Archive for April, 2007

Hello, fellow Water Words readers!

A little background: Eric’s blog serendipitously went live at the same time our organization was considering developing a number of short movies related to water use and watershed management. Needless to say, we’ve found the information very useful. Currently, it is our intention to develop a series of 4-7 minute shorts, each with a different focus, and take them on the road to local rural and urban communities. We intend to partner with a group that travels the province (New Brunswick) during the summer and fall and presents old Hollywood movies in the outdoors. We envisage that each screening will be preceded by one of the short water movies. An individual from our organization will also be present throughout the evening to offer more information and answer questions.

We’re not entirely new to filmmaking but we have never secured funding for this type of venture before. Given that there are likely to be other videographers with similar interests and/or greater experience reading this, I would welcome any comments or suggestions you may have related to funding.

Are there common pitfalls to avoid with this type of project, and what should we consider if requesting assistance from arts and culture bodies (a first for us) as opposed to environmental trusts (our traditional source of project funds)?

Many thanks to Eric for the opportunity to post this request publicly.

Dave Riddell is the Project Manager at the Environment and Sustainable Development Research Centre at the University of New Brunswick in Fredericton, Canada, which works to enhance the understanding and adoption of sustainable development principles through education, outreach, research, and community involvement. Dr. Riddell’s background lies in aquatic ecology, toxicology, and education, and he is currently involved in environmental education regarding impacts to and stewardship of urban and rural watersheds and aquatic habitats.

WEBSITE:
Work: http://www.unb.ca/enviro; Personal: http://daveriddell.byethost4.com

One of the inspirations for Water Words That Work is the Gallup Poll Daily Briefing, where Dr. Newport, editor in chief of the polling firm, narrates the company’s latest findings on a wide variety of topics (Yes, yes, they have a nicer set and fancier graphics than I do). Every year around Earth Day, Gallup does a poll on the environment.

This year, one of the findings they reported is how remarkably steady public opinion and behavior on environmental matters seems to be throughout this decade — despite a huge surge in news coverage around global warming this year.

Check out the trends in the chart above. If you allow for a 3% to 5% margin of error, there’s barely any perceptible motion here at all. How can this be?

One possible explanation is that the public has been losing faith and tuning out traditional print and broadcast news sources for a decade or more. And the result is that even huge surges in news coverage like the one Al Gore kicked off with “An Inconvenient Truth” just don’t have as much influence as they used to. What are Americans doing with those hours they used to spend reading, watching, and listening to the news? Surfing the net, of course.

I love hearing from Water Words readers, either by email or via the comment feature on the blog. In the past week, I received two emails conveying rather different perspectives on the challenge of science communications. Neither of them explicitly gave me permission to use their names, so I’ll just share excerpts.

The first viewer sent me email that included a letter to the editor that appeared in the Barre-Montpelier (VT) Times Argus on April 6. The letter author had written to protest the layoff of nine public affairs officers from state government:

They are responsible for taking the often incomprehensible arcanum of state government and translating it into useful and easily accessible information for the public. Making the process and products of government more understandable, and thereby more accessible, might serve to re-engage in the democratic process an increasingly disillusioned citizenry.

The letter writer seems to believe the onus falls on the government to take its message to the citizens. The second email was from a Department of Interior employee, who seems to believe that the citizens have at least some obligation to make an effort to understand the vernacular of these important issues. He wrote:

…some words are the words to use regardless of the knowledge base of the audience. Either that insults the audience or they really are ignorant.

This is a healthy debate for water experts to have and coincidentally, it’s raging within the wider scientific community right now. Check out posts on these blogs: Mixing Memory, Nobel Intent, and The Loom to see what the buzz is about.

You all know where I come down: I’m way past “whether” we should make an effort and I’m all about the “how” to do it. But, I’m sure everybody that has and does visit this blog has their own views on the subject.

So what do YOU think: Should we go to the public, or expect the public come to us?

If you’re willing to share your views publicly, click on the comments button below. If you want to share it privately, drop me a note a eric dot eckl at water words that work dot com.

In Sunday’s Washington Post, Chris Mooney and Matthew Nisbet published a piece called “Thanks for the Facts. Now Sell Them,” chastising the scientific establishment for failing to interpret their findings for the general public. Scientists are ceding their ability to contribute to the future of our nation, they wrote. Harsh!

In particular, they cite scientists’ tendency to present the facts of the matter at hand — global warming, stem cell research, etc. — and leave the public to muddle through what those facts mean for them. As Water Words viewers know, I have some views on this subject.

And although I completely agree with their point, I strongly dislike the tone of the piece. It’s full of criticism, but doesn’t provide scientists with a single constructive recommendation for how to do a better job. It may even have the unintended consequence of making scientists even more self-conscious and hesitant about speaking or writing for the public than they already are. How does that help?

George Lakoff, who made a splash with the chattering classes in 2004 with Don’t Think of an Elephant, also failed to follow up on his critique. He slipped back into academic obscurity precisely 15 minutes later.

Also, Mooney and Nisbet are not practicing what they preach. They want scientists to communicate to the public in the style that the public accepts, but they aren’t communicating to scientists in a style that scientists will accept. If you want scientists to believe they’re failing to make an important connection, don’t just assert it prove it. There’s plenty of evidence out there, and I’ve only investigated one tiny corner of science.

On a related topic, I know that many Water Words viewers are unfamiliar with the blogosphere. This is a good opportunity to get a taste of how these debates unfold. Read the original piece here in the Washington post, and then follow some of these links to what other bloggers are saying about the topic.

Visualize Whirled Peas
Daylight Atheism
Greedy, GreedyAlgorithms
Bark’s Blog
Anomolous Data
The NonSequitor
Get Busy Livin’, Or Get Busy Bloggin’
Effect Measure
Reconciliation Ecology
The Intersection