Earlier in the year we ran a competition, with the help of New Scientist, for you to suggest your favourite questions ever asked in I’m a Scientist. Many great questions were put forward and our judges had a hard time choosing the winners. But now, for your delight and delectation, here they are!
Winner
Tom Hartley – for suggesting ‘Which do you think is more important, sending people into space, or developing new cures for diseases here on earth?’
We loved this question, and the scientists’ thoughtful answers, because it goes to the heart of why we do I’m a Scientist. We hope that it prompts students (and perhaps even the scientists!) to think more about big questions like ‘how do we decide what science to fund?’, and realise that the answers are rarely black and white. Budgets are always finite, and deciding what gets funded and what doesn’t isn’t simple. Partly because we don’t know what research will be successful. But also because, as caragh26 highlights with this question, we have to weigh different values against each other.
Runners up
A fantastic and imaginative question which pretty much had the scientists stumped.
Kiana Bowden - for suggesting ‘Do you travel around a lot to work with other scientists as part of your job?’
We had a give a prize to Kiana for her essay-length explanation of how this question, or rather the answers, had really changed her view of scientists.
Drew Rae – for suggesting ‘How many elephants does it take to fill the suface area of the moon?’
I don’t need to explain this one do I?
Emily Robinson – for suggesting ‘If iron is magnetic and we have iron in our blood, does that mean we’re magnetic?’
A great question that shows the student thinking like a true scientist. And it has the X-men in the answers.
Prizes
All our worthy winners will be getting a Wellcome Trust bag containing goodies in the form of Last Word books from New Scientist, ‘Why does E=MC2?’ book by Brian Cox & Jeff Forshaw, provided by the Institute of Physics, IoP pens and toys. All just in time for Christmas.
None of you are allowed to give your prizes away as Christmas presents though. You must keep them forever.
Thanks to all our competition entrants, and of course to the thousands of fantastic students who’ve asked amazing questions in I’m a Scientist over the years. And the hundreds of scientists who’ve answered them.
