Another important post from Overcoming Bias about why it is difficult to explain things to other people.
Overcoming Bias: Expecting Short Inferential Distances
Call it “inferential distance” if you like; I like to call it “building on concepts”. We all acquire concepts when we learn things, and at the end of your academic education things look simple in your concept space which would have been incomprehensible in a different (unmolded) concept space. That is essentially what makes it so difficult to convey scientific knowledge to the public; and even for scientists of different disciplines to communicate.
As my thesis is rather interdisciplinary I have ventured into diverse scientific communities (cognitive science, biology, physics, philosophy, computer science).
I have found that the scientific/epistemic cultures in different disciplines are so alien to one another, that when I venture from one seminar into another I feel like visiting different worlds.
To me the furthering both of interdisciplinary dialogue and conveyance of scientific knowledge to the public are of paramount importance, and should be made one of the top agendas of philosophy departements.
An interesting subject would be to start building concept hierarchies: develop core concepts of scientific disciplines and relate them across disciplines.
