The book: Turmoil in American Public Policy: Science, Democracy, and the Environment, by Leslie R. Alm, Ross E. Burkhart, and Marc V. Simon.
My assignment: read it, take notes, keep a blog (post). I'll be doing it in bits, probably by chapter, since I told myself I would get two weeks to read it, but due to procrastination (and my friend's 26th birthday, which ate the weekend), I get to do it all this week. This review/reading process won't be as detailed as the article analysis, since I need to take less than four hours per chapter to write this post (though I wish I could take longer, I don't have the time!). I am mixing notes on the book and my thoughts on those notes without citations, except for direct quotes. This is to save time, but also because I am taking a course on Water Policy and a course on Environmental Law simultaneously, and wish to interrelate ideas without needing to overly explain the sources. There are reflective questions at the end of each chapter that are not included in these posts.
Monday, February 20, 2012
Chapter One: Turmoil in American Public Policy
The book: Turmoil in American Public Policy: Science, Democracy, and the Environment, by Leslie R. Alm, Ross E. Burkhart, and Marc V. Simon.
My assignment: read it, take notes, keep a blog (post). I'll be doing it in bits, probably by chapter, since I told myself I would get two weeks to read it, but due to procrastination (and my friend's 26th birthday, which ate the weekend), I get to do it all this week. This review/reading process won't be as detailed as the article analysis, since I need to take less than four hours per chapter to write this post (though I wish I could take longer, I don't have the time!). I am mixing notes on the book and my thoughts on those notes without citations, except for direct quotes. This is to save time, but also because I am taking a course on Water Policy and a course on Environmental Law simultaneously, and wish to interrelate ideas without needing to overly explain the sources.
My assignment: read it, take notes, keep a blog (post). I'll be doing it in bits, probably by chapter, since I told myself I would get two weeks to read it, but due to procrastination (and my friend's 26th birthday, which ate the weekend), I get to do it all this week. This review/reading process won't be as detailed as the article analysis, since I need to take less than four hours per chapter to write this post (though I wish I could take longer, I don't have the time!). I am mixing notes on the book and my thoughts on those notes without citations, except for direct quotes. This is to save time, but also because I am taking a course on Water Policy and a course on Environmental Law simultaneously, and wish to interrelate ideas without needing to overly explain the sources.
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Perceptions of Objectivity and Advocacy
This particular entry is a kind of follow-up to last week's post about scientists' views of policy-making.
For this post I looked up a more recent article by the same author, Leslie Alm (who now has heard my name through email, though I haven't contacted him directly yet). This article is titled Scientists’ Perceptions of Objectivity and Advocacy: Making the Linkage of Science to Environmental Policy. Beware - there's a typo (I hope it's a typo) in the abstract (and throughout the article) that might lead you to believe that the article was published in 2009 (since that's apparently when the interviews were conducted), but it was actually published in 2006.
The tl;dr of this article is that scientists adore objectivity, but also admit that true objectivity is not possible. Scientists believe that that reputation of scientific objectivity will be lost if they openly advocate for a change in policies - not to mention that they're risking their personal reputation as a scientist. There is a belief that science done right speaks for itself and shouldn't need scientist advocates, which explains the lack of public science advocacy.
A more complete summary/review after the jump:
For this post I looked up a more recent article by the same author, Leslie Alm (who now has heard my name through email, though I haven't contacted him directly yet). This article is titled Scientists’ Perceptions of Objectivity and Advocacy: Making the Linkage of Science to Environmental Policy. Beware - there's a typo (I hope it's a typo) in the abstract (and throughout the article) that might lead you to believe that the article was published in 2009 (since that's apparently when the interviews were conducted), but it was actually published in 2006.
The tl;dr of this article is that scientists adore objectivity, but also admit that true objectivity is not possible. Scientists believe that that reputation of scientific objectivity will be lost if they openly advocate for a change in policies - not to mention that they're risking their personal reputation as a scientist. There is a belief that science done right speaks for itself and shouldn't need scientist advocates, which explains the lack of public science advocacy.
A more complete summary/review after the jump:
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Science Communication - Class NonMeeting One
I write this post in the lounge on the 5th floor of the Environmental Research Building at Boise State. My office is on the 2nd floor, but somehow being up here on the top floor, where all my professors have offices, makes me feel smarter and more productive. Plus there are windows, which I, as a lowly TA, don't rate in my cubicle-space. Oddly I also don't rate any chairs for the students to come visit me... but that's a different matter.
I was supposed to have a meeting with my advisor here this morning, but we miscommunicated. Not sure how, but I thought we had a meeting now and he didn't, but there's no record of either of us ever really saying anything. So I have some free time (in which I should be doing the reading for my Environmental Law class later today) to write about what I'm interested in - science and communication.
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Drink up! All your daily pills in your water already
A town in New Mexico, Rio Rancho, is considering reusing their sewage effluent as drinking water (article). Last time I checked, though, it's nearly impossible to get pharmaceuticals out of effluent, so the re-use of this water, even after it's been pumped through an aquifer*, is akin to drinking all the pills that everybody else takes. Effects of these low concentration pharmaceuticals are unknown (source), but in lagoons that are used to help treat effluent before release into rivers**, feminized fish (males develop female organs and eventually weirdly can become fertile females source source source) are common. Common pharmaceuticals in drinking water include: sunscreen, aspirin, caffeine, codeine, nicotine, clofibric acid (cholesterol meds), Premarin (hormonal birth control), chemotherapy drug residue, "antibiotics, analgesics, antiseptics, beta-blocker heart drugs, residues of drugs for controlling epilepsy as well as drugs serving as contrast agents for diagnostic X rays" (source).
Even those of us in Boise, who for some reason consider ourselves supremely awesome water stewards, are ingesting chemicals in our drinking water. I can't find sources, because I don't actually pay for my water (utilities are through the university), but you can ask your water company (which hereabouts is mostly United Water, a subsidiary of Suez of Water Cartel fame) for an analysis of your tap water quality. It's not as clean as you might think it should be. Don't worry, though, your tap water is still likely safer than bottled water, which is another post entirely (and not regulated in any way by anybody, yay).
*Which I think is also a bad idea, because we don't know the environmental interactions of pharmaceuticals with minerals or long-term effects; it's polluting a source of clean fresh water.
**Also an awful idea, but in my opinion, likely less harmful than injecting it into an aquifer, since meteoric water will help dilute it somewhat... but there's also the wildlife and downstream users to consider.
Even those of us in Boise, who for some reason consider ourselves supremely awesome water stewards, are ingesting chemicals in our drinking water. I can't find sources, because I don't actually pay for my water (utilities are through the university), but you can ask your water company (which hereabouts is mostly United Water, a subsidiary of Suez of Water Cartel fame) for an analysis of your tap water quality. It's not as clean as you might think it should be. Don't worry, though, your tap water is still likely safer than bottled water, which is another post entirely (and not regulated in any way by anybody, yay).
*Which I think is also a bad idea, because we don't know the environmental interactions of pharmaceuticals with minerals or long-term effects; it's polluting a source of clean fresh water.
**Also an awful idea, but in my opinion, likely less harmful than injecting it into an aquifer, since meteoric water will help dilute it somewhat... but there's also the wildlife and downstream users to consider.
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