For Curious Grownups

"Of all the subjects of importance to society, the one most systematically neglected by American television is science." So says Michael Rice, vice president of Boston's public television station WGBH. According to a survey made at the beginning of the 1972-73 season, science programs were scheduled for fewer than 25 out of 4,368 prime-time network hours-about one-half of 1%. Further, most of the programs were not really science, but adventure-wildlife travelogues.

Commercial broadcasters have shown little interest in expanding the range of televised science programming, but WGBH is doing something about it. It has produced and, with other public television stations this season, is offering Nova, a series of innovative, hour-long shows aimed at filling the void between deadly dull "educational" lecturing and pop-science trivia.

Billed as "science adventures for curious grownups," Nova so far has looked to the skies to describe the distant Crab nebula and explain the pulsar, a kind of astronomical time clock that lies within it. The program has gone underseas for a scientific examination of dolphins and whales, resisting the temptation to Flipperize its subjects. It has even presented a fascinating inside look at the difficulties that a team of science-film makers encountered in making a nature film. Other shows will explain experiments with Washoe, a chimpanzee who has been taught to speak in sign language, and tackle the touchy subject of medical experiments on human beings.

Produced by WGBH'S Michael Ambrosino, the series was modeled on the BBC's Horizon series. It also benefits from the expertise of many leading scientists who, says Ambrosino, "are starving for the opportunity to portray science accurately." In Strange Sleep, a dramatization of the discovery of anesthesia, eminent Bostonian physicians did a remarkably credible job of acting as they portrayed their medical predecessors. Occasionally, as in The Crab Nebula, the program's accuracies are a bit too complex for laymen to follow. But for the most part the shows accomplish their purpose: to stimulate the mind of the curious grownup by raising a new question for every one that they answer.

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