I appreciate and strongly support the prioritization of scientific communication from the geophysical community via AGU. And there is much in this statement I admire (e.g. " fostering a collaborative environment that produces, promotes, and protects the free and open communication of science." and "the scientific community must engage in meaningful dialogue, including listening and responding,")

However, I feel that this statement contains a great many generalities that make it difficult to ascertain what its true intent is. For example, "diversity of perspectives" is unclear. Which diverse perspectives are included? Are they globally diverse perspectives or those of historically underrepresented (either in number or prominence) groups within the scientific community? I would argue that BOTH are needed and vital to the enterprise, but this is not stated explicitly.

This statement COULD also be (mis)interpreted as diverse "perspectives" on matters of scientific understanding. The reference to protecting “free speech” seems unusual to me in a scientific community. We can debate whether speech running counter to established scientific understanding should be amplified in the general public (e.g. in social media). However, in scientific communication (i.e. by the AGU) such discredited “science” must not receive communication priority. Rather, we want to amplify only the best science, with due acknowledgment of legitimate scientific uncertainty and productive intellectual conflict. Furthermore, we should strive to accomplish this with a diverse, inclusive set of people to most effectively communicate it. In other words, the diversity should be of the voices communicating, NOT what is communicated.

Finally, it should be made clear that the diversity in voices should be of individual or aggregates of scientists, but not corporate (i.e. businesses) or even bureaucratic (i.e. governmental) perspectives. There is room for individual scientists working in industry and certainly employed by the government to contribute to this communication. But they must primarily be representing the science they are engaged in, not the interests of their employers.

So my request is: please be more clear about whether this statement is about WHAT is being communicated - or WHO is communicating it.

I am delighted to see AGU make a statement regarding the need for free and open science communication, with an emphasis on inclusivity both in terms of those doing the communicating and in the audiences and topics of communication. I think the point about countering political interference is also crucial.

I think it is critical that prominent scientific institutions like AGU clearly and strongly articulate these goals and values. My main question about the statement follows directly from that: if these are issues that the AGU community feels strongly about, what is AGU proposing to do about them? Is there a strategy in place or can AGU at least commit to developing a strategy in this statement?

For instance, with the sentence, “The scientific community, and society, should recognize, value, and support science communication, including with adequate financial resources and time” it’s not clear to me if that’s re-affirming support for the current system or suggesting new efforts. Should we be offering more communications training in graduate programs? Should there be some guidance on what evaluating communications work looks like in tenure and promotion, including assessing the inclusivity aspect? Would there be some benefit to coordinating with other professional societies like AMS on this?

For climate communications, at least, I think there need to be a new paradigm. I’m thinking particularly of:

Swain, D., 2023: Climate researchers need support to become scientist-communicators. Nature 624, 9. https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-023-03436-1

In terms of political interference, is this statement intended to replace or augment previous AGU statements?

https://www.agu.org/share-and-advocate/share/policymakers/position-statements/free-and-open-science

It seems to have less detail on that issue, so I hope it’s intended to be complementary but that might be worth making explicit.

I hope this statement is more the beginning than the final word for AGU on this topic and I look forward to the next steps!

The AGU membership, is part of the scientific community. This draft tends to read as though the scientific community is a separate entity that we are examining from afar. Maybe a phrase emphasizing that we are a part of that scientific community, something like, "we, as members of the scientific community are obligated to facilitate communication, eliminate barriers, .....etc. " A more forceful introductory sentence that pulls us as a society into the responsibility of the position statement is needed.

Perhaps it might be useful to add that (in your words) exploring the evolving landscape of science communications should be a part of science education.

Missing: Knowledge (as mentioned in the first sentence), loosely adapted from Miller's Compentence Dimensions, is only the foundation that ultimately enables Competence (Know how), Perfomance (shows how), and Action (does) (Miller GE (1990). The assessment of clinical skills/competence/performance. AcadMed. 65:63-S7). This is what makes science communication so valuable - it has an empowerment function which, in the sense of science literacy, enables people to make sustainable and responsible decisions and take action.

"If done well" - here we would have to define "well". For example: good external science communication is science- and audience-oriented, makes the right choice from a variety of possible formats and considers its impact (adopted from Wormer H. (2023) TU Dortmund. https://www.tu-dortmund.de/storages/tu_website/Referat_1/Dokumente___Ordnungen/LeitbildguteWisskom_dt.pdf).