Leonard Cohen on songwriting
Over the years, I’ve thought a lot about the similarities between being a musical performer and being a scientist. I was listening to Leonard Cohen on my way to work the other day, and I was reminded of an interview where he discussed his songwriting process in more depth than you normally hear from an […]
How do you get to Carnegie Hall? 10,000 Hours
Slate.com has had an interesting series of articles (two of them are here and here) about the creativity originating from working in pairs: think Lennon and McCartney, Joel and Ethan Cohen, Richards and Jagger. In the second installment, Joshua Wolf Shenk said about the two Beatles: The nature of John and Paul’s intimacy evolved over […]
Why I don’t make copies of my slides available
September 13, 2010 Filed under Blog, Featured, News, Potpourri, Presentations
As I describe in the Preface to Eloquent Science, the book arose out of a workshop that I taught to undergraduates in Oklahoma. The workshop arose over six years, with what were essentially my lecture notes on PowerPoint slides. The slides were wordy and boring. During the talk, the students had paper copies of my […]
10 Tips on How to Write Less Badly
I was recently in Norman, Oklahoma, to present an Eloquent Science workshop, hosted by J.J. Gourley of the NOAA/National Severe Storms Laboratory. It was a lively and enthusiastic group in attendance, and I thank everyone who participated, bought books, and talked to me afterward. It’s great to know that there’s such interest. Yesterday, J.J. sent […]
Important advice from an editor for responding to reviewers
Occasionally as an editor I see an author respond to a reviewer, let’s say Reviewer 1, in the following manner. “Response to Reviewer 1’s comment that we should rerun the model: Reviewer 2 didn’t see a problem with our method, so we choose not to rerun the model.” It may well be that Reviewer 2 […]
CHOICE Reviews Online
Reprinted with permission from CHOICE http://www.cro2.org/, copyright by the American Library Association. 47-6207 Q223 2009-39865 CIP Science & Technology \ General Schultz, David M. Eloquent science: a practical guide to becoming a better writer, speaker, and atmospheric scientist. American Meteorological Society, 2009. 412p bibl index; ISBN 9781878220912 pbk, $45.00. Reviewed in 2010jul CHOICE. Scientists often […]
Reference list style guides
As an author, creating and double-checking reference lists in your manuscript are a hassle. Chances are if you make a mistake, a reader will go looking for that source and be stymied by a wrong year or incorrect page number. On top of the problems of accuracy, different journals require different formats for their reference […]
Where to publish case studies in meteorology
Dr. Alexander Keul of Salzburg University asked me whether any journals were publishing case studies in meteorology. What was interesting was that I had received another question or two along these lines recently. Seemed like an opportunity to blog. I would argue that there are two extremes of what one might call “case studies.” On […]
What are your pet peeves?
Appendix B: Commonly Misused Scientific Words and Expressions of Eloquent Science was inspired by a list of incorrect science expressions and annoyances maintained by Chuck Doswell. Many of Chuck’s pet peeves are included in Appendix B. I also surveyed my friends and colleagues about their pet peeves and included many of them in Appendix B. […]
If a tree falls in the forest…
This month’s issue of the Annals of Improbable Research answers the question of whether a tree falling in the forest will make a sound if no one is around to hear it. The answer is yes (Melchior 2010). Moreover, the bigger the tree, the louder the sound. What I like about this article is that […]
