Don't Be Such a Scientist: Talking Substance in an Age of Style, by Randy Olson---Review

Island Press, (c)2009, ISBN 1597265632


Randy Olson is a marine biologist who did his research, did his publishing, and became a tenured professor at the University of New Hampshire.

And then he resigned to become a filmmaker.

In Don't Be Such a Scientist, Olson talks about his own journey from scientist to science filmmaker, and explores the problems of communicating science to a broad audience. He finds the problems to lie mainly in a disconnect between how scientists learn to communicate with each other and the kinds of communication that work with the general, non-scientist public, and especially what does and does not work in the mass media.

Scientists place the highest value on accuracy; they correct inaccuracies, they question assumptions, they demand evidence. This is all vital to what scientists do; without these behaviors, real advances in knowledge can't happen. But when scientists use those same behaviors when talking to the general public, and especially when speaking on tv or making films and videos intended to reach the general public, these same behaviors come across as negative, argumentative, and unlikeable. Scientists, Olson says, work almost entirely in their heads, while reaching a broad audience--even getting the attention of a broad audience, due to how inundated we are with information--requires reaching the heart, the gut, and even, as he delicately phrases it, "the lower organs."

To illustrate the impact of an over-emphasis on being serious and relentlessly accurate, vs. presenting the information with style, heart, and even humor, he compares the reception given to two 2006 movies about global warming--HBO's April 2006 Too Hot Not Too Handle, and Al Gore's May 2006 An Inconvenient Truth. The first, he says, was "solid, relatively impersonal, objective effort featuring interviews with many top scientists." The second is a personal narrative by Al Gore, featuring his stories of long-term involvement with the issue, the tragedies involving his sister and his son, some humor, along with lots of substance. With all the emphasis on style, Gore nevertheless used PowerPoint graphs in abundance to communicate facts and data.

The HBO movie was completely accurate--but also boring and depressing. It sunk without a trace. Gore's was filled with important information, but had some inaccuracies that would never have survived in the HBO effort. But none of those errors were important enough to undermine the central point--and An Inconvenient Truth was a huge hit, and won both an Oscar and a Nobel Prize. Which was more effective in getting real knowledge of global warming to the general public?

Some of the entertaining stories Olson has to tell include his own collision with acting class (news flash: scientists are not naturals at just going with their feelings), the struggles to make his own 2006 film on evolution vs. "intelligent design," Flock of Dodos, watchable--and then the reaction of science bloggers to a movie that still wasn't accessible enough for distributors to want it for general audiences.

I'm not doing justice to the book, but it's short, pithy, and completely readable, along with providing ample food for thought on how to communicate science to the general public.

Important note: I received a free electronic galley of this book from the publisher, Island Press.

My adventures in ebooks

I've always been a holdout against ebooks. Reading a large amount of text on a computer screen is not appealing, and even a laptop is just not portable enough. It's heavy, you can run down the battery way too soon for a good reading experience if you're not plugged in, etc. PDAs and cellphones are obviously a lot more portable, but really, that's a tiny screen.

As for dedicated ebook readers... One is from Sony. After the rootkit nonsense of a few years ago, I'll never trust a Sony device again. Some of my friends have Kindles, and they love them. I've looked at them, held them--and not loved them. Not hated--just, not loved them. I suspect that if I traveled a lot, and carrying enough reading material on planes and trains were therefore an issue for me, I'd probably have succumbed. But I don't, so I didn't.

Then this summer my mother decided she wanted an ebook reader, or was convinced by my sister that she did, so that she could check books out of the library without having to leave her apartment on the days when she's less than fully mobile. She wanted to go look at ereaders, and asked me to come with her. We wound up at Barnes and Noble, looking at the Nook. Excuse me, the nook. B&N favors the lower-case n for the name of their device.

What can I say? I fell in love. It's the right size. The display is nice, e-ink really is almost like reading a printed page, far better than a typical computer screen display. It's about the weight of a trade paperback, and a bit smaller in dimensions--even with the optional but highly recommended case/cover. The battery life is more than decent, in part because the nook uses power only when changing something (such as turning a page), the touchscreen portion is active, or you're using the wi-fi or 3G capabilities. About once a week, I need to plug it  in for a few hours, and the rest of the time, I don't have to worry about it at all.

It's easy to adjust the size of the text to what's comfortable for you, and I do find that on the nook screen I prefer a larger text size than I would like on the printed page. I've also loaded on a few pictures of my dog to serve as my screensaver; it's easy to do, and fun to see her cute face every time I pick it up. Once you've got the book you're reading open, and the control touchscreen at the bottom goes dark, you can turn pages by swiping a finger over the darkened touchscreen. It's about as close to reading a print book as an electronic device can probably achieve.

Of course, if you spend the money on a ebook device, you're not only concerned about ease of use. You're also concerned about availability of material. Overall, ebook prices are closer to paperback prices than to hardcover prices, but that's not universally true. The sad truth is that many publishers are so afraid of piracy that they make ebooks expensive and load them down with DRM (digital rights management) that makes them hard to use conveniently--and of course impossible to lend.

However, I'm finding more than enough that's available at close-to-paperback cost that I don't feel unduly restricted in my reading choices. Barnes & Noble also offers some free ebooks; so does Amazon for the Kindle. B&N, unlike Amazon, does allow "lending" of ebooks bought from them--if the publisher agrees. It's very restricted (only for two weeks, and any given book can only be lent once), but it's a beginning. When the publishers realize that this is not hurting but rather helping their sales, I'm sure it will expand.

You can borrow ebooks from your public library, too (remember, this is where we started, with my mother's desire to do so.) What and how much is available this way will depend on what library or libraries you belong to, and what consortia they belong to, but if you are open in your reading choices, you may find that there's plenty of reading material available.

There are also other sources of free ebooks. At Manybooks.net, there are many older classics and older forgotten-but-excellent books available, out of copyright protection and unburdened by DRM. Some authors offer some of their own books as free or inexpensive ebooks, and some publishers, in contrast to the publishers who are terrified of the digital age, do the same with older titles. If you are a science fiction reader Baen Books is an excellent source of free sf, and you should also check out their ebook store for more current titles, not free of course, but not expensive if they're the books you want.

I'm enjoying my nook, and I think I will continue to do so.

Oh, and my mother? She wound up buying a netbook, instead, which makes sense for her needs. She had no computer at all, and library ebooks need to be downloaded to your computer first and then transferred to your ereader device, so the nook, or the Kindle, or the Sony reader, alone, wouldn't have helped her. She also wanted email access. Her netbook isn't much bigger than the nook, and it does the other things she needs. Less battery life, of course, but since the whole point is that she wanted something that would allow her to not go out when she wasn't feeling up to it, that's not really a issue. She can curl up and read with this, and still keep it plugged in most of the time.

Do I think ebooks are going to replace print books? Not anytime soon, no. They're a nice additional option, though.

Pelham Adoption Day 7-24-10

In the morning, Addy landed a starring role in a Greater Derry Humane Society poster:


Then we were off to the Pelham Adoption Day. Davey


and Sparky


and Capone


were among the dogs seeking new forever homes.

Addy helped staff the table:


ARNNE also brought this beautiful girl, Gracie:


Puppies, too! Although I didn't get this little guy's name:


All in all, it was a lively, fun day, with wonderful, friendly dogs seeking their new forever homes. Don't miss the next one!

Gucci Needs Your Help

Gucci is a four-month-old shih tzu mix, currently living at the MSPCA Nevins Farm shelter. In his previous home, someone dropped him, and he suffered a serious leg injury. The surgery for his injury was very expensive, and his owner could not afford it, so he came to the shelter. Because of the expense of the surgery, Gucci's adopter will need to pay the adoption fee plus the cost of the surgery.

But you can help! Even if you cannot adopt Gucci yourself, you can make a contribution to the cost of his surgery, which will reduce the cost to his adopter--thus speeding the day that Gucci can be adopted and go to the loving forever home he deserves.

Can you help? Even a few dollars will make a difference for Gucci.

See Gucci's Petfinder page for contact information.

Pet Oxygen Masks for Derry Fire Department

Every pet owner knows that in the event of fire, our pets are at even greater risk than ourselves--more likely to panic and do the wrong thing, and also generally much smaller and therefore more vulnerable to being overcome by smoke. But while fire departments are well equipped with oxygen masks to help rescue humans, they usually have nothing similar for our pets. Because of this, The Greater Derry Humane Society, the Derry Public Library, and Windham Animal Hospital are raising money to donate pet oxygen masks to the Derry Fire Department. On Wednesday, Windham Animal Hospital and The Greater Derry Humane Society presented oxygen masks to the Derry Fire Department.


Zoey the Jack Russell Terrier demonstrates the use of the mask with the help of a Derry firefighter and Timothy J. Butterfield, DVM


Barbara McCarthy, President of the Greater Derry Humane Society, Timothy J. Butterfield, DVM, Zoey and her brother Niles, and other members of the Greater Derry Humane Society, Windham Animal Hospital, and the Derry Fire Department

Dr. Butterfield did the research to identify the best pet oxygen masks to purchase, and Windham Animal Hospital donated several masks in three different sizes. With the masks being purchased and donated with funds raised by the Derry Public Library and others, pets in Derry will have a much greater chance of being rescued in the event of a fire in their homes.

More Pet Food Recalls--Friday night dump & run recall anouncements

Therese at PetSitUSA caught this announcement of a recall of Merrick Beef Filet Squares Dog Treats for possible salmonella contamination. This is the second time Merrick has recalled these treats for salmonella contamination, although the FDA is annoyed that the first time, Merrick didn't tell consumers about the salmonella contamination.

If you use these treats, please read the announcement and check lot numbers on whatever you have in the house.

Natural Balance has also recalled its Sweet Potato & Chicken Dry Dog Food, also for possible salmonella contamination.

UPG (United Pet Group) has recalled dog nutritional supplements sold under a variety of names. If you use supplements for your dog at all, click the link and make sure your supplements aren't on the (long) list.

And finally (for the moment, as far as I'm aware), Feline's Pride has recalled its Feline's Pride Raw food with ground bone for cats and kittens, Natural Chicken Formula.

For those of us with pets, life has not been the same since the massive, widespread pet food poisonings of 2007. We need to remember that no brand, price level, or quality level of food is immune to problems, and we need to remember that most companies deal with this as a business problem, and try to minimize the damage to themselves, rather than dealing with it as a threat to our pets, and trying to minimize the damage to our pets. And since pet food recalls are not "news" unless they happen on the massive scale of 2007, we need to be alert, and include in our news sources the ones we find to be reliable. The Pet Connection is a great one, as is PetSitUSA. You can check the FDA Recalls, Market Withdrawals, & Safety Alerts site regularly.

And above all, just be aware of how your pet reacts to his or her food. If a pet starts refusing something they've always liked, they may be ill--or there may be something wrong with the food. Never ignore what your pet is telling you!

Hopefully there'll be no more bad news this weekend, and we can all enjoy the Independence Day weekend!

Greater Derry Humane Society adoption events

On a sunny Saturday in early June, Greater Derry Humane Society held an adoption day at the Blue Seal feed store on Crystal Ave. in Derry. We had a wonderful turnout of both loving and lovable adoptable pets eager to find new homes, and interested people wanting to meet them.

Among the pets:

Ginger, a female rat terrier, and Rosco, a male Rottweiler. Ginger is a 8-year-old, affectionate girl who loves her walks, and would make a great companion for someone with small dog experience. Rosco is an extremely gentle boy who is great with kids and with other dogs. He's currently living with Ginger and another rat terrier, so he is comfortable and appropriate with small dogs as well as large ones.

Kody is a whippet mix, a little over a year old, who enjoys the company of other dogs but was very fearful of people. His foster home worked hard to build his confidence and trust, making him a much happier boy. And the great news is, Kody has found a home!

Zeke is a Patterdale Terrier/Lakeland Terrier mix, about twenty pounds of fun and energy. Zeke had a great time getting acquainted at the Adoption Day, and has also found a forever home.

But the day wasn't All Dogs, All The Time! We had cats, too!

?

Oliver, a fluffy boy clearly showing signs of "barn Maine Coon" ancestry so common in New England cats, was ten weeks old, and is now just about three months. He was happy to meet people, charm them, and show off.

Reecie, 3-year-old dilute calico girl cuddling with her foster dad, was also present to meet and greet potential adopters. She's a loving and easy-going girl who enjoys attention, and would fit easily into any household.

This wonderful adoption day is over, but we have future adoption events coming up. Greater Derry Humane Society will be participating in the Pelham Adoption Day, from 11am to 2pm, on Saturday, June 26th, at the Pelham Congregational Church, at the intersection of Rte. 11a and Main St., in Pelham, NH. And then on Saturday, July 3, from 10am to 1pm, we'll be having an adoption day at the Big Lots at Hood Commons, in Derry, NH. Come join us!

The Kong Rocket--for your "mad about fetch" dog

Recently The Kong Company sent me a free sample of the new Kong Rocket to try out with my dog.

The Rocket is a ball launcher, about two feet long, and able to hold balls from about two inches to about three and a half inches in diameter. Two balls, a larger one and a smaller one, are included, and both balls have squeakers.

The Rocket has makes it really easy to get more distance, power, and accuracy with your throws. And when your dog brings the ball back and drops it at your feet, with the Rocket you can easily pick it up again--without touching the now-slobbery ball with your hand.

Sadly, my little dog is only slowly adjusting to this, in her eyes, Unnatural way of playing fetch. However, I'm confident that this is not a case of the human thinking something is really cool while dogs think it's boring. That's because I had a friend try it out with her fifteen-week-old Briard puppy. He's not quite down on the rules of Fetch, yet, but he loved chasing the ball!

I'm disappointed that my dog is not taking to the Kong Rocket more readily, but I'm confident that this is going to be a real hit with the ball-crazy crowd, the retrievers and spaniels and herders--and of course their owners.

No good deed goes unpunished

The story I'm going to tell I got from someone in the group I'll designate 1st Rescue. It's important for context, I think, to understand that 1st Rescue is funded entirely out of the pockets of its active members, no outside source of funds. I should also note that this is not a tale from this or any other New England state.

A man with a very senior position in a large company has no dog because he travels too much on business and can't provide a stable long-term home. However, a young male dog wanders up to his house, clearly in need of help, and he takes the dog in, with the intention of finding a new home for it. He consults a person from 1st Rescue for advice, but after a month no new home has been found, and he really can't keep this dog long-term, because of his business travel.

So 1st Rescue takes the dog, has him vetted (shots and neuter), and subsequently transfers him to 2nd Rescue, which for various reasons is better equipped to place this particular dog. (Rescues tend to have specialties.) 2nd Rescue reimburses 1st Rescue for half the vet bill.

1st Rescue then approaches the man, the original rescuer, and asks him to pay the other half of the bill. 1st Rescue is astonished when the original rescuer is offended by the request.

Person from 1st Rescue then posts the story on a pet forum that shall remain nameless. 1st Rescue person also includes, for contrast, the case of a woman in a much more junior position in the same company, who found a dog and had a yard sale to help pay that' dog's "largish" vet bill.

Person from 1st Rescue proceeds to speculate about whether this is a "guy thing" or a result of the fact that people who are better off have no idea what it's like to struggle with bills and make ends meet, while people who are more precarious economically do understand this and are naturally more generous. In the subsequent discussion, essentially all of the comments discuss which of these is more likely the cause, with the weight of opinion running in favor of the man's "problem" being that he's too well off to understand about paying bills.

Plus, of course, the added observation that he clearly has no idea how rescues work and thought his "problem" was solved when he "dumped" the dog.

Excuse me? "Dumped" ? This was not his dog, and he did not "dump" it; he rescued it, and after he was not able to find an adopting family himself, he got the dog into a rescue.

He's one of the good guys, going out of his way to help a dog even though he's not in a position to adopt a dog himself. Yet he's the subject of hand-wringing over how he could be so shallow as to be offended when asked to reimburse 1st Rescue for the other half of the dog's vet expenses. Certainly it would have been good of him to do so. Certainly it seems likely that it would be no financial hardship for him to do so. But he's one of the rescuers, the first rescuer in this case, the one that made it possible for this dog to have a chance--and he's being talked about as having "dumped" the dog, and tsk-tsked over because he didn't pay the vet bills incurred after the dog left his care, on top of having cared for the dog for a month prior to1st Rescue taking him.

Shouldn't we be celebrating his generosity and willingness to take action?

Facebook and online privacy

I've been thinking about last week's kerfuffle over Facebook's "Instant Personalization" and the concerns it raised over online privacy. One thing that struck me was the dichotomy in the reactions expressed in the comments threads of nearly every online discussion of it.

On the one hand, you had people like the ones writing the blog posts and online articles, and commenters like me, who were various flavors of annoyed at Facebook once again finding ways to make money off of our private information that we thought we'd protected, and forcing us to go digging through account settings to find all the places we needed to change the new defaults so that our private information is protected again. For now, anyway. Until the next time. And on the other hand, you had the commenters who seemed completely dismissive of the whole idea of private information. After all, the online experience is much richer and more entertaining if you and your friends can see all of each other's likes, dislikes, interests, activities...and after all, what's the big deal? What need for this obsessive secrecy about basic information? One commenter explicitly said that privacy is dead and it's no loss, an old-fashioned idea for old-fashioned people who just don't get this whole new online world.

Some of this is the inexperience and lack of judgment of young people who have not yet lost out on, or realized they lost out on, a job or another opportunity because an employer discovered their Facebook pictures of the keg party that got out of hand. Or who do not yet know personally anyone whose identity was stolen, with disastrous consequences for their credit rating and sometimes their employability. One recent example that perhaps few people will feel much sympathy for, but which offers a useful lesson, would be some of the high school students in Mississipi who were involved in the "secret prom" after their high school canceled the official prom rather than allow one girl to take her girlfriend as her official date. The school had, officially, backed down and scheduled a prom---but Constance and her girlfriend and half a dozen other students were the only ones who attended it. The rest of the class attended another event the same night, which publicly they said was "not a prom, just a private party." Unfortunately, several of them posted pictures on their Facebook pages that looked remarkably like prom pictures, and in their comments and status updates described it as a prom. Since they had been allowing everyone to see everything on their Facebook pages, quite a number of sites and individuals captured screenshots and copied pictures before the kids finally woke up and locked down their Facebook accounts. This carelessness will probably affect the court case underway, and will like follow them and be an embarrassment and something of an obstacle for years to come.

The point is not that these students are especially vile and wicked. We all do stupid things, too many of us do unkind and morally dishonest things, when we are young and foolish and the world hasn't taught us empathy yet. The point is that not thinking about their privacy settings, assuming that privacy is an old-fashioned concern irrelevant to the wired-from-birth generation, made this particular unkind act public in a way that is going to embarrass them for years to come.

Situations that more naturally inspire our sympathy include identity theft facilitated by the easy availability of many details of an individual's personally identifying information, but it's the same problem. Carelessness about who may be looking at your personal information that you thought was private can lead to seriously unfortunate consequences. And when Facebook and other social networking sites, as useful and entertaining as they are, compound inattention and inexperience on the part of the user by actively seeking to make it hard for individuals to protect their information, the consequences can be very bad.

You can't enjoy the benefits of online life without some sharing of information, including maybe some sharing of information that in a perfect world you might prefer not to put out there. Further, I honestly do think that there's a grain of truth in the belief that this is a difference in generational attitudes. My generation happily discusses in public things that would have made our grandparents blush to discuss in private. The wired-from-birth generation does not regard as private all the information that my generation considers private. But those are choices that ought to be made by the individual user, on an opt-in basis, what risks they are willing to take in exchange for what benefits.

Control should be with the individual, not with the corporation trying to profit from the individual's information.