Polar Vortex, Redux
December 16, 2014 Filed under Blog, Potpourri, Uncategorized
Lee Grenci has a lot to say about the polar vortex and its abuse in the media. https://www.e-education.psu.edu/worldofweather/node/2103
Use your middle initial. Appear smarter.
A coauthor on a paper and I ended up discussing whether scientists should use their middle initial on a paper. An article entitled “The impact of middle names: Middle name initials enhance evaluations of intellectual performance” in the European Journal of Social Psychology addresses this issue. The abstract reads: Middle name initials often appear in […]
How to respond to reviewers: When two reviewers say the same thing
My coauthors and I were talking about the responses to the reviewers that we were writing for a paper that was in peer review. Because two of the reviewers raised issues about the same item, my coauthor wrote a thoughtful response to Reviewer #1, then, in response to Reviewer #2, said basically, “See our response […]
“Conclusions and Discussion”? What should you call the last section of your paper?
Astute reader Colin Smith fired the following question my way: I find that many authors call their closing section “Conclusions and discussion”, rather than ‘Discussion and conclusions”. I prefer the latter because, to me, it is logical to first discuss your results in a wider context, and then draw conclusions. However, I also understand why […]
David Byrne: Inspiration for Good Science Writing
About a month ago, I had finished reading How Music Works by David Byrne (formerly of Talking Heads). I was always a big fan of the music of Talking Heads and Byrne, and I found his movie True Stories quirky. I am a huge musicophile, as well, and when I saw the book on the […]
