THE NEED FOR CRITICAL SCIENCE JOURNALISM
Too much contemporary science writing falls under the category of ‘infotainment’
“The bulk of contemporary science journalism falls under the category of “infotainment”. This expression describes science writing that informs a non-specialist target audience about new scientific discoveries in an entertaining fashion. The “informing” typically consists of giving the reader some historical background surrounding the scientific study, summarises key findings and then describes the significance and implications of the research. Analogies are used to convey complex scientific concepts so that a reader without a professional scientific background can grasp the ideas driving the research.
Direct quotes from the researchers also help illustrate the motivations, relevance, and emotional impact of the findings. The entertainment component varies widely, ranging from an enticing or witty style of writing to the choice of the subject matter. Freaky copulation techniques in the animal kingdom, discoveries that change our views about the beginnings of the universe or of life, heart-warming stories about ailing children that might be cured through new scientific breakthroughs, sci-fi robots, quirky anecdotes or heroic struggles of the scientists involved in the research – these are examples of topics that will capture the imagination of the intended audience.
However, infotainment science journalism rarely challenges the validity of the scientific research study or criticises its conclusions. Perfunctory comments, either by the journalist or in the form of quotes – such as “It is not clear whether these findings will also apply to humans” or “This is just a first step and more research is needed” are usually found at the end of such pieces – but it is rare to find an independent or detailed critical analysis.
Infotainment science journalism appears to operate under the assumption that if a scientific paper has been peer-reviewed and published by conscientious scientists, the results and conclusions are valid. The peer-review process is equated with a “fact checker” role, thus allowing infotainment science journalism to promote the perspectives of the researchers who conducted the studies” (read more).
(Source: Guardian; bottom image: Science-Ramblings)
The Upright Bipedalist
You’re welcome I guess?
New plan:
Start double-tagging all our anthropology posts with both spellings so that all the girls on the anthropologie tag will come to understand.
Seriously, it’ll only take a week of bones, chimp butts, and questions like “how do I get the remaining flesh off this deer skull?” before they start to respect the difference…
25-Million-Year-Old Primate Fossils Unearthed in Tanzania | Paleontology | Sci-News.com
Ancient Lost World Found in Honduran Jungle
Any archaeo people care to comment?
toward an understanding of male homosexual preference
Male homosexual preference (MHP) challenges evolutionary thinking because the preference for male–male relationships is heritable, implies a fertility cost (lower offspring number), and is relatively frequent in some societies (2%–6% in Western countries) for a costly trait. Proximate explanations include the hypothesis of a “sexually antagonistic factor” in which a trait that increases fertility in females also promotes the emergence of MHP. Because no animal species is known to display consistent MHP in the wild (only transient and contextual homosexual behavior has been described), additional human-specific features must contribute to the maintenance of MHP in human populations. We built a theoretical model that revealed that, in a stratified society, a relatively high frequency of MHP could be maintained as a result of the social ascension of females signaling high fertility (hypergyny). Additional computer simulations confirmed that this result applies to populations with various numbers of classes, conditions of demographic regulation, and mating systems. The prediction that MHP is more prevalent in stratified societies was significantly supported in a sample of 48 societies for which the presence or absence of MHP has been anthropologically documented. More generally, any traits associated with up-migration are likely to be selected for in a stratified society and will be maintained by frequency dependence even if they induce a pleiotropic cost, such as MHP. These results offer a new perspective for understanding seemingly paradoxical traits in human populations.
So. Male homosexuality. In general, if you want to understand the causes, the best book on the issue is Conundrum by N. J. Peters. Peters goes through all the extant theories on why homosexuality exists and evaluates them at length and reaches some really interesting conclusions. I recommend you check it out.
The one place where the book doesn’t do great justice is when it considers a hypothesis put forward by E.O Wilson at the end of his book, Sociobiology. Wilson’s hypothesis is that a “gay gene” could propagate through generations and never go extinct if men with that gay gene were around to adopt/take care of their relatives’ children. This work out mathematically assuming A) all the children survive to adulthood and B) at least 2.5 children being helped per gay man. Given that women in hunter gatherer societies tend to have 5 children on average, that part isn’t too much of a problem.
Peters’, and most gay men’s, arguments against Wilson’s hypothesis tend to fall along two lines: A) It “reduces” gay men to the role of caretaker and B) it was E.O Wilson who said it.
What this current research is suggesting is that in highly stratified societies, the existence of a class of women who appear to be extremely attractive might allow for the existence of a class of gay men. How exactly that connection works is behind the paywall—would someone with journal access mind sending me the article?
live from pyongyang: noonereadstheurl: objet-punk-a: Anarchism - A Very Short...
Beck depression index
Does anyone have access?
Bill Nye is my favorite
Dawkins needs to get over himself
Bam. Dawkins is a jerk.
How can anybody be that hostile to Bill Nye. Look at him. It’s like Bill Nye’s innate goodness and love for humanity and science is repelling him.
How the fuck does Bill Nye expect this to happen? What do you want to do, force women to enroll in science courses, regardless of whether or not they want to do it? Just for the sake of having “enough” women? Why the fuck do these fractions matter so much? It’s not like people are holding guns to our head and threatening to kill us if we become interested in science.
Maybe, just maybe, a lot of us DON’T FUCKING WANT to be scientists. Is that a crime?
well.
(Source: scienceing)
Strongest Evidence of Animal Culture Seen in Monkeys and Whales | Wired Science | Wired.com
Until fairly recently, many scientists thought that only humans had culture, but that idea is now being crushed by an avalanche of recent research with animals. Two new studies in monkeys and whales take the work further, showing how new cultural traditions can be formed and how conformity might help a species survive and prosper.
I may have a crush on Andrew Whiten(’s research).
