Philip Ball: "We still cannot be 100% sure that the Covid virus was not a leak from a laboratory."

Philip Ball (Newport, UK, 1962) has everything those of us who explain science aspire to: an unparalleled ability to communicate complex ideas in an accessible and highly creative way, masterfully weaving together scientific, philosophical, historical, and cultural concepts. His stories are always original, unique, and captivating, regardless of the subject. He's one of those writers who grabs your hand from the first line and doesn't let go until the very end. And on top of that, he tackles everything! Because, being a physicist and chemist, while he has delved into explaining how color was invented or what quantum physics is, he has also ventured into the history of China or the construction of cathedrals.

That's why he is recognized—and rightly so—as one of the best and most influential science communicators today. In addition to writing books, he collaborates with media outlets such as The New York Times, The Guardian, waveBBC. And he is extremely prolific: last year he published How life Works: In User's Guide to the New BiologyA fascinating, nearly 600-page manual, still untranslated, for understanding the foundations of life and the revolution biology is undergoing as a discipline. And just before traveling to Barcelona, ​​he sent his editor a new manuscript, this time a biography of the Danish physicist Niels Bohr.

Ball, who worked for nearly twenty years as editor of the prestigious scientific journal NatureThis week, he was recognized with the Nat Prize, awarded for the past eight years by the Barcelona Museum of Natural Sciences to individuals or institutions that have been leading figures in their approach to and explanation of science. The ceremony, held on Tuesday in the Greenhouse of Ciutadella Park, kicked off the 4th edition of the City and Science Biennial, which is being held simultaneously in Barcelona and Madrid until November 23, and which will move to Mexico from November 29 to December 7.

He has written more than 30 books. Could you remember their titles?

— [Laughs] I wouldn't put my hand in the fire.

He's very prolific!

— Well, I'm a writer, and I have the time to dedicate to it. Although I also write more journalistic articles, books are a way for me to delve deeper into topics that interest me and a way to figure out what I think about a subject. For example, with my last book on modern biology, I felt we needed a new narrative to talk about it, but I wasn't sure what that narrative was until I wrote it.

He takes many risks. As a physicist and chemist, he tackles the history of China, how color was invented, or how cathedrals are built.

— Delving into an area that is not only outside my own expertise but also outside the realm of science is risky, and I certainly try to approach it with humility, knowing that I am not an expert in the field. But what I have discovered is that people feel that this outside voice can offer a perspective that isn't necessarily obvious to true specialists. It's also true, for example, that the book on cathedrals was really about the early development of ways of thinking about the universe as a place that has rules, that operates according to principles we can understand, and that isn't simply governed by the whims of God. This was an idea the Greeks already believed in, but in Western Europe, this idea resurfaced in the 12th and 13th centuries, in the Middle Ages. And it was the perspective I wanted to offer to help understand what cathedrals themselves are: an expression of that idea.

It is paradoxical how some of the things we stopped believing centuries ago, such as the Earth being flat, have now returned, in an era in which we have unlimited access to information and knowledge.

— Because now it's so easy to find a story online or on social media that fits with what you want to believe, in a way that wasn't even possible twenty years ago. This creates new challenges for disseminating scientific knowledge. It's clear that bombarding people with data, thinking that this will give them the right ideas, doesn't work. Because it's much more complex, obviously. First, it's necessary to understand why people believe the things they believe, what values underlie them. And it's from this perspective that the questions that interest me most arise: how science is received by the rest of society, by culture in general; how it's interpreted, and how the two interact. Understanding this process is essential.

As?

— Integrating science into the broader culture so that it doesn't seem like scientists are coming to lecture you about what's right, but rather it feels more like a dialogue and an interaction.

During the Covid pandemic, this dialogue between science and society did not quite work.

— We really knew nothing about that virus when the pandemic broke out. COVID allowed us to see in real time how science works, to understand that it is provisional, and that we must be able to change our ideas when new information emerges.

The vaccines generated a lot of mistrust.

— The question people were asking was entirely understandable and a necessary one: Are they safe? Because they were developed so quickly, when no other vaccine had been developed before. Some even used this new mRNA technology. Why should we trust them? In that case, it was really important for scientists to acknowledge that this was a valid question, and that they should accept it and provide some answers. Because there were some answers: they had to explain that the vaccines hadn't been rushed and done haphazardly, but that proper trials had been conducted, albeit more quickly than would normally be the case, simply because so much money was invested that pharmaceutical companies could afford it. They were subsidized, supported by governments, which allowed them to do things in parallel that they would normally do sequentially, one after the other, because otherwise it would be too financially risky. What no one foresaw was the extent to which everything would become politicized during the pandemic. The decisions being made reflected a fundamental tension in democracies: how much of our individual freedoms should we be willing to sacrifice for the good of society?

Part of society was drawn to conspiracy theories, such as the claim that the virus had been created in a laboratory in China.

— It's a reasonable question. In fact, we still can't be 100% sure it wasn't a leak from a lab, whether intentional or accidental. And it's important to acknowledge that, but also to accept the evidence as it emerges. Then there were governments, like Trump's, that fueled narratives that contradict the scientific evidence.

How are they now trying to link paracetamol during pregnancy and autism?

— It's absolutely insane. The link between autism and paracetamol is based on conspiracy theories.The real problem is that the system has been captured by this way of thinking, and now the people at the helm of the National Institutes of Health are even willing to accept this conspiracy. The Trump administration has gone far beyond the bounds of any rational argument. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has publicly stated that they will find the evidence to support their viewpoint; he has claimed that they will conduct a study that will lead them to this conclusion. It is the antithesis of science! And a monumental challenge in science communication, one we have never faced before, in the age of social media and the viral spread of misinformation.

In addition, there is also scientific malpractice: researchers who manipulate results to publish in scientific journals. He was an editor at Nature for 20 years and should come across fraudulent articles.

— There is a real structural problem in the way science is done, although I don't think this is undermining good research in any way. In fact, many times these flawed or fraudulent studies are discovered quite quickly, which shows that the scientific system is working as it should. But it is true that this pressure to publish in high-profile journals can push some researchers to engage in malpractice. And I can say that, having worked as an editor in Nature, There is no guarantee that publishing in this journal means your work is better than anyone else's. The scientific community needs to change its evaluation system, especially so that researchers at the beginning of their careers don't feel this pressure to publish immediately. I've met young scientists who lament that they don't have time to think. What a crazy situation this is for science—not having time to think because you have to do the next experiment and publish it! I'm sure most scientists would say they wish it weren't like this, that they want to change it, and yet nobody ever does anything because everyone is part of it and has to play this game.

Some scientists publish more than 50 studies a year.

— It's impossible to do it perfectly. No one can make that many significant discoveries in a single year. Even doing top-notch work, you might find half a dozen things that are truly worth publishing and that will really make a difference. This is what used to happen and should continue to happen. But if you have a near-automated system for rewarding these high-profile publications, this is the result.

She is visiting Barcelona to receive the Nat Prize and also to participate in the City and Science Biennial, which this year focuses on quantum physics. She has spoken about how to better communicate what this discipline is.

— What quantum mechanics tells us about how the world works really goes against intuition. That's why many people think they don't understand it, because they feel they should have some intuition about how it works. "How can things be this way? It doesn't seem to make sense." In fact, one of the pioneers of quantum theory, the Danish physicist Niels Bohr, said that if you're not surprised when you start learning about quantum mechanics, then you haven't understood anything!

Do you think there is some hype surrounding quantum physics these days?

— There's exaggeration, yes, certainly. People and books tell us that quantum computers will solve climate change, medicine, everything. While quantum computing is real, the quantum computers we have are still prototypes and, for the moment, haven't solved any computational task that can't be done with a classical computer. Therefore, in this sense, quantum computing is still in its infancy. And in the future, when they are more mature, the problems they can solve are limited. There's no reason to assume that they will one day replace classical computers, nor to think that we'll never have a quantum laptop or a quantum mobile phone.

What book are you working on now?

— Just last week I sent the publisher a draft of a biography of the Danish physicist Niels Bohr. Through his life, I attempt to recount the creation of modern physics. Bohr was born at the end of the 19th century and was one of the key figures in the early development of quantum mechanics, this total revolution in the way we think about reality. He had many friendly discussions about it with Einstein. Bohr was also involved in the early days of nuclear physics, and his work was fundamental in understanding how to translate the 1938 discovery of nuclear fission into a practical technology, for better or for worse, whether it was nuclear energy or nuclear weapons. He had to flee Nazi-occupied Denmark, and by the time he arrived at Los Alamos in the US, the atomic bomb had already been developed. He didn't actually participate in its creation, but he recognized how profoundly it would transform international relations. He was instrumental in the international negotiations and debates on arms control after World War II. And he was one of the key figures in the creation of CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, where particle physics is now conducted and major discoveries have been made. So he witnessed physics transition from the 19th century into the modern era of big-time physics and particle physics at CERN. And this is the story I try to tell through Niels Bohr.