jnmaciuch
Senior Member (Voting Rights)
Since we have such a lovely millieu of well-informed folks with a wide variety of background knowledge, I thought it might be useful to have a thread where people could ask conceptual questions and expect that the answers will be as easy to understand as possible.
I'm very passionate about making science more accessible (and chatting about science until people get annoyed with me) so I think it would be a lovely resource, but I wanted to get some feedback about whether others think it would actually be useful/how it could best be implemented.
I've tried to do a search but couldn't confirm if a similar resource already exists on here--please feel free to direct me to it if that's the case.
The name comes from the (somewhat condescendingly named) "Explain Like I'm 5" reddit phenomenon. I think it's really vital for people to feel like they have permission to ask seemingly "silly" questions, because in reality nothing is a silly question and there should be no shame in asking for an easier explanation!
I'm sure we all have a long list of "things we should probably learn about" (I know I do) but it can be incredibly difficult to get over the hurdle of starting to look into something when you're totally out of your depth.
It's even more difficult when you feel like it's something you should know by now, but have been embarrassed to ask for it to be broken down to the level you need.
Not to mention the fact that pwME have barriers to accessing high-level educational spaces, and that most resources on the internet may not be accessible when someone is dealing with brain fog and fatigue.
Ergo, "explain like I have brain fog." A shame-free thread to ask other smart people to explain things to your (smart) self in a simple way.
Here's an outline of what I envision:
General guidelines:
I'm very passionate about making science more accessible (and chatting about science until people get annoyed with me) so I think it would be a lovely resource, but I wanted to get some feedback about whether others think it would actually be useful/how it could best be implemented.
I've tried to do a search but couldn't confirm if a similar resource already exists on here--please feel free to direct me to it if that's the case.
The name comes from the (somewhat condescendingly named) "Explain Like I'm 5" reddit phenomenon. I think it's really vital for people to feel like they have permission to ask seemingly "silly" questions, because in reality nothing is a silly question and there should be no shame in asking for an easier explanation!
I'm sure we all have a long list of "things we should probably learn about" (I know I do) but it can be incredibly difficult to get over the hurdle of starting to look into something when you're totally out of your depth.
It's even more difficult when you feel like it's something you should know by now, but have been embarrassed to ask for it to be broken down to the level you need.
Not to mention the fact that pwME have barriers to accessing high-level educational spaces, and that most resources on the internet may not be accessible when someone is dealing with brain fog and fatigue.
Ergo, "explain like I have brain fog." A shame-free thread to ask other smart people to explain things to your (smart) self in a simple way.
Here's an outline of what I envision:
General guidelines:
- Specific questions will generally be easier to answer. If you want to learn about a general topic (e.g. B cells), it might help to start with a specific question (e.g. "How are B cells related to antibodies?" or "What makes B cells different from T cells?") and go from there.
- [Edit: if you have trouble narrowing down a question, you could also ask something along the lines of "give me a simplified 2 sentence encyclopedia entry for B cells" to start the conversation]
- Like the title of the thread implies, try to keep explanations as simple (and concise) as possible. This might not always be possible if the question is complex, but responders are welcome to state that a simple explanation is not possible, and prompt for a more specific bite-size question.
- Links to other resources for continued learning are welcome, but should always be preceded by an attempt at a simple explanation. Just dropping a link to an article/video/etc. defeats the purpose of the thread.
- You don't have to be an expert to answer a question! Trying to explain a topic to others is also really useful for learning. If someone feels reasonably confident about the answer, they're welcome to chime in (perhaps just with appropriate heads up that they might not be 100% confident in the answer).
Last edited: