A bit of Victoriana

Everyone loves a bit of Victoriana at Christmas, so I thought I’d dig out some of my notes on children’s science books in the 19th century. (preface of John Henry Pepper’s Playbook, 1860, via googlebooks clip) The 19th century was the age of professionalisation of science. The word “scientist” wasn’t coined until 1833 [EDIT: or … Continue reading »

Science, citizens and everything else

I have a post over on Research Blogs about the Science and Citizen conference last week. The event was a bit of a birthday party for the House of Lords’ 2000 Science and Society report. It might seem ridiculous to run an international conference to toast a decade-old select committee report. It is. It’s also … Continue reading »

Brain bloggers

I’m currently doing some research on brain bloggers. The first stage is a rather basic survey (below). This is open from today until Monday the 10th of January. By ‘brain bloggers’ I mean bloggers who write about the stuff that goes in people’s heads, whatever we think this stuff is. Such bloggers might focus on … Continue reading »

Uncertainty (again)

I’m blogging from the Science and Citizenship Conference. It’s being held partly to mark a ten year anniversary of the Lord’s report on Science and Society. Much of the programme was based on workshops considering key theme’s in the report. I took part on one about uncertainty and risk, and thought it was worth sharing … Continue reading »

STS and the Bernalian nightmare

Steve Fuller gave a seminar on philosophy of science to our MSc students last week. Always good for a provocative one-liner, at one point Steve described 21st century science and technology studies (STS) as “the poster child for neoliberal knowledge production”. These words haunted me for the following two days, as I attended an STS … Continue reading »

Children, adults and climate change media

The picture above is of the BBC Blue Peter Green Book. Published in 1990, following the introduction of a Blue Peter green badge in 1988. Sponsored by Sainsbury’s, it also has a forward by Lord Sainsbury, who went on to become science minister for the Labour Government. I have a copy of this book* which … Continue reading »

The academics are revolting

On Monday, I wrote that it was starting to feel as if a debate on the future of higher education was finally starting to open up. Today, I have a post on Research Fortnight’s blog, Exquisite Life, about the way academics are (in their own way) starting to campaign on this issue. I bashed out … Continue reading »