Paul Grobstein's blog

Notes and forum related to discussion at a Tri-co Science Studies Group meeting, 16 November 2010

Starting place:

Paul Grobstein (2005) Revisiting science in culture: science as story telling and story revising.  Journal of Research Practice 1 (1), Article M1    http://jrp.icaap.org/index.php/jrp/article/view/9/17

Issues:

"One well-known path to change is a heavily favorable mutation in a single gene. But it may be well known only because it is easy to study. Another path is exploitation of mildly favorable differences that already exist in many genes ... Theorists have argued over this point for years, but researchers have been able to address it only recently." ... Natural selection cuts broad swath through fruit fly genome, New York Times, 20 September, 2010

""I suspect there are features of the higher order organization of neurons that need to be included among the "underlying rules" to achieve a better understanding of depression, both conceptually and for therapeutic purposes."  ... PG, An expanded neurobiology of depression, June, 2009

Twenty or so years ago, when my kids were in elementary school, I visited a class to talk about my profession.  I said I was a scientist, and asked the class if they knew what a scientist was.  "Its somebody who knows things," one student said.  No, I said, its somebody who knows what we don't know and asks new questions based on that.

I don't doubt that "plagiarism" is a persistent problem that is exacerbated in the "digital age" (see Plagiarism lines blur for students in digitial age).  I do think though that it is worth noticing that there are two somewhat different issues at stake in thinking about "plagiarism," and to highlight, particularly in educational contexts, the one that often gets less attention.

Interesting intersection this weekend of thoughts from an ongoing summer institute with K12 teachers on Brain, Science, Inquiry, and Education, from seeing Christopher Nolan's new movie Inception, and from a visit to the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia.

Art

• Adventure to the stars: telling tales of science and art, Jessica Foley, Circa, Spring 2009

History

• A continuation of Paul Grobstein's theory of science as story telling and story revising: a discussion of its relevance ot history, Toni Weller, Journal of Research Practice, 2006