaper,
and a former spokesperson for the group. 


The overarching topic of this episode is activism. I talked about
activism, let's say in the footnotes of other episodes (see
references). Activism clearly plays an important role in our
world to change things — hopefully for the better, and exactly
»hopefully« is the term I am discussing with Zion.


»Soundbites are appealing to people«


What is the role of activism in our world? How can activism go
wrong — activism is (also historically) very strong on the side
of reason but increasingly also on the side of nonsense. We see
that small numbers of people can change the world — for the good
or for the worse, how can we ensure it is for the better?


»Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business and
eventually degenerates into a racket.«, Eric Hoffer


What role does science play and maybe more importantly: what is
the interaction between good science and good activism? We then
talk about naturalistic fallacies and the precautionary
principle. Finally we touch on the difficult but important
subject of risk communication.


»We have to learn to be more rational creatures, really«


What additionally fascinates me about Zion Lights: she openly
changed her mind on an important and divisive topic (nuclear
energy) as a person with significant exposure. She didn't fall
into the »ideology trap«, but constantly revisited her opinions,
continued to learn and listened to science — even though it would
have been much easier to stick to the more popular opinions in
her circle, like most of her peers did.


Other Episodes


Episode 45: Mit »Reboot« oder Rebellion aus der Krise?

Episode 39: Follow the Science

Episode 37: Probleme und Lösungen



References


Zion Lights:

Twitter @ziontree

www.zionlights.co.uk

The Ultimate Guide to Green Parenting

Sign up to the mailing list at www.emergencyreactor.org

TEDx Talk: Don't forget to look up



Andrew Neill Show

Zwentendorf nuclear powerplant 

Andrew Wakefield, The discredited doctor hailed by the
anti-vaccine movement, Nature (2020)

David MacKay, Without the hot air (2015)