With major changes expected in the Arctic in the coming years, scientists should share their data more freely.
At a panel discussion on the future of Arctic cooperation today, Dr. Lars-Otto Reiersen of the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program Secretariat said many scientists are not sharing the data they’ve collected in the High North.
Do you know what your water footprint is? If you’re a meat eater like me, it’s around 5.6 cubic metres per day. If you’re a vegetarian, it’s close to half that. Your footprint is an indicator of how much water you use, both directly (by drinking and showering) and indirectly (in terms of how much is required to produce the things you consume).
Water is “blue gold.” Or at least it could be, and soon. That was the opinion expressed by several experts yesterday, in a discussion about the Energy and Water Nexus. The Stockholm Water Prize winner Tony Allan and other big names in water research presented not only the challenges the world is facing, but also some of the solutions.
The world is warming up, global potable water supplies are becoming harder to access and require energy to pump to the places that need it the most. The Catch 22 is that the energy required to pump water increases green house gas emissions, which accelerates global warming and the demand for water. The story is much more complex than this of course, but the message is clear: we need to rethink our relationship with water and energy. Read More
York University researcher Ellen Bialystok and University of British Columbia researcher Janet Werker are making news at AAAS with their work on bilingualism and the brain. CNN was covering the story in it’s news this morning and the story has been popular here with American press. It’s another example of the great work being presented by Canadians here at AAAS.
Photo by Philipp Salzgeber.
Maybe we can’t handle the truth. As we increasingly detect other planets and assess their habitability, we also might start to question the uniqueness and significance of life on Earth. It’s a potential development that would affect our society and religious world views like never before.
That’s the interesting topic addressed in the panel session entitled, “Astronomical Pioneering: The Implicatons of Finding Other Worlds.”
Wesley Traub, Chief Scientist for NASA’s Exoplanet Exploration Program, and the Project Scientist for the Terrestrial Planet Finder Coronagraph (TPF-C), gave an update on how we try to detect other planets and how the search is going. In short, scientists are trying to detect where a planet is moving around a star within a system. And it’s going pretty well. In one system, four planets have been found to be circulating around a star. As of last week, 528 planets have been detected, something he describes as a “spectacular achievement that shows no signs of slowing down.”
We have short video pieces from the speakers at yesterday’s press breakfast. Kathryn O’Hara is below to introduce the topic and you find the rest of the speakers on the Think Canada You Tube page.
Dr. Ward Chesworth of the University of Guelph likes to quote ecologist Angus Martin, who said back in 1975 that the way humans have cultivated land for thousands of years is inherently flawed.
At a symposium on sustainable growth, Dr. Chesworth explained why it is impossible for every country in the world to have an ecological footprint equal to that of places like Canada and the U.S. that have a high standard of living. To put it to statistics, people want to attain a high Human Development Index, a statistic used by the UN as a reference for measuring life standards. HDI is often correlated with ecological footprint.
Hanoi flood by Haithanh
That’s what one science writer was told when getting a promotion and, at the same time, being asked to do more broad science stories in the future and not so many on climate change. Apparently, climate change has lost its sex appeal.
Indeed, it’s been a tough year for climate change in the media. The warming world just isn’t feeling the love from the papers and tv news lately.
News coverage of climate change took a big drop last year. There are a few reasons for this. One is that science reporters were down at the gulf for three months covering the oil spill. Health care and Wall St. issues have also gobbled up a lot of media attention that may have otherwise drifted to climate change.
But media outlets feed their audiences, and their audiences may be getting tired of the message. Climate change is ranking low lately in public surveys of top priorities. Economic concerns, of course, are occupying the top rungs.
Photo: Muhammad Rehan
IDRC’s Naser Faruqui wrote about the historical relationship between science and democracy in the Middle East, suggesting ways that science and innovation can be advanced to promote greater transparency, voice, and freedom in predominantly Muslim countries in today’s edition of The Globe and Mail.
Faruqui, Director of Innovation, Policy and Science at Canada’s International Development Research Centre (IDRC), is one of the authors of the upcoming Atlas of Islamic World Science and Innovation, and a co-author of Water Management in Islam, which presents Islamic perspectives on a number of water-management policies. He spoke on ‘Education, Science, and Innovation as Tools for New Engagement with the Islamic World,’at the AAAS on Friday, February 18th.
To paraphrase E.B. White, dissecting humour is like dissecting a frog: both die in the process.
Brian Malow, Earth’s (self-proclaimed) Premier Science Comedian, bravely picked up the scalpel today to examine essential elements of humour and help scientists better engage with their audiences through comedy.
A lot of humour derives from the delivery, he explained. “Non-verbal information is more important than the words you use.” This includes using posture, gestures, eye contact and movement to convey confidence.
“You have to believe what you’re saying and that’ll carry it a long way,” Malow said. “Don’t ask the audience if it’s funny.”
Impressions at AAAS
It’s great to put a face to a byline.
Over the past three days, I’ve been meeting some of my favourite science journalists – or at least reading the names on their press badges and discovering that the writers I follow on Twitter and the bloggers I read regularly are covering AAAS too.
That’s why the press coffee lounge is the best part of AAAS – for a science journalism student at least.
But there are other perks to joining the roughly 1000 journalists covering one of the biggest science events of the year. Read More »