Be a force for science: an interview with Barbara Schaal and Bill Moran

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the world's largest general science membership society, is an international non-profit organization with the stated goals of advancing science, engineering and innovation for the benefit of all people, communicating science broadly, defending scientific freedom, providing a voice for science on societal issues, strengthening and diversifying the science and technology workforce, and advancing international cooperation in science. Founded in 1848, AAAS today has individual members from around 100 countries, and is the publisher of the Science family of journals, including the open-access journal Science Advances. NSR talks to Barbara Schaal—an evolutionary biologist at Washington University in St Louis, Missouri, 2017 President of AAAS, former Vice President of the US National Academy of Sciences, and a former advisor of the President's Council of Advisors in Science and Technology under the Obama administration—and also to Bill Moran, the publisher of Science, about why science is a global public good, how basic science is the engine of economic growth and prosperity, the importance of social science, and why the need to defend the free flow of ideas and people across national boundaries is urgent.