Dr. Isis considers a downside to having coauthors and an ethical question it raises:
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Weekend reflection: what makes blog commenting inviting?
I’m not looking for a general theory of what sets up the right room for dialogue as opposed to an argument, nor even for a fine grained analysis of whether dialogue or argument is what most blog readers and commenters are looking for.
If you’re reading this post, I’m interested in knowing what you prefer.
First, a quick poll (where you can choose all the answers that apply):
Anonymity, real names, and dialogue.
Matthew C. Nisbet put up a post today titled The Right Room for a Dialogue: New Policy on Anonymous Comments. In it, he writes:
I’ve long questioned the value of anonymous blogging or commenting. Much of the incivility online can be attributed to anonymity. And with a rare few exceptions, if you can’t participate in a dialogue about issues without using your full name and true identity, then what you have to say is probably not that valuable.
These long standing thoughts were called to mind again after reading a post by Andrew Revkin at Dot Earth. Quoting as the subject to his post a line from Monty Python “is this the right room for an argument?,” Revkin writes:
Michael Palin asked that question nearly 40 years ago on Monty Python’s Flying Circus, and it’s as germane as ever in considering the merits and drawbacks to blogging, and particularly the comment strings following posts. Often, the commentary here and elsewhere threatens to devolve into extended volleys of retorts, particularly when anonymous contributors are involved, some of whom are so relentless that their ideological foes sometimes allege they must be getting paid to do what they’re doing.
Revkin goes on to link to a column by Columbus Dispatch editor Benjamin Marrison who discusses the negative impact of anonymous commenters on the newspaper’s Web site. As Marrison observes of people who email the Dispatch or leave comments at stories: “Is it a coincidence that all of those civil people are reachable (and somewhat accountable) through a return e-mail?”
Matt then notes that he’ll be taking steps on his blog to end anonymous commenting.
Of course, it’s Matt’s prerogative to establish whatever sort of ground rules for commenting on his blog that he likes. However, the title of his post suggests that his aim, in moving to block anonymous commenting (and presumably pseudonymous commenting, although it’s not made explicit in the post) is to foster dialogue.
Friday Sprog Blogging: K-I-S-S-I-N-G.
On account of Valentine’s Day being right around the corner, and inspired by Sheril’s almost-through-the-edits book on the science of kissing, I thought I’d ask the Free-Ride offspring (now 8.5 and 10.5 years old) whether they had any questions about kissing that they thought science might be able to answer.
Their initial reaction:
Good riddance to a pair of academic pretenses.
Following DrugMonkey’s lead, I’m going to play along on the meme proposed by Female Science Professor:
What tradition or other general characteristic of academia would you like to see eliminated completely?
According to the rules, which I just invented, the things to be eliminated have to be of a general nature. So, for example, the answer “my department chair” or “my university’s moronic president” are unacceptable unless you want to eliminate the general concept of department chairs or university presidents.
The candidates for disposal can be anything to do with academia, from the most momentous of traditions (tenure) to the most bizarre but inconsequential (academic gowns).
It actually took me a little while to think of a candidate for elimination, but once I did, it really grabbed my viscera. (Actually, technically, what I want to eliminate may be two distinct general characteristics of academia, but at their root they’re so closely related that I think they ought to get the heave-ho together.)
Blogiversary addendum.
Earlier today, I had this conversation with my better half.
Dr. Free-Ride’s better half: (with a look of deep concern) So, I saw something in your post today.
Dr. Free-Ride: Oh? (Wondering if a heinous typo got through cursory attempts at editing)
Some reflections on my fifth blogiversary.
Five years ago today, I put up the first post on a blog that was mean to capture the overflow of discussions and ideas from my “Ethics in Science” class. Back then, I wasn’t entirely sure that I’d manage to maintain the blog through the end of the semester.
It just goes to show you that you can’t always tell which of the things you try will become sustainable practices (although maybe the ones that don’t involve exercise equipment have better odds).
On the occasion of my fifth blogiversary, I’m reflecting on a question posed by BlogHer upon BlogHer’s 5th anniversary:
What are five opportunities you’ve gotten because of blogging?
#scio10 aftermath: some thoughts on “An Open History of Science”.
Here are some of the thoughts and questions that stayed with me from this session. (Here are my tweets from the session and the session’s wiki page.)
The session was led by John McKay and Eric Michael Johnson. John posted the text of his presentation and Eric posted his presentation a la YouTube. I’m going to take this as permission to skip doing a proper recap here. Instead, I’m going to write about the big ideas this session raised for me.
First, I’m struck by how easy it is for those of us who were trained to do science to know very little about where scientific practices come from — especially practices around communicating results and methods to other scientists. Somehow, we either assume it’s always been this way (where “this way” is often the way we were taught to do it), or that the practices were put in place in plenty of time for the scientists of earlier eras who might have needed them, or that the practices that were established as the right ones were so obvious that their adoption was inevitable.
What I’ve gleaned from my coursework and reading in the history of science is that the inevitable usually takes a lot of work (plus some luck).
#scio10 aftermath: some thoughts on “Science and Entertainment: Beyond Blogging”.
Here are some of the thoughts and questions that stayed with me from this session. (Here are my tweets from the session and the session’s wiki page.)
This was sort of an odd session for me — not so much because of the topics taken up by session leaders Tamara Krinsky and Jennifer Ouellette, but because of my own sense of ambivalence about a lot of “entertainment” these days.
The session itself had lots of interesting glimpses of the work scientists are doing to help support filmmakers (and television producers, and game designers, and producers of other kinds of entertainment) who want to get the science right in the stories they’re trying to tell. We heard about the efforts of the Science & Entertainment Exchange to connect makers of entertainment with scientists and engineers “to help bring the reality of cutting-edge science to creative and engaging storylines”. We saw the Routes website, produced in association with the Wellcome Trust, which included “a set of minigames, a documentary and a murder mystery which explore the fascinating world of genetics.” (In one of those minigames, you get to be the virus and move to the next level by infecting the target proportion of potential carriers — but you get just one sneeze per level to make that happen!) We learned that the drive to add “extras” when movies are released on DVD is creating something like a demand for real science content to complement science fiction.
In other words, it sounded like producers of entertainment were aware that a science-y angle can hold appeal for the audiences they are trying to reach, and were generally enthusiastic about (or at least open to) the idea of drawing on the expertise of actual scientists.
Of course, there were caveats.
ClimateGate, the Michael Mann inquiry, and accepted scientific practices.
In my earlier post about the findings of the Penn State inquiry committee looking into allegations of research misconduct against Michael Mann, I mentioned that the one allegation that was found to merit further investigation may have broad implications for how the public understands what good scientific work looks like, and for how scientists themselves understand what good scientific work looks like.
Some of the commenters on that post seemed interested in discussing those implications. Others, not so much. As commenter Evan Harper notes:
It is clear that there are two discussions in parallel here; one is serious, thoughtful, and focused on the very real and very difficult questions at hand. The other is utterly inane, comprising vague ideological broadsides against nebulous AGW conspirators, many of which evince elementary misunderstandings about the underlying science.
If I wanted to read the second kind of conversation, there are a million blogs out there with which I could torture myself. But I want to read – and perhaps participate in – the first kind of conversation. Here and now, I cannot do that, because the second conversation is drowning out the first.
Were that comment moderators could crack down on these poisonous nonsense-peddlers. Their right to swing their (ham)fists ends where our noses begin
Ask and you shall receive.