Author Brian Aull has been chosen as a winner in the 2017 '50 Great Writers You Should Be Reading Book Awards'. This is the third win for Aull, the author of 'The Triad: Three Civic Virtues That Could Save American Democracy.' In his upcoming book, 'Earth, Air, Fire, and Water: Having Fun Learning Science by Debunking Pseudoscience,’ he uses a humorous story to the take the non-scientist on a tour of the world. “I want readers to have fun learning the science of everyday things,” Aull says, “such as rainbows, weather, ocean tides, the rumbling of the Earth, and the rhythms of the sun, moon, and stars.”
In the story, nineteen adventure tourists on their way to the South Pole are abducted by a group of people dressed in penguin costumes and claiming to be NASA employees. The abductors tell the tourists that the Earth is a flat disk, and that Antarctica is just an ice wall around the perimeter. The tourists are then left alone to discuss the choice being offered to them: join a vast conspiracy to keep the secret or stay as prisoners. The characters in the tour group represent many professions: a photographer, a surveyor, an airline pilot, and a meteorologist. As they tell their stories, they debunk many misconceptions about the world.
Aull’s first book, ‘The Triad,’ is about the civic virtues needed to cure the ills of our public life, the mean-spirited discourse and mindless partisanship. 'Earth, Air, Fire, and Water’ may seem like a jump to a totally new topic. “Not so,” Aull says. “To have a healthy democratic society, we need to have critical inquiry. In our political discourse, we too often choose our facts based on our opinions. We react emotionally to issues without taking enough time to investigate the truth. Then we become easy targets of manipulation. Good science education teaches us how the physical world works, but more importantly, how we test ideas about how it works,” Aull explains. “And that’s part of preparing young people to be good citizens. Even if they don’t become scientists, they learn to suspend judgment until they’ve seen all the evidence. Unfortunately, many have the misconception that science is too difficult to understand. The science community needs to do more to fix that.”
Aull spends much of his time working to fix that. A working scientist himself, he teaches engineering classes at Tufts University. “The curiosity of young minds gets excited when they see that the basic ideas of science are often simple and can be seen at play in everyday life. You can explain the shape and size of a rainbow, for example, using very simple ideas.”
Brian Aull is available for media interviews and can be reached using the information below or by email at bfaull19@gmail.com. 'The Triad' is available at Amazon. 'Earth, Air, Fire, and Water’ is expected to be published in early 2019. More information is available at his website at http://www.AwakenDemocracy.com.
About Brian Aull:
Brian Aull is from Indianapolis, Indiana. He studied electrical engineering at Purdue University and then at MIT, earning his Ph.D. in 1985. Since then, he has worked as a staff scientist at MIT developing solid-state image sensors. He is also a passionate educator, teaching electrical engineering courses at Tufts University. He spent one year as a visiting professor at the National Cheng Kung University in Taiwan.
A resident of Cambridge, Massachusetts, he is active in the local community. He served on the boards of the Cambridge Peace Commission and the Coalition for a Strong United Nations. He has taught spiritual education classes for children living in Cambridge. The Triad was inspired in part by his many conversations with residents and local activists.
Contact:
Brian Aull
bfaull19@gmail.com
http://www.AwakenDemocracy.com
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