Category: Science

The Farting Dinosaur Debacle

Blame the Media, Dinosaurs, Headline Makers, Media, New Research, Science, Science writing

While I know everyone in the science writing community is tuned into this story, I can bet that among my personal friends and family I am the only one who has “farting dinosaurs” as an item on their to-do list. While the science media machine has given us plenty of “say what now?” moments I found this story and how it has been handled and covered in the media face palm worthy enough to warrant a closer look.

Did Dinosaurs Fart Themselves to Death?

What the paper concludes is that the amount of methane released would have impacted climate. From the press release on this story: “Sauropod dinosaurs could in principle have produced enough of the greenhouse gas methane to warm the climate many millions of years ago, at a time when the Earth was warm and wet.” What about that says dinosaurs died from farting? There has been plenty of media attention for this story, and certainly some more even keeled coverage that actually bases the headline on the climate conclusions. Some examples include Never Stand Behind a Dinosaur on Climate Central, Dinosaur Farts May Have Caused Prehistoric Warming on RedOrbit or It’s A Gas: Dinosaur Flatulence May Have Warmed Earth on Yahoo/Reuters.The quick answer is no. Was a paper released regarding dinosaur farts? You bet (In the journal Cell Biology.) Did it conclude that farting led to the mass extinction of the dinosaurs? No. Of course with the headline potential a story like this poses how could some in the media resist, truly?

Apatosaurus louisae at the Carnegie Museum via Wikimedia Commons

Apatosaurus louisae at the Carnegie Museum via Wikimedia Commons

To draw conclusions about extinction and death when the topic of the paper is actually the amount of methane dinosaurs may have contributed to the atmosphere and thus climate change is misleading. In the media there has been the Fox News of it all whose headline “Dinosaurs ‘gassed’ themselves into extinction, British scientists say” goes right for the good stuff regardless of the paper’s conclusions. There has also been the necessary debunking on blogs like PZ Myers’ Pharyngula with “the reports of dinosaurs dying of farts are greatly exaggerated.”

Another interesting aspect of this story is the fact that is was subject to an embargo break. For the non-journalists among us an embargo is when journalists are informed about a story but asked to hold it for one reason or another. This is a common practice and in general journalists tend to abide by it, but not always. Often in science journalism the story is embargoed until the release of the paper in whatever journal it is being published. For more on this embargo break, check out the blog EmbargoWatch which does a consistently good job of keeping track of such story breaks.

Thoughts On Science Writing In The Age of Denial

Science, Science writing, ,

This week I was lucky enough to be among the attendees at a conference called Science Writing in the Age of Denial, hosted here at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. What a great experience. Truly I couldn’t say enough to thank all of the organizers, speakers, panelists, and other attendees for all of the thoughtful discussion. For those of you who aren’t as familiar with the concept of science denial, it is simply the idea that despite scientific evidence that certain things are true (evolution, climate change, there is no autism/vaccine link, etc.) people will still claim (sometimes with serious vitriol) that science is wrong. This happens because the scientific evidence questions their world view or the mental model they have in place for understanding an issue.

I just wanted to share a few of the thoughts and ideas from the conference that I’m walking away with:

Respect is key. Our job as communicators is not to slap people around, name call, or put them down for thinking a certain way. Calling someone an idiot isn’t a good way to get them to take your point of view seriously. It is our job to communicate facts and evidence in a way that is compelling and approachable. I thought Dan Fagin from NYU’s SHERP program put it brilliantly when he said that as science writers we can’t stay walled off in our castle, acting like we’re on the defensive from the attacking hoard. We need to come down and really open up a dialogue if we want to make any progress.

We can not change minds with facts alone. It is our job to tell our audience a good story. A good story has the power to change minds. Telling scientific stories in a narrative way is one of the best ways we can go about trying to communicate about these controversial issues. Narrative is what will hook people, and hopefully get them thinking critically about issues and avoid them shutting down from the start simply based on the topic.

As science writers we have a tremendous ability to do harm. It could not be more important that we do our homework, and tell stories with all the nuance and shades of grey required to tell them accurately. For me this point was really driven home by Ivan Oransky, co-founder of the blog Retraction Watch, when he said that a all science/medical writers should have a biostatistician in their back pocket. It is unacceptable to spread misinformation because you as the writer didn’t understand it in the first place. We need to be reading the papers (including the graphs and methods) and asking questions of the researchers or qualified third party sources if we are unclear about something.

One of the most important things we can do for our audience is help educate those who are unfamiliar with the scientific process about how it all works. Deborah Blum raised this point, and pointed out that the problem with claiming a scientific consensus about a topic is that over the course of history scientific consensus about any number of issues has been revised. This is inherent in the nature of science, a constant search for new information is bound to result in new information. Sometimes this new information will confirm the previous conclusions, sometimes it will contradict and present more questions. This isn’t a reason to distrust what all scientists say, or to distrust conclusions for which there may be unanswered questions but for which there is very little contradictory evidence. We need to help the public understand that uncertainty is inherent in scientific research. Uncertainty doesn’t mean that scientists are liars, because unsure is not the same as false. The more we can do to help make the public comfortable with the scientific process, the more likely we are to help them learn to trust it.

We need to try to understand our audience. Knowing where your audience is coming from and what is driving their perspective is critical to being able to communicate ideas to them. You won’t change minds if you don’t establish an ongoing dialogue that addresses their point of view.

Another point I thought was really important was that the best way to help dispel misinformation is to stop repeating it. Articles like, “the top five misconceptions about climate change” just help keep the misinformation in the public eye. We need to focus on truth. I thought this was perfectly captured with the example of asking the audience who originally said the quote “I can see Russia from my house” I was among the people who thought Sarah Palin, but the real answer is Tina Fey. Palin made a comment about having foreign policy experience due to the proximity of Alaska to Russia, and Fey made fun of it by saying the above quote in a skit on Saturday Night Live. Palin never actually said it, but it has been repeated so much that it has taken on a life of its own. Thus, the misinformation lives on.

Those are just a few of the ideas I’ll be taking away from Science Writing in the Age of Denial. There were so many great sessions and panel discussions that I couldn’t possibly list every great idea and point here. If you are interested in what went on at the conference I seriously recommend checking out the twitter activity on the hashtags #denialconf and #sciencedenial. A lot of people were tweeting, myself included, and you will get a really great summary of what was said and went on. If you do check out the hashtags though, don’t be surprised to see some spam. We experienced several spam attacks throughout the conference.

I’ll close this post by just repeating my thanks to everyone who participated. I met some seriously fabulous writers (and only had one moment where I was freaking out in my brain trying to figure out what to say to someone so smart and famous). I had a great experience and I’m looking forward to hopefully meeting them, or at the very least reading more of their work, in the future. In the meantime I’ll be trying to incorporate the ideas and suggestions that came out of the conference into my own work.

Science For Six-Year-Olds: Noctilucent Clouds

First Grade, Science, Science For Six Year Olds,

Science For Six-Year-Olds is a recurring segment on Science Decoded for Mrs. Podolak’s first grade class at Lincoln-Hubbard elementary school. This year in first grade we’ve also done an experiment with butter, talked about hurricanes, sugar maple trees, and learned a song about the states of matter.
***
Hello First Graders! Now that it is officially Spring, it seems like a great time to start your new science unit on clouds. I hear you have started to learn about what clouds are made of, and the different types of clouds. I wanted to share some information with you about a special type of cloud called a Noctilucent cloud. Have any of you ever heard of a Noctilucent cloud? They are a unique type of cloud that can be observed at night and are formed by ice at the line where Earth’s atmosphere meets space. These clouds are known for looking shiny because they are so high up in the atmosphere that they stay lit up by the sun, even after it has set for the day.

Noctilucent clouds. Image via NASA

Noctilucent clouds. Image via NASA

This kind of cloud is a relatively new discovery. They were first observed in 1885, which is a long time ago but not for scientists who have been observing and learning about the Earth for as long as humans have existed. Since they began studying Noctilucent clouds, scientists have learned that they form at temperatures around -230°F. What is the temperature outside today? What about in your classroom? Can you imagine how cold it is at -230°F? In the upper atmosphere when it is that cold, dust blowing up from Earth below or falling down into the atmosphere from space gives water vapor a place to condense and freeze. 

Noctilucent clouds are most visible as the sun is going down or right after it has set, typically in Summer months between 50° and 70° north and south of the equator. Can you find where that is on a globe? Lately these clouds have been appearing outside of their normal range and with increased frequency. This has led some researchers to hypothesize (propose an explanation based on the preliminary evidence) that the appearance of these clouds may be linked in some way to global climate change.
Global warming is causing the atmosphere to heat up, and when it heats up it expands. Noctilucent clouds form at the edge of the atmosphere, if the atmosphere is pushed out further it will be colder (because it is very cold out in space). If it is colder, it is possible that this would result in more Noctilucent clouds forming and forming in different areas. However, this is just one possible explanation scientists still have a lot of research to do to learn more about these special clouds and figure out exactly why they are increasing in prevalence.
Check out this great video of Noctilucent clouds captured from onboard the International Space Station. If you have any questions let me know and I’ll do my best to answer them, but remember scientists are still learning about these clouds and there may not be answers yet.
*I got the idea for this post when this Wired article popped up in a Google search about clouds. For more information about Noctilucent clouds in general, NASA also has some great information (though not specifically for kids.)

Tweeting at the Science Museum

Science, Social Media,

When I was in the seventh grade I got “lost” in the American Museum of Natural History while on a field trip. I got distracted in the Hall of Gems and Minerals and next thing I knew my group was gone. Following the directions drilled into us prior to departing from our middle school cafeteria that morning, I saw my English teacher with her group of students entering the hall and wandered over to her to announce the obvious, “I’m not where I’m supposed to be.” I was quickly reunited with the correct group and the day passed without other incident.

This memory has to be similar to memories held by students all over the tri-state area who have made the trek into the museum’s halls. Places like the American Museum of Natural History, or even The DaVinci Science Center where I would find myself interning nearly a decade after my adventure in the Hall of Gems and Minerals are special to me because they hold such great memories of exploring science as a kid, and helping kids explore science as an adult. I’ve always looked at science museums or science centers from that kid-centric lens. But these places have a lot more to offer, particularly for adults and I think one way science museums and centers can reach adults is through social media.

I’ve noticed this particularly since I started following the American Museum of Natural History on Twitter. Social media presents an enormous opportunity to connect with different types of people, and I feel like the American Museum of Natural History in particular is reaching a wide audience and making the most of having a social media presence on a platform like twitter. This isn’t just marketing to soccer moms and elementary school teachers, not with over 91,000 followers. I mean I’m neither of those things and they’ve got my attention. I wanted to share a few things that I’ve noticed about the @AMNH‘s twitter stream that make me think whoever is behind the keyboard over there gets it.

A screenshot of the @AMNH twitter page. I love their background!

A screenshot of the @AMNH twitter page. I love their background!

1. Offering the why, not just the what – Any organization can operate a twitter account and fill it with plugs for their programs. What an organization does is important, but why they do it is more important. The why is what is going to keep people coming back long after that single exhibit they were originally interested in has moved on. While the AMNH account certainly tweets about reserving tickets to special exhibits, the majority of the tweets offer the why. There is actual information to be had here, like this piece on archaeology on St. Catharines Island. Is it promoting the museum? Sure the post’s writer David Hurst Thomas is the curator of North American Archaelogy in the Museum’s Division of Anthropology. But is it offering information you wouldn’t otherwise have? Sure. It is also providing depth to a topic that perhaps wouldn’t have drawn many people to the museum, I mean it’s hard to compete with the blue whale. It gives you a sense of who the people are who work for the AMNH. Which in this case, I think could turn a one time visitor into that person who comes back again and again.

2. Tweeting about other things – Chicago’s Brookfield Zoo has a new baby aardvark, and the Google Science Fair is currently accepting entries. These two things have little to do with one another aside from the fact that I learned about both from the @AMNH twitter account. Tweeting about things other than yourself tells me that one there is a real person behind the account, and two that person is interested in the science community not just getting people through the doors. I like that. It makes me trust not just the information in the twitter stream, but the organization itself.

3. Variety – Even when just dealing with tweets regarding the museum’s own content, there is a tremendous amount of variety in the @AMNH twitter stream. There are picture galleries, videos that explain different of topics, podcasts, hashtaged tweets about lectures or talks, and replies to individual twitter users. There is information about the people who work at or are involved in the museum when they are covered in the media. It all adds up to creating a feeling that this is about people. In terms of marketing, I think this strategy really works because it highlights all the people and topics that the museum is involved in, which makes it seem personal and approachable rather than simply like a box office.

There are plenty of other examples I could give about how a science museum could use social media, or even about what I’ve observed the American Museum of Natural History doing. They are clearly involved in a lot and have embraced social media and the interwebs. But for now, I encourage you to check them on Twitter for yourself. Whether you have kids or are a kid at heart who still gets butterflies entering the hall of African Mammals, a person who just has an interest in science and related topics or cool stuff, or are looking for an example of how to run a professional twitter stream I think there will be value in it for you. The @AMNH is #doingitright and might be worth the follow.