Starting Something: Blogging for Science

National Blog Posting Month – March 2013 – Risk

Prompt – Next week kicks off BlogHer Entrepreneurs conference, a meeting of minds for women who “want to start something.” Tell us what you’d love to start.

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How is it that whenever I’m by myself, I think about all manner of things I’d like to start. But later, when someone asks me, I draw a blank.

Maybe the problem is that I’m always thinking about independent things that I want to do. Little projects that likely would not extend outside of my little circle. But this prompt seems to be asking for something bigger. What can I start that would influence others in a positive way.

So a death cult is right out. (Sorry Joe. Much as I love you, it ain’t gonna work out. I still think you’re cute though. *sigh*)

As I think about it, I realize there is one thing that I do really want to do, that could impact other people.

I’m a scientist, you see. You know. One of those.

I want to de-mystify science. I want to get people, young and old, interested in science. I want to convince people that scientists are not white-coat-wearing, ivory-tower-dwelling geniuses who look down their noses at the ‘lesser’ people.

Scientists are just people.

I’ve actually had strangers – folks that I’ve struck up a conversation with at a bar for example – tell me how surprised they were to find out I have a Ph.D. ‘But you’re so nice!’ ‘You don’t talk like a scientist at all.’

Actually, I’m just an ordinary average scientist. Movies, TV, and documentaries portray scientists as stereotypical ‘scientists,’ and admittedly, when you get a bunch of us into a room, discussions can get very technical, very quickly. Jargon gets tossed around like it’s nothing. But I hardly know any scientists who aren’t perfectly happy to take twenty steps back and explain things in simpler terms of others would just ask.

Part of the problem is that scientists are perfectly comfortable with asking and answering questions. If no one asks questions, then we assume that everyone is following along perfectly. But, most people, your average American, is terrified to ask questions. It’s that ridiculous fear of asking a stupid question and being mocked. So communication between the sciences and the rest of the world is shot, because no one asks questions.

This bothers me. It always has. The science that I do is really cool. But it’s so technical. There’s so many little details. And it’s taken me more than twenty years to gain the knowledge that I need to do what I do. I want to share it.

The first step is to be in academia and teach. I love teaching my classes, I really do. I’ll even accept grading exams if that means that I can teach. (Speaking of which…) But that reaches a limited audience. Only those in my class (and thus only those who want to learn and can afford to a attend university) can benefit. I’ve added social media. I’m endlessly on Twitter, live-tweeting grading of exams or fixing a mass spectrometer. My personal life creeps in too – my son getting sent home from school (scientists have children?!) or my husband buying a new car (nice wheels!) – and people see that although I’m a scientist, I have a human side too. In fact, I’m just as human as everyone else! I just work at a university.

My latest venture has been blogging. This blog. It’s like my Twitter, where I write about what ever is on my mind that day. NaNoBloMo prompts are fun to work with as well.

Many of my blog posts deal with science, specifically with the science that I am doing. I answer people’s questions in the plainest language I can. What is a mass spectrometer? What are stable isotopes? How can you measure body temperature from an extinct animal? I take my own published papers and convert them into something accessible to non-scientists, so they know what the results are and why they matter. It’s a work in progress.

What I wish I could to is reach more people. My blog actually gets sometimes close to 1000 hits a day, but I wish I could reach more. That’s why I do NaBloPoMo challenges. That’s why I do blog hops. That’s why I post things on Twitter and Facebook. That’s why I friend and follow every science writer I can think of. I’ve met a few now.

I think it is to my advantage that my blog isn’t just science. By writing about writing, or swordsmanship, or parenting an autistic child, or being a mother in general, I reach others who might not be drawn to an ordinary ‘science’ blog.

I’m just an ordinary person after all. I just spend my days in a laboratory. As I write this, I’m having a discussion with an unruly mass spectrometer. But I’m thinking about my son and how, hopefully, this evening we’ll be going to sword practice.

This is what I want to do. Now if only I could make a living at it…