science communication Archives - Green Tea and Velociraptors

UNESCO mobilizes 122 countries to promote open science and reinforced cooperation in the face of COVID-19

March 31, 2020protohedgehogOpen Science

SOURCE UNESCO on 30 March hosted an online meeting of representatives of ministries in charge of science all over the world. Participants included 77 ministers, including governmental secretaries representing a total of 122 countries, as well as Mariya Gabriel, European Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth, Sarah Anyang Agbor, African Union Commissioner for Human Resources, […]

Trust me, I’m a scientist.

June 28, 2017June 28, 2017protohedgehogScience Communication

Why should people trust the published scientific record? Imagine this hypothetical, but potentially very real, conversation with a non-academic: 1: “This research paper has been published, and therefore is scientifically valid.” 2: “But it’s paywalled, I can’t access it. How do I know it’s valid?” 1: “Because it has been peer reviewed.” 2. “Can you […]

Other stuff wot I wrote

May 17, 2017protohedgehogScience Communication

As I’m sure many of you are aware, this is not the only platform I write on. This is my own personal blog, which explains the perpetually low quality of the ramblings on here. I also write a lot for ScienceOpen, and also the PLOS Paleo Community. The former of these includes a lot of […]

Open Access should never be the end game.

February 8, 2017February 8, 2017protohedgehogOpen Science

Open Access needs to be used more effectively to tear down barriers to research accessibility. The ‘open’ versus ‘closed’ access debate probably doesn’t make that much sense to many people. Including myself, actually. It’s not immediately clear what either term means in different contexts (e.g., data, review, research, science), or what we actually even mean […]

Science, echo chambers, and why facts are never enough.

January 31, 2017February 2, 2017protohedgehogScience Communication

Social media is transforming the way we engage with one another, often striking a delicate balance between bringing ourselves closer together and isolating each other. What social media has shown us is that humans love interacting with other people. We love having others agree with us, and we love jumping on social bandwagons and lashing out […]

Top tips for building science communities with social media

December 13, 2015protohedgehogPhD, Science Communication

So a few months ago, I was fortunate enough to be asked to give a talk at the Nature Careers Expo in London about how to use social media to build scientific communities. As part of this, there was a short panel discussion afterwards with myself and Sarah Blackford from the Society for Experimental Biology, […]

Spice up your science with these 10 simple steps

May 12, 2014protohedgehogScience Communication

This was originally posted at http://blogs.egu.eu/palaeoblog/?p=1168 What an awful title, eh. Well, you can avoid making this mistake! A recent Guardian post by Conversation UK’s Akshat Rathi (he’s popular on the blog today!) discusses some of the common mistakes in popular science writing and how best to avoid them. It’s fairly general, and by no means […]

The greatest mass extinction in the history of life

May 12, 2014protohedgehogEvolution, Palaeontology, Science Communication

This was originally posted at: http://blogs.egu.eu/palaeoblog/?p=1204 In palaeontology, there are so many things more important than dinosaurs. For example, the study of large-scale patterns in the history of life on Earth, commonly known as macroevolution, is all about uncovering patterns of speciation and extinction. We are currently about to enter the sixth mass extinction within the […]

The Cambridge Science Festival

March 26, 2014protohedgehogScience Communication

This originally appeared at: http://blogs.egu.eu/palaeoblog/?p=1152 Last night, I was honoured to have spoken at the final evening lecture at the Cambridge Science Festival, along with Nick Crumpton, Anjali Goswami, Rob Asher, and Stephanie Pierce, about why palaeontology is important. Below is a rough transcript of some of what my talk was about. Unlike the others, I […]