I’d like to blend two general lines of thought: what those seeking information about vaccination on-line want but might be unable to (easily) find on-line and what the science (writing) community might do to meet that.
Recently I wrote a comment on the Facebook page of local documentary programme Close Up, suggesting that people might be better ask rather than argue or “say ‘how it is’” over something they don’t have the background to to judge in the end.[1] I wrote this in part because many internet “debates” seem to degrade to something that seems pretty pointless to me.
Surely the sensible thing for those sincerely wanting to make a decision is to talk with an appropriate background, what typically happens for other things in daily life. But how do you do this for vaccine or other health issues – particularly on-line?
Before I dip into this, let’s distinguish three groups of people.
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New Zealand on-line news outlet Stuff has elected to present a science section. Yay!
Some might even say ‘about time’.
In a modest promotional effort, they’ve offered the first of what are to be daily science pictures.
It’s great to see support voiced in the comments. (Sharp readers will notice I have given a heads-up to readers there about our forum.)
“Finally a blokes version of your ridiculous fashion section…” says Peter (comment 10). Excellent sentiment, but I’ll oppose that science should be ‘for blokes’ – science is for everyone.
Image Credit: NASA / Tony Landis
Tony (in comment 8) writes:
“Great stuff! Looking forward to reading it, but please, no editorials on what you think is right/wrong, harmful/beneficial, just pure science please! For example, I’d hate to read about how someone “thinks” WiFi radiation is bad…”
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One of the most oft cited quotes on twitter is drawn from this passage from the abstract of Henry Sauermann and Michael Roach’s paper:
“We also show that the attractiveness of academic careers decreases significantly over the course of the PhD program, despite the fact that advisors strongly encourage academic careers over non-academic careers.”
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Free for this month (May, 2012) is an e-Book version of Carl Zimmer’s popular science book, A Planet of Viruses.
To get your copy, go to the University of Chicago Press website for the book and enter your email address in the space provided. You will be sent an email with a link from which you can download a copy. The book is displayed using Adobe’s Digital Editions software, of which I have little experience (but see first Footnote).
Carl Zimmer is a long-time science writer and author of several books including The Tangled Bank, (evolution), Parasite Rex (parasites), Science Ink (a collection of tattoos with scientific themes and their stories), Brain Cuttings, More Brain Cuttings (the working of the mind) among others.
Footnotes
I have to admit my initial impressions of Adode’s book presentation isn’t the best. Perhaps on other platforms it’s better? In any event other’s mileage may vary. Illustrations looked low-resolution and were not present in the flow of the text. I wasn’t too happy with the lack of good control of paging through the book by the application either. (These are not be the author’s fault! The text I am sure will be Carl Zimmer’s usual excellent effort and be worth reading despite this, but I like good presentation – it’s part of the full package.
I hope to have this blog back into more regular activity next week.
In local news, the main campus* of the University of Otago lost power this morning. According to reports on social media, the power outage is restricted to the campus area:
Paul Le Comte (@five15design)
Massive boom & the power has gone out to a big part of #Otago Uni Centre for Innovation is dark – home time via the wood & coal shop
Paul Le Comte (@five15design)
By all accounts St David St block, Centre for Innovation & all of Registry is without power
Tom Tremewan (@TomTremewan)
Complete power outage all over @otago campus right now.
Pippa Mackay (@pip_pip_pippy)
@BioinfoTools @five15design @otago power has just come back on in central library, unsure if it’s just back up or restored completely
Other self-reporting on social media indicate that surrounding suburbs were unaffected. There is no word from the University of Otago on social media at this time.
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Just a quick heads-up for New Zealand readers, tonight at 8:30pm Prime will be showing the British drama Hawking, produced by the BBC, which covers cosmologist Stephen Hawking’s earlier years from the initial stages of his diagnosis of motor neurone disease. The production features Benedict Cumberbatch, who starred in Sherlock.
Hannah M’s review at Rotten Tomatoes reads
I first saw Benedict Cumberbatch in the BBC TV show “Sherlock” and decided to look up what else he’d done. In this made-for-TV movie, he does an *excellent* job playing Stephen Hawking in the early days of his diagnosis. The movie’s writer, Peter Moffat, also wrote the fairly-entertaining Einstein and Eddington, but the writing is sharper and more interesting in this older one. Well worth checking out for fans of biographies, science stories, or Benedict Cumberbatch.
An astrophysicist, Sarah H, offered her thoughts:
I came at this movie from two perspectives: First, as a fan of Benedict Cumberbatch, and second, as an astrophysicist and high school teacher. I thought the film had a good combination of “hard science”, but wrapped up in understandable terminology and a sweet human story. Benedict’s physical work as Hawking is
I can’t vouch for this, not having seen it before, but most reviews praise Benedict Cumberbatch’s efforts - it might be worth checking out.
Other articles on Code for life:
What do scientists look like?, redux
The littlest chameleon?
Epigenetics overview (video)
Do TED lectures need better vetting?
“We’re so used to getting a prescription that’s it’s surprising when we don’t”
Are bioinformaticians gods?
Media loves those romantic, emotionally appealing, stories of someone rediscovering their favourite lost toy or book from their youth. What if that favourite thing was the computer source code of a project you put your all into?
This story could win a geek’s heart. Jordan Mechner, writer of the early graphical computer game* Prince of Persia, gets sent a box by his Dad. In the box is a 5¼” floppy disk containing the original source code, something though he’d lost. A trans-continential flight over a weekend, others’ work on hardware setup to read the disk, ensue – it’s a saga.
It’s all on his blog – read it, he writes well, recounting the arrival of the box and a post-event exploration of “why?” ArsTechnica also has coverage.
Aside from the story itself, some of the technology appeals to me. Read the rest of this entry »
Last night local current affairs program Campbell Live ran a story comparing two staff members and their decision to vaccinate or not, “of course” choosing one ‘for’ and one ‘against’ for balance.
You can view the footage* and read the comments they quoted and subsequent comments on-line. (To get back to the quoted comments from the video footage, you’ll need to keep pressing ‘View previous comments’ until you’ve got them all displayed – there’s a few hundred of them now!)
Overall the story seems well done. We’ve discussed communication of vaccine issues before here – what do think of Doctor Cameron‘s efforts?
Here’s what Aspiring Health, from twitter, thinks: “Seriously Dr Cameron on @CampbellLiveNZ is the jolliest GP ever!” He certainly presents with gusto and exudes bonhomie. Personally, I think he did an excellent job.
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In his novel COSM Gregory Benford describes* four types of scientists -
- I want to know – “Prying into Mother Nature’s secrets.”
- Theory predicts – Exploring what theory says ought to happen.
- This is what I do – “Habit often rather mindless. More deeply, it means This is who I am.”
- A sweet experiment – Doing a well designed/executed experiment itself.**
What kind of scientist are you?
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Below Jessica Tyler, from the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, introduces epigenetics, a topic I’ve touched on a few times and would like to elaborate further on. Her introduction is fairly gentle; hopefully some of the essence of the thing will come across to non-specialists!
You may need to wait until the video is buffered before it starts displaying. Feel free to ask questions in the comments below.
(Excuse the back-to-back videos and no articles – I’m very busy until at least Friday!)
Other articles on Code for life:
Epigenetics, growing old and identical twins becoming unique
Doggie ERVs
Transcribing a gene, free poster
Autism – looking for parent-of-origin effects
Coiling bacterial DNA
Epigenetics and 3-D gene structure
