nisbetmc | June 3, 2008
Note: Trends reflect the number of combined articles appearing annually in the New York Times and the Washington Post containing in the headline or lead paragraph the key words for psychic: "psychic" or "psychic medium" or "spirit medium" or "extrasensory perception," or "ESP," or the keywords for UFOs: "UFO" or "alien abduction" or "extraterrestrial." Source.
It troubles me to write, but a combination of signs point to a resurrection for the paranormal in American culture. As I have reviewed in past columns for the American Prospect and Skeptical Inquirer, the peak for the paranormal was…
nisbetmc | May 30, 2008
Released around the time of Expelled's premiere, this YouTube clip produced by the American Association for the Advancement of Science features Francis Collins, CEO Alan Leshner, and others discussing the compatibility of science, religion, and evolution. Collins ends the video by urging that we need to return to the middle ground, a place where we can celebrate both science and faith.
nisbetmc | May 22, 2008
An artist's take on the "scary wonder" of nanotechnology.
The asbestos of tomorrow? As we wrote in our article last year at The Scientist, that's not the type of frame device that augurs well for public perceptions of nanotechnology. But it's exactly the perceptual lens by which the New York Times covers a new study appearing this week at Nature Nanotechnology. As Kenneth Chang opens the article, setting the train of thought for readers:
Nanotubes, one of the wonder materials of the new age of nanotechnology, may carry a health risk similar to that of asbestos, a wonder material of an…
nisbetmc | May 20, 2008
When Inconvenient Truth was released in 2006, Gallup polling showed that less than a majority of Americans had a favorable view of Al Gore. Yet just following his Nobel Prize win at the end of 2007, Gallup polling showed that this favorability rating had jumped to 58%. Call it the "Nobel bounce."
A recently released Pew survey shows that Gore's approval rating continues to hover just over the majority mark at 53%. Notably, in Pew tracking, as shown above, Gore has gained 11% in the "very favorable" category among Dems and 19% in the "very favorable" category among the college educated.…
nisbetmc | May 19, 2008As I wrote last week, in John McCain's recent television ad focusing on global warming, he frames his position as a pragmatic "middle way" approach between the two extremes of denying there is a problem and resorting to heavy taxation and regulation. The ad even ends by offering up the complementary frames that global warming is in fact a national security problem and involves a moral duty to future generations. Perhaps most notably, the ad opens by using imagery of more intense hurricanes, a "pandora's box" framing that has led to claims of alarmism directed at advocates such as Al Gore.
So…
nisbetmc | May 14, 2008
The irony of the 2008 presidential race is that this time around, the Democratic nominee is by far the more religiously devout candidate, promoting a born again language and professed faith. In a match up with John McCain, it's Barack Obama who can genuinely speak the language of evangelicals, softening some of the Democratic party's "God problem."
Indeed, news reports are speculating that many young Evangelical voters might break for Obama in the general election, a proposition that fits with some of the recent polling data that I have spotlighted at this blog.
The Obama campaign is already…
nisbetmc | May 13, 2008
At the BIO 2008 International Convention coming up in June in San Diego, I will be participating in a panel on the communication challenges facing biotechnology. Below are the details on the panel, followed by a 500 word summary of the key points of my presentation. Readers should find the themes familiar.
Communication Challenges: Defining the Industry for Policymakers and the Public
Conference Breakout Sessions
Track Policy
Date/Time 6/19/2008 4:00 PM - 5:30 PM
Location San Diego Convention Center
Room 25 A
One of the key mandates offered up by policymakers taking part in a special session…
nisbetmc | May 13, 2008The NY Times runs a lengthy front page Sunday feature exploring Obama's years as an activist and politician in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago. As the feature recounts, Obama has always been a political pragmatist and a master at framing a message that brings diverse constituencies together.
"There are some people who say he's not strong enough on this or that, that he's wishy-washy, that he's trying to have it both ways," Abner J. Mikva, a former congressman and mentor to Obama tells the NY Times. "But he's not looking for how to exclude the people who don't agree with him. He's…
nisbetmc | May 12, 2008
In a new campaign advertisement (above), Senator John McCain focuses on global warming, framing his position as a pragmatic "middle way" approach between the two extremes of denying there is a problem and resorting to heavy taxation and regulation. The ad even ends by offering up the complementary frame that global warming is in fact a national security problem. (Also notably, the ad refers to and uses imagery of more intense hurricanes, a "pandora's box" framing that has led to claims of alarmism directed at advocates such as Al Gore.)
While McCain's commitment to climate change policy is…
nisbetmc | May 12, 2008
Gallup has released a survey showing that at this point in the race, Obama's association with Wright may be potentially more damaging to his candidacy than McCain's continued embrace of Bush. The reason, as the survey details (below), is that the association with Wright actually hurts McCain among some Democrat leaners (19% say less likely to vote for Obama), whereas McCain's strong alliance with Bush has less of an impact among Republican leaners (10% less likely to vote for McCain).
In political advertising and messaging, you can expect both campaigns along with independent expenditure…
nisbetmc | May 12, 2008
Since Earth Day, a number of polls have been released confirming that public opinion on climate change has changed very little over the past two years or since the premiere of Gore's An Inconvenient Truth. Conventional wisdom pegged Gore's film and media campaign as changing the nature of the debate in the public's mind, but unfortunately this interpretation doesn't hold up to the data. Americans already concerned about the issue have grown more intense in their feelings, while many others continue to disregard the problem.
The latest evidence is this Pew survey, that details the lingering…
nisbetmc | May 11, 2008
Obama as young Luke Skywalker, Hillary as Darth Vader, Bill as the Emperor, Bill Richardson as Han Solo. This new viral video promoting Obama's candidacy is brilliant and effective humor. Just more evidence as to why Obama is engaging young voters like no other presidential candidate in recent memory.
nisbetmc | May 9, 2008
Pew has released an in depth analysis of news coverage of the Pope's U.S. visit. As I have posted previously, some media critics have claimed that the press gave the Pontiff a pass on hard-hitting questions while polls show that the Pope's visit was a major public relations success.
As the Pew news analysis finds, the Pope's visit dominated headlines, accounting for 16% of the total news hole for the week, eclipsing for example the 5% of coverage devoted to the war in Iraq and second in attention only to the 31% of coverage devoted to the election. According to Pew, the saturation coverage…
nisbetmc | May 9, 2008Can a radio talk show host motivate Republicans to turn out in a Democratic primary and vote strategically for a candidate? Past research suggests that political talk radio can have an independent influence on political participation, but in the primaries last week, how much specific impact did Rush Limbaugh's Operation Chaos have on the primary results?
Limbaugh urged his mostly Republican listeners to turn out and vote for Clinton. I am sure we will see analysis and papers from political scientists on this topic, but for now, here's the best summary of the exit poll data that I have seen…
nisbetmc | May 7, 2008Bill McKibben's latest grassroots project is the launch of www.350.org, a Web portal and blog designed to focus world attention on cutting the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million.
From the Web site:
Dear friends,
350 is the red line for human beings, the most important number on the planet. The most recent science tells us that unless we can reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million, we will cause huge and irreversible damage to the earth.
We're planning an international campaign to unite the world around the number 350, and we need…
nisbetmc | May 6, 2008
Evidence for the influence of an effective media strategy, from a just released Pew survey:
Following his first visit to the United States as spiritual leader of the world's Catholics, Pope Benedict XVI is viewed more favorably than he was a few weeks before his trip. Currently, 61% of Americans say they have a favorable impression of the pope, up from 52% in late March. Views of Pope Benedict's outreach to other faiths have shown substantial improvement. Roughly half (51%) of those who have heard at least a little about the pope say he has done an excellent or good job with respect to his…
nisbetmc | May 5, 2008
This week's On the Media spotlights Rushmore Drive, the new search engine marketed to African Americans (audio above). As the program describes, the search engine uses a unique algorithm to find those sites that are most heavily trafficked by blacks and to return them at the top of the search results. From host Bob Garfield's interview with CEO Johnny Taylor:
JOHNNY TAYLOR: The algorithm, it's one of the few places where the black community becomes the majority for purposes of producing results. In all of the mainstream search engines, the majority's behavior is what detects how the results…
nisbetmc | May 5, 2008
Do voters under the age of 30 always trend more liberal and more likely to vote Democrat? Contrary to conventional wisdom, history and data say "No."
Political preferences are a product not just of lifecycle shifts but are also linked to the political climate. As Pew reviews in a recent analysis (graph above), the current generation of young voters, who came of age during the turmoil, scandal, and failures of the George W. Bush presidency, trend strongly Democrat, just as the previous generation of GenXers who grew up in the prosperous Reagan years trended Republican. Here's more from the…
nisbetmc | May 1, 2008A round up of recent news coverage where I have provided analysis...
1. USA Today ran this profile of actor Ed Begley, focusing on his commitment to environmental issues and a green lifestyle. Here's what I said about the impact that citizens can have on their peers when they become advocates for a cause such as environmental conservation:
Early adopters of such practices "definitely make a difference," says Matthew Nisbet, a professor at American University in Washington, D.C., who studies public affairs.
"Citizens who eagerly adopt environmentally friendly behaviors are what marketers call…
nisbetmc | April 29, 2008As I wrote yesterday, one of the emotional strategies employed in Expelled is to paint atheist pundits as the stand-ins for "big science," in the process selectively avoiding interviews with any of the many prominent scientists who have emphasized the compatibility between evolution and religious perspectives.
And as I noted in this earlier post, the claim by Richard Dawkins, PZ Myers, and other atheist hardliners that science undermines the validity of religion, even respect for religion, is at odds with the consensus view in the scientific community as represented by organizations such as…