Meet the author Cornelia Dean for a book talk of her new work, Making Sense of Science: Separating Substance from Spin. The book was published by Harvard University Press in March of 2017.
The book seeks to equip nonscientists with a set of critical tools to evaluate the scientific claims and controversies that shape our lives. Most citizens learn about science from media coverage, and even the most conscientious reporters sometimes struggle to offer a clear, unbiased explanation to readers. Politicians, activists, business spokespersons, and religious leaders with their own agendas to pursue also influence the way science is reported and discussed.
Meanwhile, anyone seeking factual information on climate change, vaccine safety, risk of terrorist attack, or other topics in the news must sift through an avalanche of bogus assertions and self-interested spin.
Cornelia Dean draws on thirty years of experience as a science journalist with the New York Times to expose the flawed reasoning and knowledge gaps that handicap readers with little background in science. Shortcomings in K–12 education are partly to blame, but so too is the public’s indifference to the way science is done and communicated. Dean shows how venues such as courtrooms and talk shows become fonts of scientific misinformation. She also calls attention to the conflicts of interest that color scientific research, as well as the price society pays when science journalism declines and government funding for research dries up.
About the Author:
Cornelia Dean is a science writer for the New York Times and Writer-in-Residence at Brown University. She began her newspaper career at the Providence Journal.
Her first book, Against the Tide: The Battle for America’s Beaches was published by Columbia University Press in 1999 and was a New York Times Notable Book of the year. Am I Making Myself Clear? her guide to researchers on communicating with the public was published in 2009 by Harvard University Press. She is at work on a fourth book with the working title of The Fate of the Coast about coastal land use in an era of rising seas.
In addition to her work at Brown, she has taught at Harvard, where she was twice honored for distinction in teaching, and at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
She is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, a member of the Corporation of Brown University, her alma mater, and is a founding member of the advisory board of the Metcalf Institute for Environment and Marine Reporting. She is a member of the board of RI Public Radio.
Ms. Dean divides her time between Providence and the islands of Manhattan and Chappaquiddick, NY.
Free and open to all.
Copies will be available for sale and signing.
