Best Practices for Numerical Weather Prediction Studies
The late Tom Warner of the National Center for Atmospheric Research just published an article entitled “Quality Assurance in Atmospheric Modeling”. You may not get it from the title, but this is a powerful paper that lays out 14 steps for improving modeling practices. All students and users of models need to read this paper […]
Plain English Campaign gets it wrong
In almost all cases, I support the Plain English Campaign, who aim to improve the readability of government documents, corporate letters, web sites, and other forms of communication. In their 2011 Golden Bull Awards, however, the Plain English Campaign got it dead wrong. The UK Met Office won an award for ‘empowering people to make […]
Scientists Behaving Badly
Fabrication of data, plagiarism, theft, retraction, image duplication, destruction of property, and death. These are the results from the Top Science Scandals of 2011, as determined by The Scientist magazine. (Thanks to Dave Topping for pointing this out.)
Monkey See, Monkey Do
December 19, 2011 Filed under Blog, Featured, Presentations
In writing my book and questioning the “standard” approach that people have used to give scientific presentations, I have often wondered if people stick to convention because that’s all they’ve seen. They see an outline slide or a meaningless “thank you!” slide and think, “Yeah, that’s the way to do it right.” The question is […]
Errors in Publications #1
Check those page proofs carefully!
Very short abstract
From arXiv.org: Can apparent superluminal neutrino speeds be explained as a quantum weak measurement? M. V. Berry, N. Brunner, S. Popescu, P. Shukla (Submitted on 13 Oct 2011) Abstract Probably not. [Thanks to Dan Housley for pointing this out.]
Will asking a question get your science paper cited more?
My friend Jim Steenburgh over at Wasatch Weather Weenies alerted me to this column in the Guardian newspaper. The column points out something that we scientists may know but forget from time to time: factors other than the quality of the science determine whether and how often our articles get cited by others. Among the […]
How To Choose a Good Scientific Problem
I have not found a more concise and clear statement about how to choose a good scientific problem for someone at various stages in their career. Enjoy! Alon, U., 2009: How to choose a good scientific problem. Molecular Cell, 35, 726-728. DOI: 10.1016/j.molcel.2009.09.013. [PDF]
Steve Jobs (1955-2011)
The first personal computer I used was a Mac. I could probably count the number of PC keyboards I’ve ever touched on all my fingers and toes. I’m not a fanboy, but you gotta respect him for what he’s done in his all-too-short life. Two essential items for today: • One thing we owe to […]
6 Habits of Highly Annoying Public Speakers
Cracked.com (America’s only humor site since 1958) always has great reads. Today’s entry was no exception. The 6 Habits of Highly Annoying Public Speakers As an example, Number 6 is “Blaming the Audience for a Lack of Enthusiasm”, illustrated above. The most annoying thing, beyond being nagged to do something you don’t really want to […]
