Not just science

#3 is the most important answer, I think.

Don't sweat it.

These "Science" blogs are not about science anyway, but scientism...using science as a front for religion bashing and poliical propagandizing.

PZ and TFK are too of the best examples.

Science? Balderdash!

At least YOU are a philosopher and proud of it. THAT deserves respect.

It worries me that we live in a society where people care about the personal lives and political views of Hollywood celebrities. Well, the SEED science bloggers may have interesting lives, or may articulate their political views better than most, but they were selected for SEED science blogs because they are scientists. That they choose to write about their personal lives and political views is their choice, and we have a choice to read them or not. Still, I wonder if the balance has tipped...is there too little science and too much of everything else?

Obviously, SEED intended for these blogs to go beyond science: "Our mission is to build a community of like-minded individuals who are passionate about science and its place in our culture, and give them a place to meet." Still, asking that one day per week be set aside for science seems like a pretty reasonable request.

I've often wondered who the audience(s) is/are and how the SEED science blogs serve them. If they are looking for science or science-made-simple, they do get that sometimes. But the ratio of noise (again, it may be very interesting noise) to signal is quite high. Will someone who is looking for scientific information stop looking on SEED science blogs because it is low-yield?

As I understood the concept, the Science Week was a whole week of nothing but science.

Now, I don't know about you, but if I were to do that, I'd maybe post one post in the week. I simply don't know that much I can spit it out like, say Mark Chu-Carroll for math or PZ Stoat-Mangler does for developmental biology.

A blog is something personal. I barely get given any cash for this - about $50/month, which I donate to some or other worthy cause. I am not here as a paid journalist, but as a person who is primarily interested in science (in my case, the philosophical implications thereof), who happens also to be a human being with lots of other interests. I shy away from politics unless it gets on my goat (mostly to do with the death of free society as we are presently undergoing it), but if I were restricted to one topic only, I'd leave and go back to Blogger. This is my home, so to speak. You are welcome here, but don't tell me what to talk about.

Pull up a chair and crack a beer. Let's talk.

John - not sure if the "You" in you are welcome here is the editorial you or refers to my post. If the latter, we have no beef. I didn't tell you what to write about. I was just wondering...not voicing an opinion. I don't know anything about philosophy (too abstract for me; I'm just not that smart) but isn't there room for musing without reaching a conclusion? I'm just saying...

So what I'm musing is...why should anyone care/be interested in what the SEED science bloggers have to say? I don't mean that in the negative way it sounds. I mean - why is what you say any the more important or interesting than what any other 100 or 1,000 or 10,000 people might say? Whether/what you are paid isn't the point. You've been given a prominent platform. Could SEED just start over tomorrow with another cohort of bloggers, if there is nothing to distinguish all of you from any other set of 100 interesting people who happen to do or know something connected to science?

Could SEED just start over tomorrow with another cohort of bloggers, if there is nothing to distinguish all of you from any other set of 100 interesting people who happen to do or know something connected to science?

Sure they could. If I get readers, it's because they like what I write, most of the time. If SEED wants to consign me to the refuse heap of history, that too is up to them. But I'll do what I do. Hier stehe ich; ich kann nicht anders...

Anyone want to discuss intelligent design of creationist antivaccination?

How about the creation of a vaccination against belief in intelligent design - or religion of any sort, come to that?

"PZ Stoat-Mangler" *chuckles*

We all have a free choice - which blogs to read, and which posts to read on those blogs. To me it's all about balance. I come primarily to try to learn some science, or some philosophy of science, but I am interested in the bloggers as people and in what they think about other things. No one is holding a gun to my head to make me read every post.

I have no problem with your balance, John, and your injection of humour, and I'll keep reading you, for as long as you keep making this effort, which I want you to know is appreciated. I may be selective about which posts I read, but so what? If I hung on your every word like an adoring adolescent fan there would be reason to worry about my state of mind. Well, there is anyway, but.....

To me Carl Zimmer gets the balance right also, and even when he is occasionally on the 'usual issue' he is suitably restrained in his treatment of it, and keeps it on the level of science and responds with scientific arguments. To me that's fine. So he flogs a book occasionally - that doesn't seem unreasonable in order to get his online writings, which are a joy to read.

Similarly, Hawksie is always a good read. He is rarely off the science, and he sets it out so a dumb bunny like me can learn something. He doesn't want comments, that's fine - there's nothing I could say to him that would be worth anything anyway, in his subject he's on a different planet from me and I can only learn from him and admire his scholarship. I wouldn't mind asking him a stupid question occasionally, but he probably gets a million of them.

Gene Expression is good, now that my innate suspicions of the purpose of it all have been assuaged, but I just wish those guys would speak English. It's a whole new language, isn't it?

But I have to be honest. I have quit even going to PZ's blog - I respect him and admire the way he writes about biology, and I have no sympathy at all with religious rantings, but his blog has become so tiresomly repetitiously single-issue that he has lost it for me. In that case I am completely on Ellen's wavelength - too little science and too much of everything else, mostly one thing. Like he cares, he doesn't need my readership, the responses he gets show he is writing about the things that get the most people most excited. That's fine. I'm the weird one, I've known that a long time, I'll go and hang around with the other weirdos.

I also get turned off by any kind of political extreme position. I don't mind someone throwing in some political issues, but the expectation is that scientists are fairly objective people (while still being human) and that their treatment ought to be, if not totally detached (which is unrealistic) at least constrained by the objectivity which they have learned as part of their discipline. Obviously biased bipartisan political rantings of any stripe will fairly soon send me away.

Finally, I have to assume that where provision is made for comments, it is for a reason. It's not there to harass the blogger or make a confounded nuisance of myself, but it's there to use. I don't comment a lot, I often don't feel I have anything worthwhile that I can contribute (I haunt the blogs about things I have not had the chance to learn about, not the ones that I have), but occasionally I will - maybe to ask a question, or say something to elicit a response in order to try to clarify something in my own mind, or offer a point of view if I have one that seems relevant, or maybe occasionally just to make what is intended to be a good humoured joke and let the blogger know that someone out here is reading and appreciating. If I happen to do that and consistently get ignored, I'm going to get the message and just quietly go away. Again, no big deal, but it's a matter of free choice, both ways. Humans are interactive creatures, and just occasionally it's fun to interact. No response, no fun, no John (not Wilkins), no problem.

And what I can say about John Wilkins is that he has always responded, even when I didn't expect him to. He's under no obligation, but for the record, he always has.

He'll probably ignore this now, just to irritate me :)