Please note that all views and opinions expressed in the following article are my own and do not reflect the views of my employer.

The "trial of the century" occurs roughly 2 to 3 times every few years. These courtroom trials are subject to substantial national media coverage, often dominating entire news cycles. But what makes for a good "trial of the century"? Although certainly not the only factor, these trials frequently focus on issues beyond the courtroom, spilling into the greater sociocultural issues that are central to the so-called "culture wars."

The first trial of the century, in the modern sense, began on July 10th, 1925. Formally, the case is known as The State of Tennessee v. John Thomas Scopes. You may know this trial by a different name: the "Scopes Monkey Trial," as it was likely referred to in your high school US history textbooks. The defendant was high school teacher John Scopes for teaching human evolution in violation of Tennessee law. Held in Dayton, TN -- a rural town 130 miles southeast of Nashville, TN -- this demure trial of a school teacher involved the ACLU, a 3-time presidential candidate, one of the most famous litigators of the 20th century, regular front-page coverage by major newspapers, including The New York Times. It was also the first trial to be broadcast over the radio and featured a performing chimpanzee. A bit much for a misdemeanor offense, right?

As an evolutionary biologist with strong ties to the state of Tennessee, having received my PhD at the University of Tennessee and currently holding a position at Vanderbilt University, I see the Scopes Trial as highly relevant to today. I think you should, too. The Scopes Trial reflected issues beyond the teaching of evolution in schools. It was about academic freedom. It was about the modernization of society. It was about who should get a say in what is morally "correct" in American society and culture. Sound familiar? Indeed, many of the deeper issues central to the Scopes Trial are, unfortunately, but unsurprisingly, still prevalent today.

The Scopes Trial ultimately reflected the growing tensions among Americans created by key cultural divides, including urban vs. rural, elitist vs. populist, and North vs. South. Many historians have analyzed the Scopes Trial through the lens of Christian fundamentalism vs. modernism, represented by religion and science, respectively. I encourage you (the reader) to keep in mind that these conflict-oriented descriptions oversimplify the nuanced socioeconomic, cultural, and political factors that shaped historical events. This perhaps makes it easier to write about and often makes for a more compelling story. I will do my best, as neither a historian nor a social scientist, to give a nuanced description of the Scopes Trial, the events leading up to it, and the participants.

I also want to be clear about one thing before diving into the context of the trial. My intent is not to be critical of Christians, Christianity, or religion, in general. Unlike some of the most prominent public voices in evolutionary biology, I take little issue with the concepts of personal faith and religion. My teenage and college years were spent trying to find my faith and reconciling this with my understanding of science. In college, I spoke with many scientists who struggled with this challenge.

I never found my faith, but the conversations I had with scientists who did were enlightening. Particularly revealing to me was their ability to interpret their religion's text as both spiritual and metaphorical: the stories contained within it were not to be taken literally, in their view. These conversations illustrated to me that the scientists could reconcile their faith with science. On the subject of evolution, they often viewed God as the Creator of the natural processes that drive evolution, termed "theistic evolution" or "evolutionary creationism." In their view, this does not undermine the uniqueness of humans, which they believe have a soul. Science is meant to deal with the natural, not the supernatural; therefore, science cannot say this isn't the case, no more than it can say it is the case.

The emergence of fundamentalism in the early 20th century
Christian fundamentalism was initially a religious movement rooted in American Protestantism that arose in the early 20th century. The late 19th and early 20th centuries saw the rise of Protestant liberalism, which sought to interpret the Bible in the context of modern science, literary critique, and the social sciences. This included embracing the ideas of evolutionary theory. Essentially, their goal was to keep Protestantism relevant for a changing American society. These were the original "modernists." Protestant liberalism held that the Bible was a human document that need not be taken literally, but still held spiritual value.

Naturally, more conservative Protestants saw this as an attack on the heart of their religion, particularly the interpretation of the Bible as the literal word of God. Thus, fundamentalism emerged in response to the modernist movement occurring within Protestantism. The term "fundamentalist" came from a series of 90 essays titled The Fundamentals, published in a series of pamphlets from 1905 to 1915. If the title has not already given it away, the goal of these was to define the new fundamentals of Christianity, one centered on the idea that the Bible is the literal word of God.

A key moment in the fundamentalist movement was World War 1. Many fundamentalists believed evolutionary theory (specifically, Darwinism and its "survival of the fittest" mentality) contributed to German militarism. Many fundamentalists took issue with Darwinism on two fronts. First, the Darwinian view of organic evolution conflicted with the literal interpretations of the Bible. Early fundamentalists were not strictly anti-evolution. Editor of The Fundamentals, R.A. Torrey, argued a Christian could "believe thoroughly in the absolute infallibility of the Bible and still be an evolutionist of a certain type," (Larson, 2008). Indeed, geologist, Oberlin College professor, and contributor to The Fundamentals George Frederick Wright believed (by the end of his career) that evolution of species could occur through divine intervention. The Darwinian concept of evolution via random variation and natural selection troubled many of the conservative Christians, as this would (in their view) undermine the uniqueness of human existence and the value of a spiritual life.

Second, many fundamentalists took issue with the application of Darwinism to society. The idea of Social Darwinism was originally developed by sociologist Herbert Spencer, who initially coined the phrase "survival of the fittest." It was this mentality that fundamentalists associated with German militarism of World War 1. Social Darwinism naturally gave rise to the idea of eugenics, which was the study of improving the human race through "better heredity." As this was the early 20th century, I will allow you to surmise what "better heredity" meant. Many fundamentalists were correctly critical of the eugenics movement, which I am embarrassed to say was linked with many prominent evolutionary theorists of the early 20th century (more on this topic in a later essay). Although Darwinism and eugenics are not the same thing, they were closely linked in the eyes of the public. Note that this opposition to eugenics inherently has populist undertones: naturally, members of the "elite" – with their supposedly better genetics -- would be more favorable of eugenics. Fundamentalists believed modernists were destined to lead the U.S. down the same path as the Germans.

It was around this time that fundamentalism began to transition from a religious to a social and political movement. Many leading fundamentalists during this period believed the Church should have a say in politics. The World Christian Fundamental Association (WCFA) was founded by William B. Riley in 1918. Having successfully lobbied for prohibition, the WCFA turned its sights on Darwinism, prompted by a 1921 Kentucky resolution to ban the teaching of evolution in schools. Some fundamentalists couched their opposition to Darwinism in schools on parental rights grounds; Riley took a less subtle approach, accusing proponents of evolutionary theory of sowing "anarchistic socialistic propaganda" and later (in the 1930s) warning of a "Jewish-Bolshevik-Darwinist conspiracy" (Larson, 2008). He would have done quite well in today's media environment.

Riley was certainly among the most prominent fundamentalists of the early 20th century. However, more directly important to the Scopes Trial was William Jennings Bryan. Bryan was a 3-time presidential nominee and the Secretary of State during the Wilson administration. Bryan was an ardent populist and a faithful Christian, both of which shaped his opposition to Darwinism. As early as 1904, Bryan declared Darwinism would lead Americans to "lose the consciousness of God's presence in [their] daily life" (Larson, 2008). As he became more active in opposing Darwinism in public school, Bryan leaned on his populist instincts: "Teachers in public schools must teach what the taxpayers desire taught." Bryan would often exaggerate or make up statistics to support his views, e.g., he claimed 9/10ths of Christians shared his views on evolution (Larson, 2008).

A common line of attack from Christian fundamentalist was, in their view, the harmful role of higher education in the secularization of American society. They often attacked educators as trying to indoctrinate children. An early example of this was the conflict between Bryan and the University of Wisconsin-Madison president Edward Asahel Birge. In 1921, Bryan spoke at Wisconsin-Madison on the dangers of teaching Darwinism, which was strongly rebuked by Birge. Bryan demanded that the university's professors stop teaching evolution. Bryan, ever the populist, did not believe individual rights should prevail over the desires of the majority (Larson, 2008).

In response, Birge argued convincingly for the importance of academic freedom in higher education, arguing that this was an essential aspect of a quality education. With the support of the faculty and Wisconsinites, no changes were made at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Similar public conflicts between fundamentalism and educators, including those that led to civil trials, occurred across the country. With growing tensions between fundamentalists and modernists, Ohio State University professor and president of the American Association of University Professors Joseph Villiers Denney called fundamentalism "the most sinister force that has yet attacked freedom of teaching" (Cain, 2012).

The foundation for the Scopes Trial was the passage of the Butler Act by the Tennessee state legislature on March 21st, 1925. This 5-page resolution was written by State Representative John Washington Butler. Butler would tell The New York Times after the trial, "I didn't know anything about evolution ... I'd read in the papers that boys and girls were coming home from school and telling their fathers and mothers that the Bible was all nonsense." The Butler Act simply stated that "it shall be unlawful…to teach any theory that denies the story of the Divine creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to teach instead that man descended from a lower order of animals." The Butler Act was signed into law by Governor Austin Peay as a virtue signal to his rural constituents, never thinking the Butler Act would seriously be enforced. Although Tennessee was not the first state to pass an anti-evolution law, it would become the most consequential.

The lead-up to the trial
The circus surrounding the Scopes Trial was by no means organic. As Pulitzer Prize winner Edward Larson put it, "Like so many archetypal American events, the trial itself began as a publicity stunt" (Larson, 2008). The ACLU essentially dared Tennessee public officials to enforce the law, with the promise to defend anyone charged with teaching evolution on the grounds of violation of freedom of speech. A few individuals in Dayton, TN, saw this as an opportunity to embrace America's capitalistic spirit by bringing publicity to the small, rural town. They recruited Scopes, who was filling in for the school's regular biology teacher. Scopes could not recall if he taught human evolution. Despite the passing of the Butler Act, evolution was discussed in the state-mandated biology textbook for high schoolers, so it was certainly possible. Regardless of what Scopes taught, he coached his students to testify that he taught human evolution. On May 5th, 1925, Scopes was charged and indicted for teaching human evolution 20 days later.

The circumstances surrounding the case escalated when Bryan accepted the opportunity to serve as a special prosecutor for the state, despite having not tried a case in over 3 decades. In response, the ACLU and defense team sought someone of equal public stature to counter Bryan. Clarence Darrow, among the most prominent litigators of the 20th century, volunteered his services, later saying he "realized there was no limit to the mischief that might be accomplished unless the country was aroused to the evil at hand." This would be Darrow's second "trial of the century" in as many years, having previously served as defense attorney in the trial of Nathan Leopold Jr. and Richard Loeb a year prior. Darrow was a leading member of the ACLU, a former labor lawyer, and a staunch civil libertarian. He was also a known agnostic, a fact that made the ACLU hesitant to involve him in the trial, believing it would shift the public focus of the trial away from free speech and academic freedom. They would be right. The trial became not just about the teaching of evolution in schools, but evolution as a symbol of modernizing society.

With the involvement of Bryan and Darrow combined with the broad-reaching cultural divide at its center, the intrigue of the case could not be ignored by the media. Over 200 reporters (including 2 from London, England) flocked to Dayton to cover the trial. It was during this time that the journalist H.L. Mencken, writing for The Baltimore Sun, labeled the trial as the Scopes "Monkey" Trial (Harrison, 1994).

The Climax: Darrow calls Bryan to the stand
Due to Judge John T. Raulston forbidding 7 of the 8 expert witnesses assembled by Darrow's team from testifying during the trial, the defense ran out of witnesses by the 6th day of the trial. But on the 7th day, Darrow did not rest. Instead, he called Bryan to the stand as an expert witness on the Bible. Darrow took the advice bestowed upon him earlier by Mencken (Harrison, 1994): "Nobody gives a damn about that yap schoolteacher. The thing to do is make a fool out of Bryan."

With the large crowd of media and members of the public crowding the courtroom, Judge Raulston moved the trial outside of the courthouse. Bryan agreed to be a witness under the assumption that he would get the chance to question Darrow. With Bryan on the witness stand, Darrow questioned him on his interpretations of Biblical events and stories (Bryan refused to call them "interpretations") in the sweltering Tennessee summer heat. The temperature on that day appropriately matched the exchange between these 2 master orators, both self-assured in their correctness and righteousness. In other words...it got pretty heated.

Darrow's strategy was not to give Bryan a chance to proselytize about Darwinism, avoiding any questions specific to evolution. Darrow opened with a simple line (p. 284-285) of questioning to establish Bryan's belief in the Bible.

Darrow: "You have given considerable study to the Bible haven't you, Mr. Bryan?"

Bryan: "Yes, sir, I have tried to."

…

Darrow: "Do you claim that everything in the Bible should be literally interpreted?"

Bryan: "I believe everything in the Bible should be accepted as it is given there; some of the Bible is given illustratively…"

Darrow pressed Bryan to explain numerous aspects of the Bible, if it were to be taken literally, for nearly 2 hours. This included the story of the large fish or whale (a minor point they quibbled about) that swallowed Jonah and the Tower of Babel, which supposedly explained the existence of different languages. In many cases, Darrow was able to get Bryan to admit that some descriptions in the Bible did not need to be taken literally, such as the Earth did not have to be created in 6 24-hour days.

Their back-and-forth was often confrontational, but these moments best exemplified the broader implications of the Scopes Trial, bringing to the forefront a cultural divide. Scopes was hardly relevant during Bryan's testimony. Whatever pretense remained that this trial was about Scopes was thrown out the window.

For me, two telling moments put on full display the cultural divide that had emerged in the U.S. First, with Darrow grilling Bryan on the exact age of the Earth according to the Bible and if that agreed with scientific evidence, an objection from the prosecution team led to the following exchange (p. 299):

Bryan: "The purpose is to cast ridicule on everybody who believes in the Bible, and I am perfectly willing that the world shall know that these gentlemen have no other purpose than ridiculing every Christian who believes in the Bible."

Darrow: "We have the purpose of preventing bigots and ignoramuses from controlling the education of the United States and you know it, and that is all."

Second, following Darrow's questions (p. 304) about the story of Creation in the Book of Genesis:

Bryan: "Your honor, I think I can shorten this testimony. The only purpose Mr. Darrow has is to slur at the Bible, but I will answer his question. I will answer it all at once, and I have no objection in the world, I want the world to know that this man, who does not believe in a God, is trying to use a court in Tennessee to slur at it, and while it will require time, I am willing to take it."

Darrow: "I object to your statement. I am exempting you on your fool ideas that no intelligent Christian on earth believes."

And with that, the court was adjourned for the day.

The next morning, Judge Raulston struck Bryan's testimony from the record. With that, Darrow entered a guilty plea, arguing that it would save the court time on a result that seems inevitable, as the defense was unable to prove John T. Scopes did not teach evolution. Because of (a) the expunging of the record of Bryan's testimony and (b) the entering of a guilty plea and skipping their final summation, Bryan was unable to question Darrow as a witness and was not allowed to give his prepared final summation. The jury deliberated for 9 minutes and returned with a guilty verdict. John T. Scopes was convicted of violating the Butler Act and was made to pay the minimum fine of $100. His conviction was overturned a year later by the Tennessee Supreme Court on a technicality.

The aftermath of the Scopes Trial and the broader implications for education, society, and politics
Historians contest the direct impact of the Scopes Trial. Some view it as the cause of many subsequent events. Others view it as a major event, possibly even an inflection point, in an ongoing culture war. In my reading and (amateur) analysis of various sources, I lean towards the latter. Regardless, the Scopes Trial brought national attention to a growing cultural divide among Americans.

A common argument is that fundamentalists retreated into themselves following the Scopes Trial, humiliated by Darrow's examination of Bryan. Journalists such as Mencken pushed this narrative, portraying Bryan and the townspeople of Dayton as anti-intellectual, backwards "yokels." It was further popularized by the 1960 movie Inherit the Wind, a dramatization of the trial that served as a parable for McCarthyism. In this movie, the character serving as a proxy for Bryan was a caricature, a simpleton lacking basic curiosity. In the final moments of his testimony, Bryan was laughed off the stand as he raved and ranted, shouting quotes from the Bible as Darrow (or rather, his proxy) mocked him. In transcripts of the actual trial, there was plenty of laughter after Bryan spoke, but not at his expense; rather, the crowd laughed and applauded his gibes at Darrow (p. 291).

In contrast to some of the myths popularized by the media, fundamentalists felt emboldened immediately following the trial. After all, they won. Despite the overturning of Scopes' conviction, the Tennessee Supreme Court upheld the Butler Act as constitutional. Fundamentalists were by no means done, but had only mixed success. Many states attempted to pass anti-evolution bills, but only Mississippi (in 1926) and Arkansas (in 1928) were successful. These laws stayed on the books for roughly the next 40 years; however, they were hardly enforced.

Fundamentalists were also somewhat successful in pressuring textbook publishers to remove or downplay the role of evolution. This pressure on publishers pre-dated the Scopes Trial, but given the public attention of the trial, it was likely amplified. For example, Texas Governor Miriam Ferguson ordered all sections discussing evolution physically cut from the state's high school textbooks. Specifically, she justified her decision by alluding to both her religion and her parenthood (Moore, 2001): "I'm a Christian mother who believes Jesus Christ died to save humanity, and I am not going to let that kind of rot go into Texas textbooks." Many other states followed suit, forcing publishers to make alterations to appease these specific states.

However, even changes to textbooks were not quite a resounding win for the fundamentalists. As argued by Aaron Shapiro in Trying Biology (Shapiro, 2013), many updated textbooks simply replaced the word "evolution" with a similar word (e.g., "development"), keeping many of the core concepts. In effect, many students were still learning about evolution. This pre-computer find-and-replace approach seemed to be adequate for those opposed to teaching evolution in public schools and universities. I often do a similar verbal sleight-of-hand when explaining my research to people outside of academia. I'm certainly not the only one. The word “evolution” is polarizing; many of the concepts (mutation, variation, etc.) are not.

The relevance of the Scopes Trial for modern-day researchers and educators
It is not difficult to find parallels between the time of the Scopes Trial and modern-day cultural issues, and how these issues shaped politics following the common political pundit trope of "politics is downstream of culture." As discussed by Dr. Adam Laats in The Atlantic and in Nature, attempts to ban the teaching of Critical Race Theory in public schools and universities largely mirrored efforts in the 1920s to ban evolution. The Supreme Court recently ruled parents are allowed to pull their students from lessons involving LGBTQ+ themes based on religious objections. Additionally, there are explicit efforts to censor the reading material accessible to students. Over the last few years, book bans have become commonplace through legislative action and pressure from far-rights groups like Moms for Liberty. Earlier this year, Knox County, TN, updated the banned book list to over 100 titles, including the incredibly controversial Eyewitness Books: Mammals by Steve Parker.

Much like in the 1920s (p. 51, (Bryan, 1921), see here), there are two common themes: (1) using parental rights to justify the banning of topics they consider immoral, and (2) that academics and teachers are actively attempting to indoctrinate students in favor of this immorality. Furthermore, these ideas have been backed by resurging populist sentiments and the growing influence of Christian nationalism – the belief that the U.S. should be an explicitly (white) Christian nation -- among elected and unelected government officials.

Populist sentiments, particularly among conservatives, mirror the general distrust of the "cultural elite," including professors and journalists. Although public trust in scientists generally remains high, a 2024 Pew Research Center survey revealed that public trust has dropped substantially since the COVID-19 pandemic. This is particularly true among Republican voters, who were also far more likely than Democrats to view scientists as bad communicators, as feeling superior to others, and as ignoring the moral values of society. Combined with the general distrust of public institutions and higher education among Republicans, it is unsurprising that the Trump administration feels comfortable attacking "elite" symbols of academia and scientific research, claiming to save the taxpayers' money by cutting "fraud and waste."

These attacks included cutting or delaying over 2,500 National Institute of Health (NIH) research grants thought to be aligned with liberal or progressive values, or more recently have become polarized (e.g., vaccine research). Importantly, NIH funding has an excellent return on investment: $2.56 for every $1 spent on research. Even as I finish writing this essay, a Wall Street Journal article alleged that Russell Vought -- director of the Office of Management and Budget, an author of Project 2025, and self-described Christian nationalist -- attempted to halt all outgoing NIH money to researchers for the remainder of the fiscal year. In a crystal clear example of "screw you, I got mine," Vought's daughter receives a treatment for cystic fibrosis developed with the help of NIH funding. I could go on, but you get my point.

So, why does the Trump administration attack some of the clearest examples of government success? Setting aside ideology, I do not think even the Trump administration would so brazenly attack America's scientific research institutes unless they truly believed it could be spun as a political win to their supporters. As scientists and academics, more generally, have been "othered" as members of the cultural elite, this is not unfathomable.

A common stereotype of academics is that we are stuck in the Ivory Tower, rendering us unsympathetic towards the plight of the average person. This is nothing new. Even during the 1920s, the staunch populist Bryan charged his "elite" counterparts "look with contempt upon those who do not exhaust the alphabet in setting forth their degrees…"(Arnold-Forster, 2022). His charge was not without merit. Indeed, the major urban media (especially Mencken) relentlessly mocked Bryan, the Daytonians, and the South more generally. Such incidents have only played into the caricature of condescending elites who look down upon the real America. Having grown up in Sadieville, Kentucky, and as a former regular consumer of Fox News, I am keenly aware of the distrust for the cultural elites. So…what the hell are we going to do about it?

Leaving the Ivory Tower of Babel: the need for improved communication with the public
The Ivory Tower has perhaps become the Ivory Tower of Babel. Scientists generally do a poor job of communicating the how and the why of their research to the public. And why should they be good communicators? There are few institutional incentives to do so, e.g., it does not factor into consideration for promotion. With professors often wearing multiple hats -- scientist, educator, manager, accountant, and so on – there is seemingly little time left for any type of public outreach. As current events illustrate, even a little bit of distrust from the public can be exploited to cause massive harm to scientific research and education. As most research is publicly funded, we need to rebuild epistemic trust (the sources a person trusts) with the public (Sinatra & Hofer, 2016). This can be done both in and out of the classroom.

On July 12th-13th, 2025, I attended the Scopes "Monkey" Trial Centennial Symposium held at Vanderbilt University. Organized by the Evolutionary Studies Initiative – itself the brainchild of my advisor, Dr. Antonis Rokas – and the National Center for Science Education, this symposium brought together evolutionary biologists, lawyers, historians, and educators to discuss the significance of the Scopes Trial 100 years later. I learned much of the information contained in this essay during this symposium. Among the attendees were some of the individuals cited in this article, including Dr. Edward Larson and Dr. Adam Laats. There were also many well-known evolutionary biologists who successfully left the Ivory Tower of Babel, such as Dr. Steve Brusatte (of Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard fame) and Dr. Sean B. Carroll (not to be confused with physicist and podcaster Dr. Sean M. Carroll). Needless to say, it got pretty wild (for academics). 

A theme of the Scopes symposium was improving science education and public communication on the topic of evolution. The symposium speakers emphasized that we, as educators, do not need to play into the idea that religion and science are inherently in conflict. For me, a key takeaway was the need for cultural competency (the ability of an individual to understand and respect values, attitudes, and beliefs) in the classroom. Pedagogical research emphasizes this concept in creating a more inclusive classroom environment. Entering their first year of college, most students (greater than 60%) profess to believing in a higher power, in stark contrast with the average biology professor (about 25% overall and only 10% for evolutionary biologists) (Barnes & Brownell, 2017). Even implicitly, this drastic difference between teacher and pupil contributes to the perceived conflict between religion and science in the eyes of religious students, often making them hesitant to accept (note: I did not say "believe") evolution (Aini et al., 2025). 

Research by Dr. Jamie Jensen (a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) and Dr. Elizabeth Barnes (an atheist) emphasized the benefits of cultural competency for helping religious students understand and accept evolutionary theory without challenging their faith. Specifically, cultural competency in this context includes recognizing that students are generally more likely to be religious, allowing for theistic evolution, and empowering students with the choice to accept evolutionary theory (Aini et al., 2025; Barnes & Brownell, 2017; Lindsay et al., 2019). I emphasize that Dr. Jensen and Dr. Barnes work at Brigham Young University and Middle Tennessee State University, respectively, so they are used to working with students of faith. You can even see some student responses to Dr. Jensen's approach to teaching evolution here.

Do not mistake my stance: science educators at all levels have a responsibility to teach students the most current and prevalent ideas that explain our natural world. As Birge argued in the 1920s, it is our responsibility to provide our students with a quality education. We do not need to disrespect anyone's faith, but we should also not commit the both-sides fallacy by presenting every religion's creation story as on the same ground as evolutionary theory. Again, science deals with the natural, not the supernatural. I will not rehash the creationist/intelligent design debate of the late 20th and early 21st century here. Given the current social and political landscape, now is probably a good time for the evolutionary biology community to step out of the Ivory Tower and take a more direct role in public outreach.

This does not mean we need to become full-time science communicators, with an active podcast, YouTube channel, or TikTok. Most scientists do not have that kind of time. That form of communication may also not be your strength. A simple thing you can do is keep a blog giving non-expert descriptions of your papers on your lab's website (many modern labs keep an active website for recruiting). These write-ups should explain not just what was found, but the how and the why. Many of us have written short versions of this for our publications because many journals now require a significance statement. The blog could be an expanded version of this. Additionally, many universities will work with you to create a press release for your research.

There are many other creative ways to communicate with the public that may be closer to the typical scientist's comfort zone. During the Scopes symposium, Dr. Corrie Moreau described the exhibits she designed to introduce the public to insect evolution at the Museum of the Earth in Ithaca, New York. A key goal of the Evolutionary Studies Initiative established by Dr. Rokas is to educate the public on topics related to evolution. For his efforts, Dr. Rokas was awarded the Friend of Darwin award this year by the National Center for Science Education. If you're particularly ambitious and bold, you can write popular science books and make guest appearances on podcasts, like Dr. Brusatte and Dr. Carroll.

Regardless of your approach to public outreach, it all contributes to rebuilding epistemic trust. For those of us who work on controversial topics, it is even more important to take an active role in public outreach. There are many people out there willing to misrepresent and misuse your research for ideological purposes. For example, human genetics research is often misrepresented to justify racism (Carlson et al., 2022). These ideas can proliferate through non-traditional channels (e.g., Reddit). Although we are unable to stop this, active public outreach can at least help us get out in front of these efforts.

To do my part, I'll be writing here at Grads Gone Rogue every few months on topics of relevance to evolutionary biology. I plan to cover some of the more controversial issues affecting the field, including our understanding of human evolution. If you're interested to learn about any specific topics related to evolutionary biology and evolutionary theory, don't hesitate to reach out!