sheril | January 16, 2009
We recently learned that our friend and ScienceDebate co-founder Lawrence Krauss will co-chair the Board of Sponsors of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists with Nobel Laureate Leon Lederman. Together they aim to re-energize a national discussion on the reduction
of nuclear weapons stockpiles, fight proliferation, and encourage
disarmament. The Board--founded in 1948 by Albert Einstein--aims to support the efforts of the Bulletin to 'amplify voices of reason and encourage rational policymaking on nuclear weapons, nuclear energy, climate change and biotechnology.'
Krauss, Director of a new…
cmooney | January 16, 2009I forgot to link it on Wednesday, given how busy we all were at Arizona State planning the future of ScienceDebate (about which I hope we'll have more to say soon). But my latest Science Progress column, which has already prompted some critical responses, is about Obama's OIRA pick, Cass Sunstein. Without disapproving of the choice, I argue that there are definitely some serious issues that have been raised about Sunstein's stance on the role of "cost benefit analysis" and "reason" in the regulatory process:
...peering into Sunstein's writings on risk, rationality, and regulation--and other…
cmooney | January 15, 2009I have a new piece on Slate exploring precisely this question. Here's the core of it:
If the war on science is over, we're now entering the postwar phase of reconstruction--the scientific equivalent of nation-building. The Bush science controversies were just one manifestation of a deeper and long-standing gulf between the science community and the broader American public, one with roots stretching back to our indigenous tradition of anti-intellectualism (as so famously described by historian Richard Hofstadter in his classic work from 1963) and Yankee distrust of expertise and authority. So…
sheril | January 15, 2009S. 22, The Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2008 passed the Senate this afternoon 73-21. The package includes ocean exploration, NOAA undersea research, ocean and coastal mapping integration, the integrated coastal and ocean observation system*, federal ocean acidification research and monitoring, and coastal and estuarine land conservation, and lots more. Once the House acts, the final version may get sent to the next President...
In other words, Obama's first law might be huge for ocean science!
* hat tip to Senator Snowe for all her work on ocean observing
sheril | January 15, 2009Lots of folks have been asking us about our forthcoming book, Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens our Future and we're happy to report that the product description is finally available at Amazon:
Climate change, the energy crisis, nuclear proliferation--many of the most urgent problems of twenty-first century require scientific solutions. And yet Americans are paying less and less attention to scientists. For every five hours of cable news, less than a minute is devoted to science; 46 percent of Americans believe that God, not evolution, created life on earth; the…
sheril | January 15, 2009Deep Sea News--one of my favorite ocean science blogs--has gone indie. Craig, Peter, and Kevin recently set up shop at deepseanews.com, so make sure to go check out their new digs and read about what the boys of the benthos are exploring this week...
sheril | January 14, 2009Because he's too humble to blog it, I hope readers will join me in congratulating Chris for being honored tonight by American Meteorological Society, the nation's leading professional society for those working in the atmospheric and related sciences. Storm World: Hurricanes, Politics, and the Battle Over Global Warming has won the 2009 Louis J. Battan Author's Award.
Mooney's book is being honored as "an accurate and comprehensive overview of the evolving debate on the impacts of global warming on hurricanes that illustrates the complexities of this significant scientific problem." The…
cmooney | January 13, 2009I am currently in Phoenix, Arizona, and Sheril is in the air over the United States on her way here. We're gathering at Arizona State University for an intense 24 hour meeting with Lawrence Krauss, Matthew Chapman, Shawn Otto, Darlene Cavalier, and others involved organizing in the ScienceDebate2008 push. Now's the time to take the incredible momentum that this initiative generated and figure out how to channel it towards further endeavors in 2009 and beyond.
To that end, we'd very much like to hear your suggestions about what ScienceDebate2008 should grow into, how it should evolve.…
sheril | January 12, 2009Except it's a bonobo.
Field and Stream magazine, 'The World's Leading Outdoor Magazine' has published their 'Best of 2008: Sasquatch Trail Cam Photos.' Thing is, the runner-up submitted by Pete Morgan of Bradford, Pennsylvania looks awfully familiar to my pal science author Vanessa Woods and I.
The reason? It's her photo.
Vanessa took the photo at Lola Ya Bonobo sanctuary last year. Mr. Morgan added a time stamp.
Bonobos are our closest living relatives, and share 98.7% of our DNA. Lola ya Bonobo is the world's only bonobo sanctuary, with over 60 orphans from the bushmeat and pet…
cmooney | January 12, 2009Kenneth Chang continues the Pluto blogging by asking readers to select a preference among the following planetary options:
The Current Answer: Eight. The current situation dictated by the I.A.U. where Pluto is a dwarf planet, not a planet.
The "No Planet Left Behind" Option: 13. If a planet were any round object in orbit around the Sun, that would include not only Pluto, but also the asteroid Ceres and three Kuiper Belt objects, Eris, Haumea and Makemake. The number of planets would continue to increase in the coming years.
The Historical Precedent Choice: 10. If Pluto were set as an…
sheril | January 12, 2009
It's no coincidence that our forthcoming book, Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens Our Future is due out at around the fiftieth anniversary of C.P. Snow's famous lecture entitled "The Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution." As Chris explained last week at Science Progress, Snow's delineation of the broad disconnect between the scientific and humanistic ways of thinking has resonated powerfully across the last half century, and describes a problem that's very much still with us. And with that we reveal a bit more about a theme of our narrative--as we'll continue to…
sheril | January 11, 2009Last Sunday, I shared the story of a mouse that ate my breakfast and readers provided a myriad of helpful tips on catching our rodent residents in comments, blogs, and over email. I did some research based on your suggestions and ordered The Smart House--yes, it's actually shaped like a little green house.
And would you know it, Gus moved right in:
He has subsequently relocated to a lovely park several miles away after I gave warning to stay away from cats. We both hope that Jaq will be joining him soon. Thanks to everyone for your help confronting our unwanted guests.
And with that,…
sheril | January 9, 2009Grad students are used to making tough choices, living on a small stipend, and facing an uncertain job market. But can they survive anticipated budget cuts at their institutions? Friends in PhD programs across the nation are reporting the same conversation is happening in pubs at various coordinates located near research universities:
Who won't be funded next year?
Did you hear we're being encouraged to finish as fast as possible?
How much of the school's endowment was lost?
Did you get the email from the department?
Thank God I'm almost done/Thank God I've got 4 more years/Thank God I'm…
cmooney | January 9, 2009Kenneth Chang notes that Neil deGrasse Tyson has a new book coming out very soon: The Pluto Files. Apparently deGrasse Tyson caught a lot of hell over the years for being involved in the slighting of Pluto over at the Hayden Planetarium, long before the International Astronomical Union finished the banishment in 2006.
I'll look forward to reading Tyson's book, but as a Plutophile I gotta say, the plaque that the Rose Center for Earth and Space provides to explain its Pluto demotion (which I learned about thanks to Chang's post) isn't very impressive to me. It reads like this:
Our solar…
sheril | January 9, 2009The NYTimes suggests this recession will last at least into the summer, and now with over 11 million Americans unemployed, do readers think the stimulus package will be enough?
* We apologize that comments are not currently posting. Scienceblogs is doing maintenance and The Intersection will return to normal soon.
sheril | January 8, 2009In case you missed today's speech at George Mason, President-elect Barack Obama wants to double the production of alternative energy within three years and make over 75 percent of federal buildings and 2 million homes more energy-efficient. It's a move that will create jobs immediately and save money for homeowners and businesses down the line. His new infrastructure push would also support the construction of a smart grid to save money, protect power sources, and collect and distribute renewable energy.
While the actual plan has yet to be officially unveiled, the draft provides more detail…
cmooney | January 8, 2009That's the news from the Chicago Tribune. I'm interested to hear whether any environmentalists are going to be rattled by this choice. Sunstein is an ingenious scholar, and continues the whole "best and brightest" motif of the Obama administration--so welcome after so many years of Bush anti-intellectualism. But on the other hand, some of Sunstein's views on regulation are controversial, although certainly very thoughtful.
Important question: Will he roll back the Bush administration's overuse of the Data Quality Act?
By the way, I haven't read all of Sunstein's books, but I have read…
cmooney | January 8, 2009Eric Berger blogs that leading climate researchers are increasingly turning towards the idea that there's going to have to be some sort of backup plan, in case our societies don't (or can't) dramatically cut emissions. This is basically what I said in my Wired feature last year: Geoengineering is starting to win over serious climate scientists because 1) political inaction keeps making the problem worse; 2) new scientific findings keep suggesting that the problem is worse anyway; 3) one geoengineering solution, stratospheric sulfate infusion, is definitely going to work and can be done right…
cmooney | January 7, 2009From The New York Times:
As for the startling estimate from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, if it proves accurate, the budget deficit will be nearly two and a half times bigger than the previous record shortfall of $455 billion reached in 2008.
The estimate was far higher than most other analysts have predicted. If combined with the gigantic stimulus package of tax cuts and new spending that Mr. Obama is preparing, which could amount to nearly $800 billion over two years, the shortfall this year could hit $1.6 trillion.
How do you think the federal science budget, which has…