Junk the Jargon Interview on Public Engagement

An oldie, but goodie. Here is an interview (Junkcast) I did for the University of Manchester Junk the Jargon competition. I talk about my own experiences good and bad with public engagement, tips for connecting with the audience, and the origins of Eloquent Science.

Storm chaser, no. Meteorologist, yes.

The death of four storm chasers in the recent Oklahoma tornado raises issues about the safety of stormchasing, but also how stormchasing is marketed to the public and students. For example, some undergraduate meteorology, environmental science, and geography programs use storm chasing as a tool to market their programs. Even MyMajors.com lists stormchaser as a … read more

Is it OK to mentor someone who is writing a peer review?

Brian Curran asks: I would like to hear your thoughts regarding the review process and young (or inexperienced) reviewers. I’ve reviewed just a handful of manuscripts, so it’s safe to say I’m inexperienced. Having a mentor or two guiding us relatively inexperienced reviewers through the process might prove to be beneficial and could serve to … read more

“Utilize” versus “Use”

From The Telegraph (sent to me by Jamie Gilmour): When the American writer David Foster Wallace died four years ago, he left behind the following fragments: notes towards a dictionary all of his own. Utilize A noxious puff-word. Since it does nothing that good old use doesn’t do, its extra letters and syllables don’t make … read more

Thoughts about Clarke’s “Ethics of Science Communication on the Web”

My friend Jim reminded me about an article “Ethics of Science Communication on the Web” by Maxine Clarke of the Nature Publishing Group in Ethics in Science and Environmental Politics. I might have seen this paper before, but Jim’s reminder and me taking a look at it again strikes me as a little ironic. Don’t … read more

How to choose a scientific problem and nurturing young scientists

I discovered the following article a while ago, yet only have gotten around to writing about it now. Alon, U., 2009: How to choose a good scientific problem. Molecular Cell, 35, 726-728. [PDF] [HTML] Why the paper resonated with me is that it brought me back to choosing my research topic for my PhD. I … read more

Review: “Writing Science” by Joshua Schimel

I just finished reading a new book Writing Science: How to Write Papers That Get Cited and Proposals That Get Funded by Prof. Joshua Schimel, in the Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Marine Biology at UC Santa Barbara. Schimel’s book is the perfect companion to Eloquent Science. Whereas Eloquent Science provides guidance about how to … read more

More on British and American English

In a previous post, I had given a set of the more common rules for American and British English differences. Since then, I have received comments and emails asking me about how to submit to a journal that uses a form of English different from the one that you use. I can speak for myself … read more

Petterssen, Palmén and Newton, Carlson, and Lackmann

I am honored to have seen page proofs of Gary Lackmann’s new book Midlatitude Synoptic Meteorology: Dynamics, Analysis, and Forecasting to be published later this year by the American Meteorological Society. For this book, Gary goes back to the original meaning of the word synoptic (“forming a summary or synopsis”). Twelve chapters summarize and synthesize … read more

How important is it to use “important” in your writing?

Have you read an article where the author talks about “an important process” or “the important role of another process”? Do these sort of platitudes go in one of your ears and out the other? Are you convinced by the author’s use of the word “important” that it truly is an important process? Or, do … read more

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