WASHINGTON (AP) — The Latest on the March for Science, with events around the world intended to promote the understanding of science and defend science from attacks such as proposed U.S. government budget cuts (all times EDT):
1:10 p.m.
Hundreds turned out in light rain for a pro-science rally on the Maine statehouse lawn in Montpelier. One of the speakers, Rose Paul, director of conservation science for The Nature Conservancy of Vermont, told the crowd that “Science is not a partisan issue.” She said “climate change is happening” and scientists are needed to help understand how shifting weather patterns are affecting the world.
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12:43 p.m.
Denis Hayes, who co-organized the first Earth Day 47 years ago, said the crowd he saw from the speaker’s platform on the National Mall in Washington was energized in a rare way, similar to what he saw in the first Earth Day. That’s unusual for an odd numbered anniversary, he said.
“This magical thing that sometimes happens, sometimes doesn’t happen,” Hayes said. “The reason that it happens is that you’ve got a clear enemy. For this kind of weather this is an amazing crowd. You’re not out there today unless you really care.”
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12:36 p.m.
Lara Stephens-Brown, a graduate student studying veterinary medicine at the University of Minnesota, joined thousands marching in St. Paul.
They chanted “hey hey, ho ho, we won’t let this planet go.”
There are cancer survivors and doctors with signs that say “science saves lives,” she said, and estimated that 90 percent of the signs are not political.
“Science is not a partisan issue,” she said. “Science is for everyone, and should be supported by everyone in our government.”
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11:45 a.m.
Thousands of people stood outside the Washington Monument amid bouts of downpours, listening to a mix of speeches and music. Speakers noted that President Trump was in the White House nearby, having cancelled a weekend in New Jersey.
This was the first protest for Jeannette Villabon and her son Nikko Chey of Stanhope, New Jersey. So Villabon went all out, donning a Tyrannosaurus rex costume and holding a sign that said: “Hey tiny hands fund EPA study. Quit being cretaceous.”
Trump’s “archaic thinking is going to ruin us all,” Villabon said.
Other signs were only slightly less pointed, such as “edit genes not the truth,” ”data not dogma” and “global warming is real. Trump is the hoax.”
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11:37 a.m.
More than a thousand people stretched for miles through the streets of Gainesville, Florida. It was a peaceful demonstration, said Pati Vitt, a plant scientist at the Chicago Botanic Garden in town for work at the university.
“We’re scientists, so we’re orderly,” she said with a laugh. “We let the signs do the talking.”
She said her favorite featured a drawing of DNA, with the note “checks itself before it wrecks itself.”
And she hopes the crowds at hundreds of cities across the country draw attention to the perils of ignoring science funding.
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11:30 a.m.
Hundreds of people have braved pouring rain in Nashville, Tennessee, as they march through city streets and chant “science, not silence.”
It’s just one of the locations across the United States and the world on Saturday’s March for Science events.
Lawyer Jatin Shah brought his young sons — a 5-year-old who wants to be a dentist when he grows up and a 6-year-old who plans to be a doctor.
Marchers are waving signs that say “there is no planet B,” ”make America think again” and “climate change is real, ask any polar bear.”
Shah worries about his sons’ futures if science spending is cut.
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8:50 a.m.
The March for Science has attracted several thousand people in Berlin, and those supporters of sciences have walked from one of the city’s universities to the Brandenburg Gate.
Meike Weltin is a doctorate student at an environmental institute near Berlin. She says she’s participating because — in her words — “I think that politics need to listen to sciences.”
Germany’s foreign minister, Sigmar Gabriel, has endorsed March for Science events across Germany. Gabriel says “free research and teaching are the supporting pillars of an open and modern society.”
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5:10 a.m.
Thousands of people are expected to attend March for Science events around the world to promote the understanding of science and defend it from various attacks, including U.S. government budget cuts.
The March for Science was dreamed up at the Women’s March on Washington, a day after President Donald Trump’s inauguration in January.
Saturday is also Earth Day.
The march puts scientists — who generally shy away from advocacy and whose work depends on objective experimentation — into a more public position.
Scientists involved in the march say they’re anxious about political and public rejection of established science such as climate change and the safety of vaccines.
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