Goodbye

This blog is no longer active. The course it supported has ended for the year, and we are unlikely to use blog-based communication for 2007-8.

We keep it online as a useful archive. Use the labels to get about. Click on student post and you'll find pieces written by students who took the course. Class summary will take you through the course content, (backwards) lecture by lecture. Other labels are more thematic - such as museums, climate change or dialogue - and reflect both topics the course aims to cover and the subjects students that year happened to find interesting. It's also worth scrolling down to find some links to other similar courses and science communication organisations.

If you are interested in taking the course in the future, please go to this page at Imperial College's Humanities Programme.

class 20: revision

Sarah started this class by writing up a blank timeline: 1985 at one end of the whiteboard, 2007 at the other. She asked the class to tell her where major developments in science communication would go within it. PUS, and events such as the Bodmer report ended up at one end, with PEST at the other. You might find the overview on this page a neat summary.

I then tried to synthesise some of the rest of term one in reference to a sightly 'sensational' story on bird flu. To quote Gregory and Miller on this topic:

sensationalism and gee-whizzary... [is] not a punishment inflicted on science stories by disdainful or malicious journalists. It arises in science journalism because of the rhetorical conventions of popularization (Gregory & Miller, 1998, 116-7)

This points us towards thinking about news values, and other contextual differences between the cultures producing news language and those constructing scientific discourse. It's also worth thinking about the specific context of the issue covered - are stories on MMR a different case from 'Climate Porn'?

In some ways linked to this, I also discussed questions around science and fiction. I went through the opinions of a variety of thinkers on the topic (e.g. Russell Stannard, Joan Solomon, Rosalind Haynes) and emphasised that students should take a developed approach to considering audience effects (an issue which is worth keeping in mind across the course)

Sarah then put some of term two together, by considering each of the specific media we've looked at.

• Museums
• The Internet
• Popular Science
• Documentary
• Education

She asked the class to list specific issues relating to these media, and what topics (such as boundary work, structure, interactivity, etc) might be an issue across them.

class 19: education

Firstly, thanks for all your essays - we'll get them back to you as soon as we can. I look forward to reading them.

This session acted partly as an introduction to the topic of school-science, but also as a revision of key issues in the history of thought on the Public Understanding of Science, which is important as we approach the exam.

We discussed the introduction of this new GCSE, and the general movement in school-science to build a curriculum based on what "everybody needs to know" rather than just what people training to be scientists should learn. A move away from training and towards PUS, or thinking about science "consumers" rather than the "producers". That last metaphor is from Martin Hollis at the QCA, see handout on WebCT for reference, please note he means engaged, 'empowered' consumers, not passive, manipulated ones. Specially, we were talking about English school-science, but the issues involved are applicable abroad.

We discussed how infrequently children are asked their own opinion as children, especially on science issues, but that the change in curriculum was going to involve bringing opinion into the classroom, moving to teach more about science than simply scientific content, training people up to be able to "engage" in all the PEST-based dialogue places such as the Dana centre run.

The second half of the class was an activity where groups in role as local business, the university sector, patents teachers or students considered what a change in school-science might involve. I asked each group whether they wanted to change or not, and although there were some very thoughtful pros and cons, overall you seemed against the change.

If anyone's interested in the interactions between stakeholders in education, it's worth looking at this report (n.b. links to pdf).

Popular Science magazine (online)

Image from here

The internet has revolutionised the way in which information is propagated to the mass audience, creating a communication web which encompasses the whole world. As a result, Newspapers, Magazines, Television Channels etc all have an associated website through which communication can continue, and Popular Science Magazine is no exception. I had a look through their website, to determine how effective and indeed engaging the site was.

My overall impression of the website was very positive, as it is well presented and entices you to have a look around. The home page includes their top articles from each of the different sections; How2.0, Science, Aviation and Space & Technology, as well as a PopSci blog section which instantly caught my eye. Navigation through the website is very simple, with the articles are clearly laid out in their respective categories. The articles themselves are from a varied range of topics, and in my opinion pitched at the right level for lay persons to understand. Links are available for further understanding on the topic.

I particularly liked the blog entry based on Laser tagging and graffiti technology (pictured), which enabled a building in Rotterdam to be used as a massive Etch-a-Sketch board.

Aminur Rahman

The Last Word

Everyweek in the New Scientist magazine I always end up skipping straight to the ‘Last Word’ column. The ‘Last Word’ is a small section of the magazine in which scientist from across the world try to answer questions from members of the public. These can vary from intelligent questions which are quite difficult to answer such as;

Why is it when two people walk together they often subconsciously start to walk in a synchronised manner?

To highly amusing, silly questions such as;

Why is snot green?

The highlights of the ‘Last Word’ column were, last year, made into a highly successful book aptly named ‘Does anything eat wasps?’ This was so well received by the general public that the follow-up ‘Why don’t penguins feet freeze?’ has just been released.

Even though these books are presented in a light-hearted and jovial manner I believe they actually represent a very good piece of science communication and further aid the publics understanding of science.

Why? One might ask. It is precisely this type of informal scientific writing which intrigues those who relish wit, insight and scientific curiosity, yet may not want to read the complex, and sometimes slightly boring articles in the New Scientist or Nature. These books are definitely a ‘wise, weird and wacky compendium that is guaranteed to amaze, inform and delight.’

Chris McLeod

howstuffworks.com

How Stuff Works is an informative and easy to understand website which answers day to day questions to more complicated, specialised questions. It covers a wide range of areas including Health, Money, Science and Travel just to name a few. These categories are then sub-divided into about six areas which make the information needed easy to find.

The endless amount of topics, each contain animations, pictures or video clips which not only increases the audiences’ understanding of the topic but also keeps the audience entertained! Having a glance at the topics increased my curiosity of how things do work and I believe I could spend hours on the website to increase my general knowledge and have all my curiosities answered!

The audience are able to sign up for weekly news updates from the website keeping them up-to-date with all the great stuff going on in the world and it also contains brain teasers, not only for fun but also to challenge the audience. A new feature of the website is the section on readers’ opinions where the audience are open to discussion boards in which they can state their opinions and views of various topics.

The downside of this website is that the immediate presentation is not as attractive to the eye as say the BBC Science and Nature Website. The BBC website caught my eye straightaway and I was curious to have a look around, whereas, it was only after I had a look around the ‘how stuff works’ website that I found the positives of the site.

Younsuk Oh

Class 18: Health promotion and health metaphor

Today we looked at health communications. Probably one of the biggest areas of science communication (bar the weather forecast), this area nevertheless often gets forgotten by PUS promoters. This is maybe because these communications don't come from the usual suspects, but from the government, charities, and businesses.

Health communication comes in all sorts of formats, but we focussed on just one: leaflets. We had a whole bunch of these, advising us on everything from meningitis to migraines, and evaluated their audience, purpose, and effectiveness (good practice for the essay due in next week). Generally we quite liked the ones we had; although we noted that their purpose was ultimately to inform, educate, and change behaviour, which raised the memory of traditional PUS.

We then had a look at the metaphors the leaflets used. The ones that we found were often in images; other than the 'military' metaphor of disease the text seemed to use relatively few 'live' - i.e. obvious - metaphors. However, a final point at the end was that, according to Lakoff and Johnson, all of our language is actually suffused with metaphor - we just don't notice it any more.

One thing I didn't get chance to mention: health promotion as a recognisible genre. We talked at the start about we recognised health communication, and mentioned things like purpose and who the communication comes from. But are there other things in the style that make us think 'health promotion'? Take a look at this ad and think about what it's trying to mimic and why...

“Parasite Rex” by Carl Zimmer

Ever lie in bed at night and swear that you can feel something crawling around inside your skull?

Well it is probably paranoia or it could just be a Botfly larva devouring your brain from the inside-out. This disturbing thought is just one of the disgusting and frightening images depicted in Carl Zimmer’s “Parasite Rex”.

The front cover of “Paraste Rex” is analogous with that of a 1950’s Sci Fi comic, but on further inspection we find that this is not a story of intergalactic space aliens, but that these hideous, disturbing and grotesque organisms are actually ‘common’ human parasites.

Parasite Rex is a refreshing popular science book that neither shys away from using scientific names nor tries to patronise the reader with endless repeats of the same information like most popular science books of recent years.

The story of the human tapeworm I found particularly nauseating as we travel from mouth to gut to the intestinal tract and find that these pulsating Cestodes can grow up to 30m in length and break up into hundreds of egg sacs, ready to infect new hosts.

I would strongly advise those with weak stomachs and heart conditions to read this book at their own risk, as Carl Zimmer pulls no punches and delivers what I would call, a riveting and enlightening picture of those organisms that feed, breed and survive at our expense.

Matthew Hayward

SciPod – New Scientist Podcast

With the use of iPods and other MP3 players on the increase, it is of no surprise that the science world has started using ‘Podcasts’ as a way of communicating science to the public. An example of a science magazine employing this method of communication is the NewScientist.com Podcast – or SciPod.

SciPod is a weekly podcast which is available for download on the New Scientist website. The programme consists of four or five pieces of science news which correspond to articles in the upcoming issue of New Scientist magazine - published the following day.

The informal style of the programme makes for easy listening and the language used make the more detailed aspects of the science easy to follow. The topics are often related to current issues, allowing listeners to learn more about subjects covered briefly in the news, such as climate change, obesity, etc. The variety of subject matter is broad, with different areas of science being included in each programme.

SciPod is an effective audio programme for communicating science to the public, in spite of the cheesy music and tag-lines such as “SciPod - it’s not just a podcast, it’s the very essence of happiness!” With specialist subject matter explained in layman terms and in digestible chunks of about 7 minutes per topic, SciPod is a good overview of the week’s science and technology news that engages the listener’s interest and may also encourage listener to pick up a copy of the magazine to found out even more, which, in my opinion, indicates that SciPod has successfully served its purpose as an effective form of science communication.

Cheryl Lai

Cosmopolitan

Even Cosmo has started to science communicate! Imagine my surprise when a quiz in the December 2006 issue with the headline “What sex is your brain?” turned out to have nothing to do with, well, what you expect of Cosmo!

The gregarious claim that men and women’s brains are “completely different” was supported by Professor Simon Baron-Cohen from the University of Cambridge. He asserts that women are “geared up for empathy” whereas men have “excellent spatial awareness.” Interestingly within the introductory paragraph to the quiz lies a contradiction. Men and women supposedly have different brains, but the Professor’s research concludes that “only 50% of each sex have the brain type that corresponds to their gender,” hence the quiz. In this article you can take the quiz to find out whether your brain is more male or more female, even though your sex should determine that already.

While I acknowledge that Cosmo readers may not be the most intellectual bunch, I wonder if such a huge contradiction went unnoticed by them. If women can have male brains and if men can have female brains, is there really such a thing as a male or female brain?

Why did I buy Cosmo? The free bag matched my shoes. My brain is male, in case you were wondering.

Noora Husseini

session 17: the internet

Comic-strip from xkcd.com - a webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language, mainly because I like the idea of a internet-shaped cake.

Today's lecture started with a link to last week's discussion on realism and persuasion in popular science books. I introduced the class to "bob the balloon" who demonstrated, in a very hands on way, Newton's Third of Motion.

We then, more seriously, we looked through some science website before discussing topics of authority, access and the history of hypertext. I asked the class to think about what elements of a website make it appear trustworthy. Examples included: how high it was on google-searches, whether it had commenting, linked to other rebutable sites, had advertising on it, had been updated recently, seemed big and well designed. Of course, we can be fooled by many of these, the pregnant man website I promised to link to is here.

The second half was a group activity where I asked people to design a site for a (hypothetical) telecommunications gallery at the Science Museum. We had some great ideas; interfaces based on history of mobile phones, various styles of virtual tour, many different ideas about involving texting visitors and ways of using 3G or VOIP technology to get people in the gallery and outside to interact.

The Science Channel

The science channel is a television channel from the same people behind the discovery channel, it focuses specifically on scientific issues. The channel focuses predominantly on space science, such as astronomy, human science and other topics in science related to humans aren’t usually broadcasted on this channel. This channel can be watched on television and also on pod casts.

I recently watched a documentary about the discovery of new planets, which was titled our destiny.

The documentary was very simple, explaining how new planets were discovered and by whom. The documentary has a narrative text which describes what’s on the screen and features several guest speakers from universities that carried out research in to the topic. In this documentary research that the scientists were doing was simplified to a point that their work seemed trivial. Although taking away from the scientists achievements, it was probably necessary so that the audience could have a better understanding of the topic.

The documentary takes advantages of visuals using a lot of actual pictures and footage of events in space; however during this no information on what these pictures depict is given. These are simply used as they are appealing to the eye, they have no informational value.

The Science channel explains scientific topics very simply making it easy to understand for lay audiences and even children. The channel however only looks at a small part of science and what it does look at is oversimplified. It is a very interesting channel and I would recommend it to anyone interested in space science.

By George Banjo

Science is a game

Game On is a temporary exhibition at the Science Museum looking at the technologies that have changed gaming over the decades. It looks at the earliest games, different game types (action, simulation and puzzle games), game soundtracks, games associated with films and many other aspects of gaming. Visitors to the exhibition get the chance to play a wide variety of games, from pong to the Nintendo Wii.

Obviously getting to play a lot of games is immense fun. It's not just the game's ability to distract but there is a nostalgic attraction to some of the older games, which heightens the experience. However, does such an exhibition really belong in a science museum?

A science museum's remit surely should be to educate, inform and interest the public in scientific issues and also more generally in science and technology. Game On is really a history of games. It looks at how new technologies impact on how games are played - the Internet's influence on multiplayer games for example - but does not examine how these technologies work. And who would pay attention to any explanation while trying to collect all the coins or win the race? Here the Science Museum fundamentally fails its remit.

The exhibition does raise some questions. How well do play and science education mix? For example, how well can a game convey a scientific principle? Is it justifiable to have an educational 'loss leader', an exhibition which has a rather a tenuous link to the remit of the museum but attracts a lot of people who may explore other parts of the museum which deal more directly with science? I have my doubts.

Ryan Dee

Animals in the Womb

‘Animals in the Womb’ aired on channel four on Thursday 21st December at 9pm. The lives of an Asian elephant, a dog and a dolphin were followed from conception to birth, with revolutionary ‘4D’ technology used to illustrate each stage with images of foetuses moving inside the womb.

Public appeal was obvious with plenty of cute pictures of baby animals waving, blinking and yawning at the audience. However, this wasn’t merely ‘soft science’ –there was a strong informative foundation behind the pink dolphins and waving puppies.

I was impressed by the depth, quality and scope of the information the programme provided, from embryology to evolution to behaviour, all delivered in ‘everyday’ terminology that the layman could understand. The programme kept the audience awake by switching between species, rather than just recounting the lifecycle of each in turn. Computer imaging was also used to good effect, bringing the science alive.

However, I felt that the length of the programme was slightly too long; lay audiences may loose interest after the first hour. It would also have been nice to see a human foetus for comparison of the different stages of development. This may have related the programme to the audience more closely.

Despite these criticisms, viewing ‘Animals in the womb’ was a refreshing and rewarding experience. The programme was informative, appealing and exciting – exactly the way science communication in the public sector should be!

Submitted by Lucy Fray

science and pseudoscience

Do you know the difference? Dr Ben Goldacre (he of 'Bad Science' fame) talks about which category he thinks 'Dr' Gilian McKeith falls into in this Guardian article. See her side of the story on her website.

Popular Science

We started the session asking what is popular science, looking at some titles and considering whether we thought they were popular science or not. We then moved on to the broader question of what does popular science mean? What does the content popular science, indeed it's very existence, say about the cultural role of science?

Baudouin Jurdant suggests popular science can be considered as the "autobiography of science". Written mainly by scientists it articulates a public face of both scientific content and practise. This issue was largely discussed in the context of boundary work, we the class close analysis of an extract from this book; looking at where the writers construct and/or apply boundaries between science and an other.

We had a good student point raised about half way through. It was suggested that it was ironic I was talking so much about boundaries, when popular science was about acting as a bridge/ point of translation between science and the public. I agree, but... popular science can both aim to bring such groups together and act to separate them at the same time (we shouldn't imagine social actions are consistent). Last term Sarah probably mentioned a paper by Stephen Hiltgarter (see reading list). This argues that all popularised science, be it in book form or something like the Dana center, emphasises the difference between the public and science. The very existence of popularised science suggests the need for some special translation between science and society and so acts to emphasis the gaps between them. It might also be worth reading this paper by Massimiano Bucchi.

I also mentioned the problematic status of popular science books in terms of their claims to reality; a topic we'll pick up on next week. Baudouin Jurdant argues that much of the status of science is constructed by not being literature; science is special because it has a stronger (empirical) link to reality than simply text. Jurdant suggests that popular science is a rather problematic genre; textually communicating something that is by definition extra-literary. I suggested popular science books have to find ways in text to be as persuasive as visual or physical demonstrations, and we investigated this in some popular science books I'd taken out of the library

Anyone looking at popular science books as an essay topic should read the papers in the journal Public Understanding of Science by Jon Turney and Baudouin Jurdant. You can access them electronically from college. This is in addition to this week's reading, also by Turney, which is on webCT.

Hamster power

Amidst a frantic band of jumping and shouting little kids, a science teacher attempts to explain the concept of conservation of energy to an 8-year old. Meanwhile, another bunch of children is jumping up down, waving their hands in the air, to make a lightning bolt strike a tree. Designed to be yet another ‘interactive’ science exposition, the energy gallery in the science museum subjects a hapless visitor to a torrent of acoustic abuse and even electric shock therapy.

Indeed, for adults, the energy gallery may not be quite what they had in mind for an enjoyable, quiet afternoon out. However, by keeping in mind that it is aimed at children of about seven to fourteen years old, I think the gallery succeeds quite well in conveying some of the key issues concerning energy and its associated problems.

With a minimum of text and an overload of audio-visual-sensual effects, it is made clear that it will be very hard to change our current pattern of energy consumption. Visitors can have a try at energy management by pretending to be minister in a computer simulation. The kids are asked if they would process there hamster into electrical energy to power the television, illustrating rather well that tough choices must be made.

Although all-in-all a good initiative, it is deplorable that virtually no mention is made of the relationship between fossil fuels and climate change, which might raise questions considering that BP and BASF were the main sponsors of the gallery. Definitely worthwhile visiting with your hyperactive little cousin!

Submitted by Cornelis Plet

The March of the Penguins: a Trade Off

The film documentary ‘La Marche de l’empereur’ was first released in January 2005 in France. Other versions were later released including the American ‘March of the Penguins’ which we saw in Britain. It follows the reproductive journey of Emperor penguins in the Antarctic.

It has been received as a documentary, and in that category has won many awards including an Oscar. Although I think it is a brilliant film, I do not agree with this classification. Documentaries are visual records conveying factual information. Being interpreted as a documentary when it clearly isn’t bestows on it false factual authority.

Anthropomorphism is used to increase empathy in the audience. However, this leads to misunderstanding the nature of the penguins. There is a trade-off between how realistically you portray the subject, and how the devices that create empathy affect the realism. The French version was dubbed to give the penguins dialogue. It successfully instilled empathy in the audience, but was a far cry from a visual record.

Although the American version was narrated, it again developed the penguins’ character beyond fact. It assigned the penguins emotions such as love, and encouraged an interpretation that has led to both the Conservatives and US religious groups heralding the Emperor penguin as the epitome of family values.

Kate Royle

A Quite Interesting Blog

Based on the BBC 2 Quiz show, QI (it stands for Quite Interesting if you didn’t know) The Book Of General Ignorance throws what you thought was true in the recycling bin and sheds light on common misconceptions in History (Medieval people did not believe that the Earth was flat), Invention (Thomas Edison didn’t invent the light bulb) and Nature and Science in general (the Blue Whale is not the largest organism on Earth – it is a 2000 year old mushroom covering 890 hectares).

Obviously then, it is not a pure science book, but what science it does contain is very enlightening. The book is broken up into small bits of texts only a few paragraphs long explaining the who/what/where/which in question. The science is not spread evenly throughout the book, but is rather delivered in chunks of a few small articles, so you could go through a few pages encountering no science at all – but that’s alright because each article is written in a witty manner, and most of them are indeed quite interesting.

Since it is not marketed strictly as a science book, it has the potential to reach a larger audience than most science books. Of course it doesn’t go into as great a detail as those science books, but in reaching more non-scientific audience it may spark a hidden interest in science in more members of the public, which can only be a good thing.

Class 15: Science in museums

Continuing our series of classes on the media of science communication, today we discussed - and experienced - science as it is presented in museums. While your handout (on WebCT) and the reading for this week (chapter 8 of Gregory and Miller 1998) give you some idea of the history of museums, helping us to understand the background to the format and the development of science centres, in our visit to the Science Museum we tried to concentrate on questions of exhibitions as constructed spaces.

We looked round two galleries: Making of the Modern World (ground floor), and Energy - fuelling the future (2nd floor). (Note that both have extensive websites attached to them, which can be used independently of the galleries - an interesting development in itself.) The galleries use very different styles, at least at first glance: MMW is object-heavy; while Energy contains very few objects but lots of computer-based interactives. We tried not to simply experience the galleries as a given - as we often do when wandering around museums - but to think critically about the effects they had and how these were created. In particular we considered what audience the gallery was designed for, how it was structured and laid out (and why), and how science was presented. In other words, we thought about the galleries as made for a particular purpose.

Opinion differed on both galleries: to some, Energy was 'gimmicky' while MMW was overwhelming in the mass of objects it presented. In our discussion afterwards, we touched on funding (how often are galleries updated, and where does the money come from?), purpose (are science museums there to present history, highlight contemporary science, or help people learn for themselves?), and the differences between visiting a science museum and an art gallery.

One final thought that we didn't get chance to discuss: should controversial science be presented in museums, and how could this be done?

Punk Science

Last term Sarah organised a trip to a "dialogue" event at the Dana Centre. I thought we could do something similar this term. Except this time, to see people aiming more to entertain than engage.

The "Punk Science" boys will be performing on the 27th Feb. They've been doing shows at Dana since it opened, and have even taken them to the Edinburgh Festival. The Metro said “Laugh as you learn” and the British Council sent them on a tour of Malta. There's more information about them here and a review of one of their older shows (by a Imperial College student) here.

They tend to sell out fast, so if you are interested email me, and I'll see about getting tickets.

The Nature Podcast

The Nature Podcast is released on a weekly basis and is intended as a free audio supplement for the famous journal Nature. I believe that the Nature Podcast is an invaluable resource for time and money-strapped students that wish to keep abreast of any new developments in pretty much every scientific field.

Even though I have a subscription to Nature and try to selectively read every biologically-related article each week, it’s still useful to listen to the podcast, as I find that it simplifies and consolidates the main gist of some pretty complex research.

In fact, the podcast is so good that I often find myself listening to and understanding the basics of research from outside the biological field, such as astrophysics (which is quite interesting incidentally!).

Thus, I believe that listening to the Nature Podcast can help give a broader appreciation of all sciences. This is especially useful at an undergraduate level, where I believe there’s a ‘funneling’ effect of teaching; as you progress through your degree you get a more and more detailed understanding of a certain section of the discipline you’re studying, but as a result, the overall picture of what is going on in the other sciences in general can be lost. Would you agree?

The Nature Podcast makes my learning and inclusion of outside reading easier, and more diverse. I hope that many of you make use of this resource and perhaps consider listening to it on the way into university each week.

Submitted by Heny Mori

How the Universe Got its Spots

When is a doughnut the same thing as a coffee cup? Is the universe infinite or just really big?

Janna Levin sets out to answer these questions and many more in her book How the Universe Got its Spots: Diary of a Finite Time in a Finite Space. She writes about important scientists and theories of complex geometries and strings – including a fantastic section where she makes use of Flatland by Edwin Abbott Abbott (discussed in one of our lectures).

But the book captivates primarily through the way the author goes about transmitting her message. The explanations of chaos and background radiation are thrown in amongst accounts of her personal life with its love woes and frequent relocations.

She also discusses how scientists are viewed (badly dressed, white lab coats and glasses) and is realistic about the degree of subjectivity innate in scientific research (theories “fall out of favour” or are “all the rage”). Actually the book itself renders a moving and accurate picture of what being a scientist is all about.

Although this book rides the popularity wave created by writer-physicists such as Stephen Hawking, it is very different in tone. Janna Levin succeeds in conveying the beauty of physics in a manner that is alternatingly poetic and wryly humorous. All this makes the book a lovely read for people interested in theoretical physics but put off by the degree of dry technical content in some popular science books.

Inspired? Buy the book or become a cosmologist yourself.

Submitted by Alex Martinsson Dorff

Class 15 info

Next week - Monday 5th February - we will be thinking about museums as a medium for science communication. To help us do this our (double) class will be based in the Science Museum.

Please don't forget that we are meeting at 12 just inside the main entrance to the Science Museum, rather than our normal classroom.

Class 14: Documentaries

This week's class was given by a guest lecturer - Bob Sternberg from the Science Communication Group. We were given a whirlwind tour of TV documentary over the last century, from the 1920s Nanook of the North, through the different forms that emerged in the '60s with the introduction of new technology, to the mixes of different approaches often found in science documentary today.

We heard about four basic types of documentary: expository (where an argument is followed through), observational ('fly on the wall'), interactive (or interventionist, making use of interviews), and finally a reflexive form that acknowledges the constructed nature of the reality a documentary presents.

Bob left us thinking about how all documentary actually creates the 'reality' that we are presented with. This is a key idea that we'll be considering over the next few weeks as we look at other media for science communication. The close analytical work we started doing today - asking how a particular effect is created, who has done it, and why - will be repeated on other media such as museums, websites, and science books.

Bob's handout, and one from us giving some extra advice on assignment four, are both available on WebCT.

Sciencehorizons

A new government funded "PEST" programme, Sciencehorizons, was launched yesterday. A series of events will run nationally over the next 6 months, aiming to get people discussing their hopes and fears for future technologies. The discussions will be fed back to the government and could help shape future science policy.

Sciencehorizons aren't just running events at places like Dana, but have provided interactive packs to download, so you can run their own dialogue events. The BBC news story's spin on them is "science by cartoons". To spark discussion, the packs use cartoon characters of "everyday folk" living in the future.

(click on the image to see a bigger version if you want to read the text)

Personally, I think the resources look more like something aimed at people in their early teens than adults. Which I'm sure isn't the (patronising?) tone they'd want to go for. But that's just my view, maybe it is a great way of engaging people with science policy. I'll keep an open mind, at least till the results come out.

Class 13: presentations

Seeing as the students provided the content today, there isn't much for me to report.

But thanks to everbody for their great presentations - I don't think I've seen a year with such a great collection of props! Special thanks to those who agreed to attend outside of time-tabled hours so we could fit you all in. Thanks also to Giskin for helping us mark.

ucl seminars

UCL's Science and Technology Studies seminars this term. The one on the 26th Feb might be relevant to this course.

Creationism against science

This topic of ‘where we came’ from was the main topic of The Guardian’s weekly science update podcast. The focus was on the debate between intelligent design and science, and whether or not both of these views should be taught in schools. The point about it being taught in schools was on the back of a video sent to state schools outlying the basis of intelligent design.

The podcast used 4 different scientists only one of which actually supported the notion of intelligent design. This first scientist introduced the idea behind intelligent design, and the notion of irreducible complexity. This was really the only argument for the intelligent design belief that the podcast put across, which made it a little one sided.

The remaining 15 minutes of the podcast was dedicated to arguments against intelligent design, initially started by a ‘Christian believer’ studying palaeontology at Cambridge. This scientist totally dismissed the theory and then followed this up with the question of exactly what there was to teach as intelligent design from a scientific perspective. This was then adequately reinforced by a professor at UCL and also a scientist from the U.S.A who has had to deal with this debate in more severe cases.

In summation the podcast has certainly re-affirmed my belief in evolution and did so without clouding the basic argument with ‘too’ advanced scientific jargon. There could have possibly have been more of an argument put forward for the intelligent design theory but to be fair they may have just struggled to find scientists willing to argue that theory.

submitted by Chris Hanley

The Kids Know It Network: Biology Domain

The Kids Know It Network is an online-learning network, a lot like a virtual homework club. It is divided into sections. Biology is predominant, but there are maths, geography and geology networks too. Unfortunately, the physical sciences are sadly underrepresented.

As a biologist, I had a nose around the biology sections. The network is easy to navigate, and the information is clearly presented and uses the same adult but child-like language your favourite primary school teacher used to use.

Each section starts off very basic, but on the whole progresses to fairly detailed explanations. The wordsearch in the games section includes words like ‘macronucleus’ and ‘chromatin’, giving an idea of the depth the website goes into and also an idea of the poor quality of the games!

Information includes a network on human biological systems such as the circulatory and endocrine system, a database of animals and a network on biology basics like the make up of the cell.

One can imagine children treating the ‘chapters’ like most undergraduates treat journal articles, using what they recognise and ignoring the rest. Because of this the website can be used by children of a variety of ages, from junior school through to years 7 or 8, but due to the lack of good games, only for work purposes.

Submitted by Charis Howard

opportunities for budding writers

If anyone is even slightly interested in science writing should enter this competition.

Also, Nature have an opening for a summer intern. It'll be very competitive, but if anyone's interested, then email me and I'll forward you the details.

Space Station Experience

The human need to explore the universe and gain an understanding about the larger world has prevailed for centuries. The development of the International Space Station (ISS) which started its construction in 1998 has been one of the greatest engineering achievements, since a man first stepped on the Moon in 1969.

Spacestation is a 3-D movie running on IMAX cinemas all over the world giving the opportunity for millions of people to experience what it is like to work at a facility in space 220 miles above the Earth.

I had my 3-D experience of the Space Station at the IMAX theatre located at the Science Museum and it took me spacewalking under zero gravity alongside all the other astronauts. The movie is a story about how much effort is put in by engineers and astronauts in achieving the dream of a complete research laboratory in space.

The film also contains a scene where a dialogue activity had been organised between the astronauts of the space station and a group of school children through satellite communications. This type of activity helps encourage a younger audience to ask questions from human pioneers who have ventured into the space and learn from their experiences.

The large size of the screen combined with the sounds and the 3-D imagery takes anyone watching it right to the Space Station and also the movie is free for Imperial College students at the Science Museum-IMAX!

Submitted by Malith Wijesinghe

please note...

...there is a change to the published class schedule this term. Monday 5th February will now be the session on museums and science centres (involving a trip to the Science Museum; more details to come), and Monday 12th will be the class on popular science. Both are double sessions.

Class 12: Speaking on science

Today was an informal class designed to help you prepare for the assignments next week. We discussed some of the places in which science is spoken about - coming up with a surprising range, from pubs to the radio. Next came some personal top tips for speaking: the power of pauses and preparation, being a lighthouse, signposting, and using comedy, amongst others. Much of what was said is repeated on the class handout, now on WebCT.

You then got a chance to try out speaking at the front of class and to get some feedback. Overall themes were probably a need for volume, being careful about body language, and avoiding 'um's and 'er's as much as possible.

Next week you are expected to come to at least one hour (out of four) in order to give your talk, give feedback to someone else, and to support your colleagues. Check your inboxes for your time slot!

science and the public conference

There aren't many places that talk about science communication in an academic way. So if you're interested in the theory as well as the practice, you might want to know about the conference we run here at Imperial. I'm posting our call for papers below - I doubt any of you would want to submit, but it might be worth sticking the date in your diary. We use MSc students as runners on the day - maybe you'd like to volunteer as well?

Call For Papers - Science & the Public Conference, Imperial College London, 19th May 2007

Science studies research tends to focus on "the lab", being chiefly concerned with the internal workings of the scientific community. This conference aims to bring together the strands of academia that consider science as it intersects with non-scientific cultures.

The conference title's dichotomy between "science" and "the public" consciously references the approach often taken by the scientific community. We are aware of the variety of problems of referring to the "the public"; research problematising the term may form part of the conference programme.

Other topics covered may include:
* Science and the arts (including science fiction)
* Innovation studies and science policy research
* Popular science
* NGOs, science and development
* The continuing application of the "deficit model"
* Public programmes aiming at "Engagement with Science"
* Boundary work
* Specific media: films, the internet, museums, radio and others
* Science and education: young vs. old, formal vs. informal

There is no especially contemporary focus and historical work on any of these areas would be most welcome. Neither do we limit submission to those within the science studies community, or only from the UK.

We would particularly like to encourage those who take a critical approach to the topics described above to submit abstracts. Moreover we should stress this is an academic - rather than practitioner-focussed - conference. The conference will focus on, but not be limited to, early-career researchers.

Abstracts (no longer than 300 words) for a 20-minute presentation should be emailed to scienceandpublic@googlemail.com by 1st March 2007. Enquires also to this address.

class 11: rhetoric

Although today's lecture was officially entitled "rhetoric" we spent a lot of it talking about coursework. You can now download the assignment 3 details on WebCT. Also please note that Humanities is now level three of Sherfield, not Mech Eng or level 5.

My focus on coursework was party because there are other humanities courses where you learn about rhetoric, such as the Saying True Things UG module, or the MSc in Science Communication. What I emphasised today was that much of science communication (including technical scientific communication) is about persuasion, or at least we can read it as such.

I also talked about Fahrenstock's focus on the way the audience of a piece effects the content, as well as suggesting the idea that the medium itself might "make" the message. The wikipedia entry on rhetoric might give you some further overview of the academic field, and there is a short bibliograpahy in the reading list, to which I'd like to add this:

• Prelli, L (2001) Topical Perspective and the Rhetorical Grounds for Practical Reason in Arguments About Science, in Stocklmayer, S et al (eds) Science Communication in Theory and Practice (London, Kluwer) pp 63-82.

Despite my link to wikipedia above, I did also emphasise that we expect you to read more than what is on the web for your assignments. Although wikipedia and similar resources might be useful to get a first-glance hold of a topic (in fact, it's pretty good on science studies), it would not normally be appropriate to cite it in an essay. Wikipedia is, as members of the class mentioned, "policed". But this not the same as peer review.

Like lecture notes, dictionary definitions and most encylopedia entries, use it to get an idea of a topic but don't cite it in coursework. If you have any questions about using a particular source or want advice on further reading just ask. Normally the best place to start is the bibliogrpahy of the textbook and our reading list (including bibliographies in the books we suggest).

tomorrow's world

Tomorrow's World to return

Jan 1st, not April 1st

Only days into 2007 and already I have a contestant for weirdest piece of science communication of the year.

PUS campaigning group Sense about Science have published a "science for celebrities" leaflet. This will be placed in "VIP hangouts" such as VIP lounges at airports, Premiership football clubs, exclusive restaurants and clubs, aiming to catch the attention of those foolish celebs who ignorantly expose the dangers of MMR or the wonders of eating sprouting beans. BBC story here, The Guardian here.

I assume they are taking the mickey as a PR stunt, but (a) it's hard to tell with Sense About Science and (b) I'm still not entirely sure of what they are trying to achieve.