Okay. I'll try. I should tell you that I'm not a social scientist, although the Institute for Coastal Research, where I'm now working, is an attempt to look at coastal resource problems with an interdisciplinary approach that includes social sciences and humanities, not just natural sciences.
The point I was trying to make was that we do a lot of research and we learn things. We learn how to do a better job of salmon farming. We learn how to manage sea lice, for example, as we've been discussing.
But the real question is different; it's whether we should have salmon farming in British Columbia or not. There are people on both sides of that issue, and it does not seem to yield to scientific research. Therefore, what are the real issues? Why do people feel so strongly about this? This is where social scientists can have an impact and help us understand.
There are some questions they might answer. Why is this medium-sized industry attracting so much negative attention and what are the drivers of this? How is the industry perceived in local communities and what are the dynamics of these perceptions? What is the value to coastal communities of the jobs created by this industry? How does it compare to other industries? How do the jobs created by this industry affect community resilience?
Are there ways that the salmon farming industry could bridge the current controversies, other than waging a better PR campaign? Why are scientists frequently so strongly on one side or the other of the issue?
This is beyond the usual debate of science. Is this a common situation in natural sciences all over or is it systemic to this type of question? How do the media, the government, and the public make use of scientific discovery? How have other industries met such challenges?
Those are all questions that different branches of social science could help us with, I believe.