(image by frankieleon)
This is reminder of the obvious, but perhaps one some of you could use: Be sure to save your files in a format, and on a medium, that you can read in the future.
Let me tell you a little story about an email that I got this week. Continue reading
It’s been argued that in ecology, like politics, everything is local.
You can’t really understand ecological relationships in nature, unless you’re familiar with the organisms in their natural environment. Or maybe not. That’s probably not a constructive argument. My disposition is that good ecological questions are generated from being familiar with the life that organisms out of doors. But that’s not the only way to do ecology. Continue reading
I’m on vacation. But while I was posting a few photos on social media (amazing National Parks and a wooden carving of bigfoot drinking a beer) I stumbled on some extended silliness among fellow scientists that I want to discuss. Luckily, I woke up early, my family is sleeping in, so here goes.
A very-routine event has somehow caused some a great worry: A famous person said something rather hideous. This hideous opinion was put in quotes and got circulated on twitter. A storm-of-righteous-indignation built on twitter, and spilled over onto facebook and other media outlets. Within a few days, this famous person got “in trouble,” insofar as a famous and powerful person can genuinely get in trouble for voicing a contemptuous opinion.
This is a very common story. It’s a little different because of the specifics: Continue reading
There was a piece published on the Science Magazine website, by Eli Kintisch, that smelled fishy to me. The article was an overview of a range of efforts to make the sharing of raw scientific data easier and more common. Continue reading
Small Pond Science 