Cutting NSF Is Like Liquidating Your Finest Investment
Look closely at your mobile phone or tablet. Touch-screen technology, speech recognition, digital sound recording and the internet were all developed using […]
What is Census Data?
When most Americans think of the census, they think of the 10-year or decennial census that is used to gather basic data about the total population. The decennial census is an actual count of people and housing units, and it serves as the baseline for measuring and generating other census data-sets…
Lying With Maps and Census Data
Geographer Frank Donnelly notes that census geography and maps are not automatically reliable – they can be used to intentionally skew research findings.
Would Popular Science Books Benefit from a Rating System?
Standing in a powerful pose increases your testosterone levels. Ten thousand hours of practice leads to mastery and high achievement. Eating out of large bowls encourages overeating. These are just a few examples of big ideas that have formed the basis of popular science books, only to be overturned by further research or a closer reading of the evidence…
Book Review: Research Impact and the Early Career Researcher
Research Impact and the Early Career Researcher presents chapters that reflect on the experiences that ‘early career researchers’ have had in relation to research impact. The collection is not a manual or textbook on how to achieve impact, but instead presents different voices on how researchers experience and react to the demand for impact.
Book Review: Higher Education and Social Inequalities
The higher education system rests on the principle of meritocracy, with entry into the ‘top’ Russell Group universities supposedly the product of ability. This is despite growing attention to the over-representation of independent school students studying at the ‘top’ universities, with state school students and disadvantaged groups less likely to secure admission.
Sizing Up a ‘One Size Does Not Fit All’ Mass Media
If you were going to create an encyclopedia about “mass media,” your first task likely would be to define both words in the term. Doing so was immeasurably easier in the 1920s, when the term “mass media” first started making the rounds, but it’s grown corresponding harder as both the popular conception of ‘mass’ has mutated and the very media itself has evolved from purely paper to heavily broadcast to OMG online.
Book Review: Writing a Watertight Thesis
How you structure the thesis itself is only one part of the overall structure of your doctorate. In their new book, Mike Bottery and Nigel Wright discuss the importance of three different areas in which a good structure is crucial to your success…
Why Faith in Science Is Critical: Five Questions for Naomi Oreskes
Science journalist Hope Reese speaks with Naomi Oreskes, author of the new book ‘Why Trust Science?’ about how to trust science that may conflict with our moral or religious values and what we can do to prevent bias in scientific communities, and methodological fetishism, among other topics.
