cmooney | June 20, 2007posted by Sheril R. Kirshenbaum
We all know music is powerful. It moves and motivates us. Makes us feel something. The latest issue of Vanity Fair features Bono as guest editor and draws attention to AIDS, genocide, and poverty in Africa. Folks at the magazine seem to be getting accustomed to framing important social and environmental issues by way of celebrity icons in order to reach out to a broad demographic. They've also figured out that a social conscience is more fashionable and profitable these days than even the latest from Manolo. Just weeks ago we saw Leo and Knut the polar…
cmooney | June 20, 2007Throughout the spring and into summer, I've pointed out repeatedly that there has been a consensus, among seasonal hurricane forecasters, that there will be an active season this year in the Atlantic. 17 named storms was Bill Gray's number; NOAA said 13-17. Methodologically, both Gray and NOAA use a "statistical" forecasting technique: In other words, they get these numbers based upon correlations between various climatological factors (and particularly El Nino) and the number of storms that appeared in past seasons.
But there is another, newer type of forecasting: Dynamical seasonal…
cmooney | June 19, 2007Something that makes me very sad is going on over at Tara's blog, I'm afraid. A number of commenters, who seem to be largely scientists, are beating up mercilessly on science writers for various sins, largely misquotation (which wasn't even what Tara's post was originally about). The comments got as nasty as this:
So why should we be interviewed and questioned? Contact us and ask us to write a piece on some topic. If the resulting language is terrible, then have the editor work with the scientist to improve it. I think the journalist is entirely unnecessary.
As someone who has both written…
cmooney | June 19, 2007posted by Sheril R. Kirshenbaum
Last week the National Academies reported that stereotypes affect women's academic performance. Their report, Beyond Bias and Barriers: Fulfilling the Potential of Women in Academic Science and Engineering came out earlier this year concluding:
Women are underrepresented at higher levels of science and engineering academics because of the influence of gender bias and the disadvantages that such bias generates.
Another report, To Recruit and Advance: Women Students and Faculty in Science and Engineering, goes on to say female high school students are less…
cmooney | June 18, 2007I will be appearing live on the Bill Press Show, the top rated progressive morning radio show, tomorrow morning at around 8:30 am ET. You can listen here. The subject is Storm World. Bill broadcasts right out of the Center for American Progress building, and after the show the Mooney-Nisbet talk on site will begin....so it'll be a busy morning. But I hope to have something to say about the new GAO report on federal agency media policies for scientists...
cmooney | June 18, 2007
The longer form reviews of Storm World are starting to come out, even as the book is now shipping from Amazon (and presumably other sites). I'm excited that the first really meaty review has gone up today by Mike Mann at RealClimate.org. You can read it here.
The review is very positive but does include "minor quibbles" such as the following:
As we have remarked before, one should be very careful about giving too much weight to any one late-breaking paper. Where there are certainly exceptions where paradigms are dramatically broken on the strength of one groundbreaking paper, science rarely…
cmooney | June 18, 2007posted by Sheril R. Kirshenbaum
I promised to provide the run down of what went on in DC during Capitol Hill Oceans Week (CHOW) 2007.. three days when the biggest players in the oceans game gathered to discuss current ocean and coastal issues. The usual suspects ranged from marine scientists to fishermen to members of Congress with representatives from federal and state governments, executive agencies, and Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) in the mix. Even ocean celebrities Jean-Michel Cousteau and Sylvia Earle were involved.
But why settle for my recap of CHOW when you can now watch…
cmooney | June 15, 2007posted by Sheril R. Kirshenbaum
Have you heard of OCEANS-21 (H.R. 21) The Oceans Conservation, Education, and National Strategy for the 21st Century Act?
Rep. Sam Farr introduced this Big Oceans Bill in January aka the 'ocean health' bill. With 50 cosponsors, it's building momentum in the House and over 20 members have signed on in just the last 6 weeks.
For those outside the political tinderbox, what does this mean? OCEANS-21 would become the first national oceans policy if passed. It would strengthen NOAA, promote ecosystem-based management, enhance education, information collection, and…
cmooney | June 15, 2007Well, folks: The Storm World talk in Grand Rapids went quite well--Ed Brayton was there, it was fantastic to meet him for the first time, and he's got a post up about my talk entitled "Hurricane Mooney." The oddness of giving a speech about hurricanes in Michigan was not lost upon me, but I had an attentive crowd of some 140 people, thanks to the great organizing of the Freethought Association of Michigan, which is a really stellar group. I was very impressed.
And just to make the talk locally relevant, I told them all about "Hurricane Huron" of 1996. Check it out. It really happened...but if…
cmooney | June 14, 2007posted by Sheril R. Kirshenbaum
While Chris is still in The Great Lakes State, I'm back with a recommendation for those in Cap City next week..
On Tuesday June 19 at 9:00, you have the opportunity to listen to Chris and Matt Nisbet present Speaking Science 2.0 at the Center for American Progress. I saw this great tag-team talk last Thursday at the American Meteorological Society's 2007 Summer Policy Colloquium. While normally I'm not a fan of dual presenters, these two pull it off spectacularly while getting their audience engaged and thinking!
Come early for breakfast at 8:30 and stay…
cmooney | June 13, 2007posted by Sheril R. Kirshenbaum
Jerry Lewis is a Congressman representing the 41st District of California.
Jerry Lewis is also a comedian from Newark, New Jersey.
I imagine it's confusing to share a name with someone famous. Even more unusual is the case of the Jerry Lewises because both fellows have independently and collectively made names for themselves.
Well it turns out the Congressman has quite a sense of humor - arguably rivaling that of the comedian. As former chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, he had this to say regarding a substantial spending boost for NOAA's oceans…
cmooney | June 13, 2007Over at the website Truthdig.org--which just won a Webby--I've done a piece about getting ready for this and future hurricane seasons entitled "The Readiness is All." I think we need a comprehensive national hurricane risk assessment project that takes account of the possible effects of climate change--plus the will and the vision to act once we've done the research.
Meanwhile, and hurricane-relatedly....as I've noted previously, my brother Davy, the jazz guitarist, understandably left New Orleans after Katrina took a whack at the music industry (along with everything else). Now he's moving…
cmooney | June 12, 2007Some of you may have expected or sensed that it was going to happen. But now, I can finally announce that it's official:
I have invited Sheril Kirshenbaum, who did such a spectacular job blogging here in my absence a few weeks back, to come on to blog here permanently. And she has accepted. "The Intersection" will thus become a two person blog....and all of you will be regaled regularly by Sheril's awesome and unique blend of science and pop culture commentary.
I'm not sure I really need to introduce Sheril much more fully at this point. But for those who may have been on, say, the Andaman…
cmooney | June 12, 2007I've done something a bit off the beaten path recently--teamed up with a scientist to write an editorial for a medical journal. My piece, with Beth Jordan, M.D., who is the scientific director of the Association of Reproductive Health Professionals, just appeared in Contraception. Here is the gist:
In the medical and especially the highly politicized reproductive health arena, one consequence of the frequent misappropriation of the mantle of science can be seen in a cacophony of news headlines, presenting bewildering and often conflicting information: "Rethinking Hormones, Again", "What?…
cmooney | June 11, 2007I've ben a bit tied up and unable to blog yet today. Thankfully Sheril has taken up some of the slack. I'll have an entry later, but in the meantime, definitely check out this cool post by frequent Intersection commenter Fred Bortz. Bortz is drawing on a recent article in American Scientist by two glacier experts (including Philip W. Mote who I've interviewed in the past about Pacific Northwestern snowpack loss) on how Mt. Kilimanjaro has been used as an inappropriate icon of global warming. The article argues that while many glaciers are melting, and while global glacial retreat has indeed…
cmooney | June 11, 2007posted by Sheril R. Kirshenbaum
Since quoting Doug Adams, I've received some thoughtful emails from readers in northern and inland states asking whether they ought to be concerned about An Inconvenient Truth. Fair question. If sea level rise and warming temperatures appear to have little personal relevance, why worry? The series finale of The Sopranos is troublesome enough for the weekend.
This influx to my inbox got me thinking about social momentum..
The usual suspects (climate scientists) have been concerned for a long time as they've documented increasing levels of CO2 in the…
cmooney | June 9, 2007Princeton climate scientist Simon Donner has been blogging about Cyclone Gonu and the disturbing way in which the U.S. media seems to care more about oil prices than people killed by the storm. Of course, one might reply that at least our media actually covered this storm. By contrast, it more or less ignored the Madagascan cyclone disasters from earlier this year. No disruption of oil supply involved there, you see. Just destruction of the rice crop, which the people eat, and the vanilla crop, which they rely upon for exports....
cmooney | June 9, 2007
Cyclone Gonu, having weakened down to a Category 1 equivalent storm, lashes Oman and Iran without making a full landfall on June 6, 2007. Image courtesy of NASA's Earth Observatory.
This historic storm is now estimated to have killed 70 people in Oman and Iran, and that number may continue to rise. Much of the destruction in Iran appears not to have come from winds or from storm surge but, rather, from intense rainfall of a sort that the region isn't at all used to--and of course, dangerous floods resulted. It seems some Iranian villages were swept away entirely. Let's hope coming days don't…
cmooney | June 8, 2007posted by Sheril R. Kirshenbaum
Back soon with the review of Capitol Hill Oceans Week (CHOW), but in the mean time, a suggestion to keep you out of the heat..
At the moment, I'm still in the District where I happened upon Cosmic Collisions at the Air and Space Museum. A friend and I ducked into the planetarium to retreat from the hot soup that is June in the city. I'd heard about this phenomenal show in NY and was not dissappointed. Amazing visuals and a great story.. not just for Trekkies either - a must for anyone within biking distance. It's a great way to get out of the summer…
cmooney | June 8, 2007After giving the Mooney-Nisbet talk in New York on Monday, I had the pleasure of hanging out with a group of young scientists who had come to attend. To me that's a key point of our speaking tour: To create events, both intellectual and social, where young scientists can engage with new ideas about communication...and then go out and have a few beers afterwards. Even if it's a Monday night.
So I'm glad to see that some of my compatriots from Monday also blogged about the talk. Check out: Kate Seip, who says that "three questions remain unanswered"; I am about to answer her in the comments…