communicating science
laelaps | April 9, 2008He lectured on the Cavern of Torquay, the now famous Kent's Cavern. He paced like a Franciscan Preacher up and down behind a long show-case, up two steps, in a room in the old Clarendon. He had in his hand a huge hyena's skull. He suddenly dashed down the steps-- rushed, skull in hand, at the first undergraduate on the front bench--and shouted, 'What rules the world ?' The youth, terrified, threw himself against the next back seat, and answered not a word. He rushed then on me, pointing the hyena full in my face--' What rules the world ?' 'Haven't an idea,' I said. ' The stomach, sir,' he…
pharyngula | April 6, 2008You know, I caught a plane at 5:20am this morning, had a long flight across the country followed by a 3 hour drive to get home, so I'm not exactly feeling pleasantly conducive to continuing the latest sanctimonious whine-fests from some of the people who share a server with me. I have been avoiding the various framing flare-ups around here, despite the fact that everyone of them seems to drag my name into the mix.
We appreciate your concern, it is noted and stupid.
I will defer to Greg and Russell and let them speak for me, since at this point, I really don't give a damn about the issue. I…
laelaps | April 4, 2008This morning I set off for the MIND08: The Design and the Elastic Mind Symposium in New York City expecting discussions of the ways in which science influences art (and vice versa). What I got was... well... I don't really know what I got. The first two presentations I saw about the shape and origin of the universe were pretty good and at least entertaining, but after that came a spate of nearly incomprehensible presentations about art that somehow involved various mathematic theorems and natural designs.
The put it bluntly, most of the artists did not know how to effectively communicate.…
laelaps | April 2, 2008Although the initial flurry of posts about framing has died down, the debate about what framing is, is not, or should be continues. In an effort to go back to square 1, Chris has posted up a basic rundown of why framing is important, item #6 on the list getting to the heart of why this issue is so controversial;
Rather, you have to pare down these highly complex issues--or "frame" them--selectively highlighting just those aspects of the issue that will resonate with the core values of the particular audience (and there are different audiences, of course, and different frames will work for…
laelaps | April 2, 2008Illustration, either through text or pictures, has always been important to explaining sciences like paleontology and evolution. In terms of pictoral illustration, books like Niles Eldredge's Fossils and Jean Baptiste de Panafieu's marvelous Evolution are stunning books that are as pleasing to look at as to read. Before glossy, lavishly-illustrated books were able to be produced, though, writers often had to construct evolutionary or paleontological "epics" to help draw the reader in to a better understanding of the topic at hand.
The construction of "Just-so" stories is abhorred, but the…
pharyngula | April 1, 2008
Start traveling, everyone. The Morris Cafe Scientifique will be held at 6pm, Tuesday, 1 April (that's tonight) at the Common Cup Coffeehouse on Atlantic Avenue. So come on out and learn about local climate change!
Climate Change in Lake Wobegon: predicting the impact of a warmer world on the forests of West Central Minnesota
Pete Wyckoff, Biology
What will West Central Minnesota look like at the end of the century?
This talk will explore what science tells us about the past response of vegetation in Minnesota to changing climates, and how knowledge of the past may (or may not) provide a…
laelaps | March 30, 2008A number of science bloggers, myself included, often write about the current manifestation of creationism that is presently popular, but lately I've been starting to wonder why creationism is so well-received in the first place. Despite the fair amount of attention Expelled has attained on science blogs, it seems that most members of the public don't even know it's going to come out. Creationists have published their own technical journal for years, yet outside of a handful of "creation scientists," no one seems to care. Dozens of creationist books, essentially rehashed tracts of previously…
laelaps | March 30, 2008I was able to get a considerable amount of reading done this past week (I read Glorified Dinosaurs, Feathered Dragons, Fossils, and Major Transitions in Vertebrate Evolution cover-to-cover), but I ended up being greatly disappointed by one of the books I read. Although I wasn't expecting a popular review like Colbert's Evolution of the Vertebrates, a number of the entries in Major Transitions in Vertebrate Evolution were beyond my comprehension. I'm sure it's a valuable book with plenty of good information inside it, but the authors of the various papers didn't seem like they cared much for…
laelaps | March 25, 2008Presently there are few words as divisive among science bloggers as "framing," and at this point it appears that the concept of framing itself has been "mis-framed." The concept has always been a bit nebulous to me, but I'm definitely concerned by the recent formulation of framing being proposed by Chris Mooney and Matt Nisbet. Over the past two weeks a series of posts and articles have been generated by the pair advocating that scientists (and other figures in the public associated with science) stop picking at creationism, global climate change denialism, etc. Now hot off the heels of the…
laelaps | March 24, 2008There are times when I'm not entirely sure what to write. Like many other bloggers, I was certainly frustrated by Matt Nisbet's latest piece about who is allowed to "speak for science," but whatever useful discussion there might have been essentially was dead at the start. I wrote something up earlier today on how the present argument over framing has degenerated into name-calling and demands for apologies, but I ultimately decided to trash it; I didn't see it adding much, things being as they are.
Still, the arguments presently being aired did remind me of something Blake asked not too long…
laelaps | March 23, 2008Where there's one, there's the other. The pair behind the infamous "framing" concept are back, and this time they're telling scientists to shut up, perhaps taking up the axiom of "Wouldn't it be nice if everyone were nice?" More specifically, in a recent blog post Matt Nisbet admonished PZ and Richard Dawkins for their particular views about the conflict between science & religion as they appear in the creationist propaganda piece Expelled. Quote Nisbet;
As long as Dawkins and PZ continue to be the representative voices from the pro-science side in this debate, it is really bad for those…
pharyngula | March 23, 2008You just knew Matt Nisbet was itching to voice his opinion, and we all knew exactly what he'd say.
As long as Dawkins and PZ continue to be the representative voices from the pro-science side in this debate, it is really bad for those of us who care about promoting public trust in science and science education. Dawkins and PZ need to lay low as Expelled hits theaters. Let others play the role of communicator, most importantly the National Center for Science Education, AAAS, the National Academies or scientists such as Francis Ayala or Ken Miller. When called up by reporters or asked to…
laelaps | March 21, 2008The other day I wrote quite a bit about science popularization (most of it as a result of being aggravated), but one point that I forgot to mention was how Darwin approached the problem of creationism in On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection. Natural theology, especially of the kind popularized by Paley, was a bit of the elephant in the room; even though science was moving towards secularization and had rejected a strict Mosaic account of the formation of the world decades earlier, it was still a touchy subject. What was "the reluctant Mr. Darwin" to do?
As is well-known,…
laelaps | March 20, 2008
I had a feeling that other people were going to weigh in on Chris Mooney's latest article about "enablers" when I hit the "publish" button and shut down the computer yesterday afternoon, and I guess I was right. ERV, PZ, and Mark H have put forth their take on the article as well (ERV's comparison of Mooney 2006 and Mooney 2008 is a must-read).
For your further enjoyment, Bora collected a set of links about communicating science yesterday, and Blake was kind enough to provide another link to something I wrote out of frustration in relation to a post T. Ryan Gregory wrote.
I'd love to say…
pharyngula | March 20, 2008Uh-oh. Chris Mooney has roused the wrath of both Brian and ERV with his argument that people on the science side should avoid reacting to the anti-science ranters, because we're just promoting their lies for them.
I sort of agree — it is true that we can't criticize these loons without simultaneously bringing them to wider attention. But that's the operational dynamic, and if Chris could come up with a strategy to educate and rebut that doesn't actually involve mentioning the stupid things people say, I'd like to hear it. I don't think it exists.
We do have a real problem. Science is…
laelaps | March 19, 2008Chris Mooney has a new article out with the title of "Enablers" in which he charges that scientists are essentially drawing attention to creationism, global warming skeptics, etc. by actively refuting pseudoscience. What should we do instead? Well, there doesn't seem to be much of an answer to that;
Couldn't all the energy and resources bestowed on rebutting our enemies be better used to help promote our friends--perhaps, say, by devoting resources to getting the word out about individuals who have written pro-environment books? Rather than reacting, couldn't we be setting the agenda?
Given…
laelaps | March 19, 2008Yesterday a copy of John Brockman's The Third Culture arrived in the mail, and I was expecting it to contain a discussion about the modern mode of science popularization, or at least some insight into why many scientists decided to cut out the media middlemen and start writing books themselves. What I got was a collection of interviews (with the questions ripped out) and a whole lot of back-biting along the well-worn lines of evolutionary "pluralists" and "ultra-Darwinians," and the fact that the text is made up of interviews (rather than essays) undercuts the core of what the book is…
pharyngula | March 14, 2008More people, especially public school teachers, ought to be aware of the Ask a Biologist website — it's an excellent and easy resource. Kids (and adults) can fire off a quick question that gets tucked into the database, and then someone on their team of volunteer professionals will try to answer it. There are some big names on that list!
AAB also turns one year old today, so let's celebrate by getting more schools to send in questions.
pharyngula | March 12, 2008In early February, a number of bloggers brought to your attention a peculiar paper on mitochondrial proteomics, a paper which was obviously odd on even casual inspection, containing grandiose claims of a theoretical revolution that were entirely unsupported and ludicrous assertions of evidence for God in the genome. Deeper examination revealed that much of the paper had also been plagiarized from various sources. To the credit of the journal, the paper was quickly retracted one month ago today; however, the retraction was entirely based on the plagiarism, and none of the other failings of the…