Australia's chief scientist Ian Chubb has warned Australia is suffering from a national ''torpor'', calling on the government to improve maths and science education.
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But despite huge rallies on the weekend protesting the removal of the carbon tax, Professor Chubb said he was positive about the Abbott government's language on climate change.
''The important thing at the moment is that the Environment Minister Greg Hunt keeps repeating that he and the government accepts the science,'' he said. ''And I think that's an important message to get out there.''
Speaking at the National Engineering Heritage Conference, Professor Chubb said although sections of the scientific community were furious at the absence of a science minister in the Abbott government, he believed the jury was still out.
''You can read a lot into the symbols of science minister … but it's much more important to have a passionate advocate for science in cabinet than to give him a name,'' he said.
Professor Chubb would not comment on the individual policies of either party to combat climate change.
He said Australia needed to take hold of the future, rather than ride out the present wave of prosperity.
''Our natural wealth is going to be finite. We're digging holes all over the place and sooner or later we'll get to the bottom of the hole. And what are we left with?''
Less than 3 per cent of primary school teaching was science and less than 10 per cent of year 12 students were taking advanced maths in 2011 - half of what it was in the 1980s.
There was an audible hush when he announced TAFEs were reporting almost half of apprentice bricklayers were unable to do addition or find the area of a rectangle.
The government couldn't ignore these statistics any more. ''If you see that there's a pimple in the middle of your forehead, it's still going to be there even if you never look in the mirror again. It's still a problem,'' he said.
Professor Chubb blamed the lack of interest on an increasingly negative view of science, particularly in areas of climate change. ''The discussion is not well informed, it is not well based. When a bunch of scientists say it is 95 per cent probability, people say, 'See, they're not certain'.''
Chairman of Engineering Heritage Canberra Lyndon Tilbrook pointed to the CSIRO's development of Wi-Fi technology as an example that should be used to inspire a new generation of scientists.
