science communication Archives - Page 6 of 8

08/01/201408/01/2014

A Year at EcoEvo@TCD

The Christmas decorations have been banished for another year, stashes of left-over turkey are dwindling and the hollow echo of empty biscuit boxes tone the end of holiday indulgences. As the promise of ever-longer evenings beckons and the first, brave (or fool hardy) snowdrops contemplate their next move it’s that time for the inevitable “year in review”. Rather than a countdown of favourite scientific discoveries from the year, I thought I’d celebrate a year in the life of EcoEvo@TCD.

We dusted off our competitive spirits in January to open the year with a month of blog games. Apocalypse Meow trashed the competition to win the prize for most hits for a blog post in a single day thanks to a winning formula of cute cats, birds and reddit. The cuteness theme continued with insights into why we often experience mildly violent and destructive reactions to coping with cuteness.

We’re lucky in Dublin to receive annual visits from Brent Geese, the beautiful transatlantic migrants who enliven many a winter walk. The birds were the subject of some controversy in March with a somewhat unlikely foe. The researchers who follow the geese are no less interesting and were kind enough to take some of the EvoEvo@TCD team under their wing…

We’re a diverse bunch. Our research interests lend themselves to trips to beautiful natural history museums and the opportunity to poke through some museum treasures.On the lab and field work side, we work with bees, vultures, Indonesian birds, badgers and sometimes the animals even visit us (it’s not all just about computers…). Our School of Natural Sciences postgrad symposium in April showcased the diversity and quality of current research in our School.

Some of our more popular posts are advice pieces on how to survive and thrive in academia. From how to retain your sanity during long lab experiments to thesis writing, how to find a PhD and why you should consider coming to work with us in particular, EcoEvo@TCD is your one stop shop on how to survive as a student.

And we don’t just have tips for students. Most of the EcoEvo@TCD team are active on twitter and I think we would all agree that twitter is a great resource for academics of all levels with far more benefits than downsides. Armed with science networking tips, we set forth into a summer of conference season madness. Our ranks were divided as we attended different conferences, the main ones being INTECOL in London and ESEB in Lisbon.

Many of our advice and perspective pieces arose from our weekly NERD club meetings where we bashed out the details of our current projects, prepared for conferences and seminar presentations and benefited from academic survival tips and collaborated within group projects. All of which culminated in our all-important NERD club AGM.

We had multiple forays into the world of science communication and outreach. We gave guided tours of the Zoology department’s museum over the summer and recounted the exotic tales of some of our animal residents. The museum opened its doors to the public for free as part of Discover Research Night when we showcased some of our department’s current research. Media and blogosphere reactions to some of our publications were interesting to say the least. From dealing with creationist backlash to negotiating the media storm surrounding a paper that went viral, even when that media attention is sometimes off the mark, we’re a far more media savvy bunch than before.

This year is all set for more EcoEvo@TCD fun. In February we will have our postgrad symposium and we welcome a new Chair of Zoology to the department. Our Friday seminar series continues this term so expect more insights from our final-year undergraduates. There will be more articles arising from our NERD club discussions, conferences galore in the summer as well as research and fieldwork tales.

Happy New Year EcoEvo@TCD!

Author: Sive Finlay, sfinlay[at]tcd.ie, @SiveFinlay

Image Credit: www.joe.ie

06/12/201301/12/2013

Science X-Factor

What is consciousness? Why do we live? Why did the dinosaurs die out? Are tenrecs cannibals? Can we control our dreams? Do you like cake?!

These are just some of the burning questions which I had the pleasure and challenge of trying to answer while taking part in I’m a scientist, get me out of here! This online competition is science communication and outreach designed for the X-factor generation; school students submitted their science (or otherwise!) –related questions to panels of scientists divided across different zones of research. The students used the resulting answers to cast votes to keep their favourite scientists in the competition. In each round, the person with the fewest votes was eliminated (minus the tense lighting and music which normally accompanies these things) until there was a final winner left standing in each zone of the scientific jungle – and it didn’t even involve eating bugs!

I had some notion of what to expect from following Andrew Jackson’s participation last year but even still nothing prepared me for the all-encompassing addiction I would experience. I thoroughly enjoyed delving into the dusty recesses of my general scientific knowledge, honing my googling skills for some of the tougher questions (thank you Wikipedia!) and, most importantly, developing the fine art of interspersing scientific explanation with liberal sprinklings of smiley faces and emoticons. I was in one of the general science zones (as opposed to the themed space and nanotechnology zones) which left us open to an interesting and challenging array of questions; from what is quantum mechanics (oh how I wish I had more than Junior Cert physics!) to why do we grow more when we sleep ? The scientists taking part were equally diverse in their backgrounds and stages in their research career; my zone included a chemist, mathematician, pharmacologist and neuroscientist so it was very interesting to see how our specialities influenced our answers to some of the more open-ended questions.

One of my favourite parts of the event was taking part in live chats; half-hour sessions with school classes where we were open to anything that the students cared to throw our way. They were great fun and quite intensive; classes of around 30 students all submitting questions at the same time which meant that the chats were a bit like a cross between the ultimate quick-fire quiz round and an exercise in typing speed! I loved the challenge of coming up with on the spot answers to questions ranging from “Are we alone in the universe?” and “How did life begin?” to “What did you like about school?” Varied topics to say the least but my favourite live chat question was definitely “What’s the average trajectory of a swallow” to which I replied “an African swallow or one carrying coconuts?” (You never know when an eclectic knowledge of classic comedy and musicals might come in handy!)

The main aim of the event is to encourage students to take an interest in science, not necessarily with the view towards choosing a science-related career but more to spark their curiosity in the world around them. A big part of this is trying to show scientists as “normal people” – a debatable description at the best of times but hopefully at least it’s a step away from the lab-bound, crazy-haired, mad-scientist stereotype. The dawning realisation that scientists are real people too did produce some funny outcomes – imagine having a sibling who’s older than a scientist!

I hope that the students enjoyed taking part in the event but I know that it was definitely a hugely rewarding experience for me. Aside from writing some articles it was my first foray into the world of science communication and outreach and I’ve definitely been bitten by the bug. There were some really great, difficult questions which were tough but fun to try and answer. I also enjoyed the challenge of losing the jargon while still getting across the important scientific concepts and ideas. I was delighted to win my zone; I hope that my answers had something to do with it although I have a feeling that the combination of an exotic study species, a background in zoology and a cute puppy in my profile picture may have been advantageous in appealing to the teenage demographic…

The competition was a clean sweep for TCD scientists; Shane McGuinness won the Helium Zone, Sinead Cullen came top in the Nanotechnology Zone and Joseph Roche took the prize in the Space Zone. It’s certainly a good sign for the healthy interest of Trinity staff and students in communicating their research and science in general to a wide audience. This is the second season of the event in Ireland; a spinoff from the highly successful UK event and the newly added version for engineers. It’s a great event for scientists and students alike and I would highly recommend getting involved. When else do you get the excuse to contemplate anything from cosmic computer programming creators to some of the really important parts of life?

Author: Sive Finlay, sfinlay[at]tcd.ie, @SiveFinlay

21/10/201308/10/2013

Night in the Research Museum

On Friday the 27^th of September, as part of the Discover Research Night we opened the doors of the department to the public. We decided that since we have a museum full of some really cool stuff, we could use it to demonstrate some of the research in the department.

Since the research night had a mix of students, families and the generally curious we introduced each tour with some of the j-awesome teeth (I make no apologies for puns) to demonstrate the basics of ecology and evolution. So, with the help of Baleen, shark jaws, elephant molars and the jaw-dropping narwhal tusk we whetted the audience’s appetite to see just what evolution can do to modify a few teeth in order to match a particular ecology (okay I apologise for some of the puns).

We then used some of the more mobile museum specimens (although the pilot whale skull we brought up from the basement would argue against that) to set up a game of “guess that longevity” to help explain some up and coming NERD club research.

This worked really well and I think people became really engaged with the idea that there is so much variation in how long animals live, especially the sturgeon that can live over 150 years. It’s then an easy sell to explain the basis of our new paper which shows that species with lower external mortality (those that can avoid danger such as by flying) live longer than expected for their size (stay posted for more info on that soon!).

I'm really just a fuzzy bird when it comes to my age — I’m really just a fuzzy bird when it comes to my age

We finished up the tour by displaying some of our individual research such as some upcoming T.rex modelling (with added Jurassic Park music), a possible new bird species (and some spot the difference) and some obligatory lasers (one guy even came to ask if he could use the scanner for his golf clubs!?). It was also a great excuse to roll out those conference posters that are often treated like an Irish convertible that only gets a spin out once a summer!

In the context of trying to engage the public with research I found it to be in complete contrast to my previous experiences as although we managed to get nearly 200 people into the department we really got the chance to explain face to face why what we do is interesting and cool (an easy task when holding a stuffed platypus) but then also explain some of the possible applications that might not be obvious (such as medical or ecological). It also allowed us to talk about the things that are interesting to the public themselves instead of continually telling them what they should be interested in.

All and all the night went great and I think everyone, including some of the specimens enjoyed the night!

Author and Photo Credits:

Kevin Healy: healyke[at]tcd.ie, @healyke

01/10/201330/09/2013

Radio Ga Ga Science: a student’s point of view

I was planning to write a blog about our new paper recently published in Animal Behaviour however something relatively unexpected seemed to scupper those plans, the media!

For those who haven’t come across an article talking about the best way to swat a fly or heard me rambling away on radio, our paper has been covered from Roscommon to North Korea so I won’t delve into it further here, especially with some nice summaries and our article available through open access.

What I wanted to write about was the perspective of a PhD student caught in the whirlwind of the big bad media world and how I felt about the whole experience as both a student and scientist.

First off I still have not fully grasped what happened, to sit on the Dart and read about your own research in the metro is very surreal and its extremely flattering to think that someone thought that what I was working on would be interesting for someone else to read about!

Despite it being a fantastic thing to be acknowledged in the media, it did also make me feel very anxious as something I had been working on for nearly two years was completely out in the open multiplying every hour as it became part of the international news recycling system. I also now know what it feels like to be the squirrel on water-skis fluffy news piece at the end of the news, there to lighten up the fact that the news is the even more depressing then watching “The Road”.

This lack of control is probably something any scientist is not comfortable with, with every comment section full of ludicrous assumptions and misunderstanding about the research none of which I could, or even should, try to set right or defend. In fact after so many “I knew that when I was five” comments it becomes more fun just to see whether the Independent or the Daily mail fared worse below the line (the guardian was worse again but seems to have closed the comment section).

While I think this experience has been nothing but beneficial through advertising our science, in terms of the more general aspect of science communication with the public I found it a little tricky to decide how useful it was. This is due to what I found to be the fine balancing act of lowest common denominator reporting and getting the intricacies of you research across. For example, while I think the metaphor of swatting a fly is a good way of explaining our research in a real world scenario, we did not expect it would spawn a full article on the best methods to swat a fly, or that we would be referred by Ray D’Arcy as “Fly Experts”, despite the fact that flies were not in our dataset or that none of us have ever studied anything on flies!

It also raises the question of the value of engaging with the media from a scientist’s point of view. In one respect I think it is important to engage with the public as at the end of the day research is largely funded through the State and it’s important to remind the public not only that research is worth it but that “blue skies” (awful term) research cab also be relevant. I think in some respects I am happy we achieved this with sites specifically aimed at 10-12 year olds with a specific educational aim and also through some good interviews on radio that I think got a generally positive response.

However with this there are also a lot of “the best way to swat a fly” pieces which aren’t getting anything across and at times may even start to trivialise the research and hence devalue its worth in the public’s eye (clear from comments hoping that no money was spent on this research).

Overall I think almost any science that enters the media will produce a mixed bag of results. But after the level of enthusiasm from people and the genuine line of questions such as seen in this reddit forum (Unlike the Irish reddit forum), I think it’s nearly always worth it to let your research out there as it will undoubtedly be genuinely appreciated by at least some people.

Author and Photo Credit:

Kevin Healy: @healyke, healyke[at]tcd.ie

30/09/2013

Radio Ga Ga Science

In the midst of the media circus surrounding our paper “metabolic rate and body size are linked with perception of temporal information”, I was invited to speak about our work on several radio shows. What followed was a mixture of immense excitement, nervous trepidation, deflation and all round good fun. This is only the third time I have spoken about research on the radio, but this time there was so much exposure that I really learned a lot – mostly how to manage my own expectations and general sanity with the whole bizarre affair.

It starts with excited phone calls with producers of the radio shows. They tend to call you at ungodly hours and want to chat with you about the work. I get the impression this is as much to sound out what you are going to say and how you will come over on the airwaves as it is to let you know what the focus of their on-air discussion will be.

What followed for me was a very exciting and bleary-eyed 6am trip to our national broadcasting headquarters RTE in their Dublin studios where I would do a “link up” to the British BBC radio stations for their various breakfast shows. Since I was just there to use their facilities, I was shepherded down to the basement to sit in a tiny studio cubicle beside their engineering and IT department. Were it not for a very nice, interesting and friendly sound engineer (lots of engineers I know are “sound” but this guy was both – its an Irish thing) Kevin Cronin, I would have been lonely and bored indeed.

First lesson – you get mucked about. I don’t think a single time-slot I was given was kept strict, so you end up sitting around not quite sure who you are going to talk to next. Then, suddenly, the earphones go live with the sound of the radio show you are going to link with, and a producer’s voice comes over to check the line and give you a few minutes warning alerting you to the go-live. Next thing, typically following some grim story unfolding from somewhere around the world, you are introduced by some typically odd segue and off you go. Talking to what could just as easily be a few million people as a few thousand. They will take liberties with your time, so if you need a break, tell them you can’t talk at a certain time. Don’t feel beholden to them – although if it’s a big show then probably you should make the effort.

Second lesson – the presenter is in charge. Make no bones about it, you are there to answer their questions, not to talk about your actual research. They will have read your press release if you are very lucky, else they will have garnered the gist from the producers notes or worse still from whatever news article they read about your work on the way to work – a chinese whispered, now long-since bastardised version of your science. In my case, I ended up talking about how best to swat a fly, not the tiger beetle that runs so fast it runs blind, or the swordfish that speeds up and slows down its visual processing abilities as and when required. No. Fly swatting. I don’t work on flies, never have, likely never will. I don’t mind though, it’s not up to me to say what’s interesting in my work for other people, just as it’s not up to the artist to determine what people should see in their painting – Jesus face on a piece of toast for all I know.

Third lesson – it gets boring. If you find yourself doing a few of these in one day, you will likely be over the excitement after the first few. Then repetition and boredom sets in. Same questions, but now, more aware of what’s happening and determined to get my point across I try to steer the topic back to the actual work we did and away from flies. Nope. Remember, the presenter is in charge. You can sense their desire to cut you off when you start to drone on, and you are back to flies. It also gets tiring, so remember to eat and load up on coffee.

It gets easier. Once the first nerves die off (I wasn’t particularly happy with my first interview of the day on BBC Radio 4 with John Humphries), and you stop trying to second guess what you will be asked, you find yourself just going with the flow. It has certainly helped me with my “elevator pitch” and I would like to think I would be more confident if and when this kicks off again sometime in the future.

It was a mad day, typified by having loud conversations on my phone in the tea room in Zoology along the lines of “yeah, no, I can’t do that slot, I’m with BBC world service at 12.30, I can probably fit you in after though…”.

Best parts – I got to chat with John Humphries live on air, shook Ryan Tubridy’s hand (I just stopped him in the corridor and gave him no choice!) and I got to talk to “Daddy Ray” (Ray D’Arcy from my childhood favourite Zig and Zag show The Den). My parents are proud to say the least, various people high up in College seem happy, and my PhD student Kevin Healy has had a whirlwind start to his academic career – on 16^th September 2013 he won the internet.

Last pointer – don’t get flippant or try to be funny if you are anything like me. At the end of my piece, I took a swipe at Ray D’Arcy’s audience with a bit of a pun joke saying that some of them had too much time on their hands with their over-thinking of how to swat a fly.

Author:

Andrew Jackson, @yodacomplex, a.jackson[at]tcd.ie

Photo Credit:

Kevin Healy

16/09/201316/09/2013

NERD Club AGM

And we’re back!

The tea room is fuller, society stands are being dusted down to create the Front Square Fresher’s week gauntlet and venturing out of the office during the lecture change-over times will soon be inadvisable unless you have a particular affiliation for crowd control. Trinity is gearing up for the new semester and our blog has returned from its summer hiatus.

We marked the end of the summer with NERD club’s first annual AGM. Theoretically an acronym for our networks in ecology/evolution research discussion group but practically far more appropriate if you take the true sense of the word, NERD club is our weekly meeting for people working on any aspect of ecology or evolution. It’s a diverse collection of people and certainly one of my favourite times of the week as, fuelled by the necessary provision of biscuits, we discuss each other’s research or wider topics relating to academic research and scientific careers. It is also the origination of many of our previous and, I’m sure, future blog posts.

The AGM rounded off a very successful year for NERD club’s members. Between us we attended and presented our research at 19 different conferences or workshops, received 4 new grants and produced 28 new papers, one of which was a collaborative effort arising from a NERD club discussion. We also contributed to an eclectic mix of science communication and outreach projects including radio and television interviews, blog and magazine articles and guided tours of the Zoology museum. We came up with plenty of new topics for discussion and teaching sessions along with ideas for future collaborations so I’m sure the year ahead will be equally if not more interesting.

Our NERD club awards were a fitting conclusion to a great year. Here’s the honour roll!

1) Best NERD club session of the year: Erin Jo for her research on toxic nectar and bees.

Best NERD club session: Erin Jo Tiedeken

2) Best blog post of the year: Deirdre for her advice on coping with cuteness overload.

3) Best blog post pun: Keith for Apocalypse Meow!

4) Cutest study species: Sive for tremendous tenrecs (an unfair advantage when you consider that I study these!

5) Most annoying PI, aka the devil’s advocate: A draw between Natalie, Andrew and Ian.

Devil's advocates: Andrew Jackson, Natalie Cooper, Ian Donohue — Devil’s advocates: Andrew Jackson, Natalie Cooper, Ian Donohue

6) Best threesis video: Thomas, for explaining phylogenies by means of baking…

Author

Sive Finlay: sfinlay[at]tcd.ie

@SiveFinlay

Photo credits:

Natalie Cooper

01/07/201301/07/2013

Why dating a scientist has ruined my life

Did you know that otter’s penises are shrinking? I didn’t. Until I was informed of that by my scientist girlfriend. I can no longer look at otters the same way again. Science ruins everything.

I used to enjoy life. The future promised to us by Back to the Future was so close! That all ended the day I started going out with a scientist.

I’m now a cynic. I don’t trust anything that isn’t peer reviewed and even then, what’s the impact factor of the journal? I even know some journals by name now! About 50% of the time I can say “Congrats on getting published in PNAS” without laughing.

Nights out with scientists are different to nights with any other group of people. While most people like to leave their work behind them, scientists take theirs with them and just get slightly louder while they discuss it. It must be how Robin Ince feels when he goes for dinner over at Brian Cox‘s, but instead of talking about the Higgs Boson the topics range from the plight of the buff tailed bumblebee to dinosaur biomechanics. Who knew dinosaurs could be so boring? I didn’t. Until I started dating a scientist.

Peer review is a twisted system. It’s a place where people can be just downright mean to others and get away with it. It seems that the point of peer review is not just to ensure that only the best research gets published in the best journals, but to make those whose work isn’t good enough feel stupid and embarrassed that they thought their puny intellect was capable of appearing in a journal as glorious as the almighty [redacted]!

I must admit, it hasn’t ALL been bad, I no longer think everything gives me cancer (who knew The Daily Mail wasn’t a reliable source?!) That’s right, this blog PROBABLY won’t cause cancer.

I now look forward to being told that my blog doesn’t ask a question, didn’t have a hypothesis and had no supporting data. I haven’t even cited anything. I’m ok with those inevitable criticisms. If they get me down I just have to keep reminding myself, only two more years until we get hoverboards.

Author

David Fortune: davidfortune23[at]gmail.com

Photo credit

Wikimedia Commons

04/06/201304/06/2013

If you please – draw me a dino…

Imagine you’re stuck in the desert, your plane has crashed and you’re trying hard to fix it. Then a child pops up out of the blue and asks you straight out “If you please – draw me a dino…”. Now let’s say you do as Antoine de St-Exupéry and take up the challenge without asking too many questions. How would you draw that dino? I guess it depends on when you were asked the question.

Let’s go back through the history of drawing dinosaurs. The pictures I grew up with were the ones from Jurassic Park who came directly from the last dino-revolution started by Ostrom and Bakker‘s work (especially with the publication of Dinosaures Heresies, in 1986). This vision was then heavily popularized by the three (nearly four?) blockbuster movies we all know and love…

Since the late 1990’s, the increased availability of formerly highly expensive techniques such as CT scans or synchrotrons, has helped to understand dinosaurs better than ever. Led by new discoveries from vast, previously unexplored deposits, some of the most interesting work from recent times shows an even closer link between birds and dinos than we previously thought (see last week’s Science NOW). So I believe (and hope) that the next generation will grow up with the pictures of dino-chickens and see their lunch time chicken wings as true theropod meat…

It is always really interesting to look at all the work that has been done and presented to the public through dinosaur pictorial art; from the weird/funny starts in the first half of the 19th century to the modern, highly accurate representations of today (the French artist Alain Bénéteau is just one example among many). As a nice example, have a look at the pictorial evolution of the second oldest scientifically described dinosaur: the Iguanodon.

Mantell's_Iguanodon_restoration — Mantell‘s *Iguanodon* – 1825

800px-Goodrich_Iguanodon — Goodrich‘s *Iguanodon* – 1859

Harder's Iguanodon - 1916 — Harder‘s *Iguanodon* – 1916

Bekaert's Iguanodon - 1995 — Bekaert‘s *Iguanodon* – 1995

Tamura's Iguanodon - 2012 — Tamura‘s *Iguanodon* – 2012

But here I’d like to emphasize my love for what I think was the “golden age” of dinosaur pictorial art. I obviously want to refer to the work of artists like Charles R. Knight (1874:1953), Zdeněk Burian (1905:1981 – have a look at this awesome online gallery) or Rudolph F. Zallinger (1919:1995). Their beautiful and (for their time) highly accurate scientific artwork was crucially import for bringing palaeontology into the public eye. This “golden age” was made possible by the upgrading of palaeontology to the status of a true science and the general acceptance of Darwin’s theory. Public interest in palaeontology at this time was also fueled by new fossil discoveries from expanding European colonies and the American frontier eventually leading to the most epic palaeo-story ever: the Bone Wars (soon to be seen on HBO)!

I refer to this period (second half of the 19th century and first half of the 20th) as a “golden age” but that does not mean that it was the peak of palaeontological discovery or interest. Our palaeo-knowledge has never been richer. Dinosaurs are no longer merely unknown beasts from an ageless past. They are now placed in accurate phylogenetic frameworks and are just one of the many extinct tetrapod groups which we can now link to extant biodiversity. However, identifying birds as living remains of the dinosaur lineage does diminish dinosaurs’ mightiness. They are no longer the perfect romantic group of fossils: giant monsters that ruled the earth for over 150 million years before being completely wiped out by a single meteorite that cleared the way for us to evolve and exist. Even if I actively try to fight against this simplistic view of the History of Life, I have to admit that it is the one that brought me into palaeontology, not the chickens I used to keep in my parents’ garden… So, although I have no drawing talent whatsoever, because I think that dinosaurs are still awesome but lacking the mightiness they deserve, I’ll draw that little prince something like this:

Dr_M_in_extassies_at_the_approach_of_his_pet_Saurian_by_Henry_De_la_Beche — A sketch from De la Beche (1930) titled: *Dr M[antell] in extasies at the approach of is pet Saurian*

This post was inspired by the excellent “Dinomania” chapter of Gould’s Bully for Brontosaurus 1991, by a master’s project done with F.Barbiere, S.Enault and B.Ramassamy and by the excellent blogs which can be found about this subject such as here, here or here.

Author

Thomas Guillerme: guillert[at]tcd.ie

Photo credit

Wikimedia commons

15/05/2013

Sentenced to death: how not to communicate science

I like to think the purpose of language (poetry excluded) is to convey information. Doing so in science is complicated somewhat by the vocabulary that every field accumulates. But, from my experience, most of this jargon takes the form of nouns and these are easy to explain when necessary. Take the word ‘phylogenetics’ as an example. On first inspection it’s a polysyllabic monster but as a noun it’s easy to define as “the systematic study of organism relationships based on evolutionary similarities and differences.” Simple. And over time this word slots into our vocabulary so we no longer need a definition every time.

The real problems in the language of science communication lurk elsewhere. Neuroscientists declare the self is an illusion but there is always going to be a subject doing science no matter how objective we want it to be. And it is that subject who should do the explaining of his or her work. The complete aversion of scientists to personal pronouns is a disaster for clarity and renders many papers unreadable. There are instances when the passive voice is more suitable but it’s not a case of ‘I showed’ for the humanities and ‘it was shown’ for science.

Lewis Spurgin lists myriad forms of bugbears in communicating science in one of his blog posts. Pretentious writing and clichés are both listed! As he says, so much light has been shed on matters in science that we’ve all gone blind. So rather than eschewing obfuscation and espousing elucidation try to keep it simple stupid (KISS). Despite Will Self’s eloquent defence of obscure words, in science communication, clarity should be our highest priority.

And finally we come to the “funny title: actual title” format (see this blog post). Spurgin reckons scientists prone to this are in need of a colonic irrigation. And with good cause, for having a colon in your title reduces the number of cites you receive.

Author

Adam Kane: kanead@tcd.ie

Photo credit

wikimedia commons

13/05/2013

Monsterology

Monsters and fantastical creatures are integral components of every culture and society. It’s easy to dismiss fantastical beasts such as Cyclopes, unicorns and mermaids as fanciful creations of story tellers with over-active imaginations. While this may be true, there are also often plausible explanations of either extinct or extant animals which could spark such tales. The intriguing pseudoscience of cryptozoology has a long history which is still strong today.

Marauding Cyclopes seem to have been rampant on the islands of mythological Ancient Greece. One of the explanations suggested for the origins of these one-eyed monsters stems from dwarf elephant fossils found on Cyprus. The central nasal cavity for the trunk may have been interpreted as a large single eye socket which could have sparked the legends. Plausible enough but, if true, the elephant origins doesn’t explain why Cyclopes are never depicted with tusks.

Convinced of their existence, Greek writers included unicorn descriptions in natural history rather than mythology writings. Medieval and Renaissance curiosity collections often included fragments of unicorn horns belonging to the real unicorns of the sea, narwhals. Leaving any magical capabilities aside, the existence of a single-horned artiodactyl isn’t that implausible. Pre-historic contact with a giant Eurasian rhinoceros, the Elasmotherium may be one origin of unicorn stories. More recently, the birth of a roe deer with an unusual genetic mutation resulting in a single central horn sparked many “modern day unicorn” stories.

When early explorers ventured beyond the dire “here be monsters” warning on their limited maps, monster sightings were often confirmed rather than dismissed. Christopher Columbus recorded mermaid encounters en route to discovering the New World in 1492. Sea manatees and their penchant for sometimes sitting upright in the water seem to be the most likely explanation for many mermaid stories – although, even allowing for their seaweed hair, given manatees’ rather homely appearance I often wonder why mermaids were always recounted as being so beautiful.

In later years, curious audiences could pay to see their very own mermaid in the scaly and furry flesh. Fiji mermaids comprised of a monkey’s torso sewn onto a fish’s tail were popular in 19^th century sideshows. Although the Victorian public was rather more gullible than their modern day counterparts, it was not long before Fiji mermaids were identified as a hoax. Such trickery set a precedent which created difficulties when it came to scientific acceptance of seemingly fantastical creatures. In his excellent Life Stories series, David Attenborough recounts the scepticism with which European academics reacted to duck billed platypus specimens shipped over from Australia. Surely a creature with the beak of a duck, webbed feet and a non-descript hairy torso must be a hoax of taxonomic trickery? Sometimes real world animals are far more fantastical than any mythical beasts.

In our genomic age, the study and “proof” of mythical creatures has developed far beyond the amateur status of sewing body parts together. Recently, the Sasquatch genome project has sequenced and published big foot’s genome. The mitochondrial DNA has 100% homology with humans (I wonder why??) while the complete genome is a “mosaic of novel primate and human sequence”. Rejected by the journal of cryptozoology the results are published in a newly founded “peer reviewed” journal with the article only available for purchase and, curiously, remains largely unseen by anyone other than the study’s authors…

Whether based on grains of truth or pure fantasy, the field of monsterology remains strong today. I’m sure the Victorian mermaid stitchers are looking down on their Sasquatch geneticist descendants with pride.

Author

Sive Finlay: sfinlay[at]tcd.ie

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