How to Become a Scientist

August 5th, 2011

One of my more popular posts is Five Qualities Required to be a Scientist.  In response, I get a lot of comments and email from kids / teenagers who want advice about how to become a scientist.

Now, as a practical matter, being a scientist is like being a writer.  No one makes you into either.  If you write, you’re a writer.  If you do science, you’re a scientist.  So, want to be a scientist?  Practice science!

It’s a different story if you want to make a career of science and support yourself and perhaps a family as a scientist.  The answer is simple in some ways, but the execution can be challenging for many.  For the later stages of a career and having success in graduate school and beyond, I’ve explained before how to win at science.  But how do you even get to that stage?

First of all, get top grades throughout school.  If you can’t manage to be a straight A student, or haven’t been in the past, you have to prioritize at least your math and science classes and work hard and be at the top.  Impress your science teachers.  Do more than the minimum.  This isn’t just passing a class — this is your passion and your future career!  You ought to love it and it need not feel like a sacrifice.  Frankly, if putting extra into your science classes seems like work, you don’t love science enough to do it as a career.  You’re better off following another interest.

Beyond your classes, read and do science!  Participate in science fairs.  Read books about science.  Watch documentaries about science.  Participate in citizen science projects online like Galaxy Zoo.  Science, science, science!  Read and watch science fiction, too, if it inspires your science interest.

Go to the best schools you can at every stage.  Science is basically an academic discipline, although industry does support many scientists in many fields, but that’s generally post-PhD.  Take your top grades, your science activities on your transcript, glowing recommendation letters from your science teachers, and get into the best college you can afford to go to that has a top department in your field of interest.  There are a lot of online resources now, and it isn’t that hard to figure out which departments are good and recognized in different fields or subfields.  I’ve written about this process before for high school students.

In college, your goal should be to keep a GPA above 3.5 while majoring in your field of interest.  Avoid double majoring unless you have a real double passion and can see a niche in the overlap.  You should pursue research with a star in the department, who is likely to have grant money and can support your work financially as well as intellectually.  Work for that star professor in the summers, and try to do a summer reserach program (or two!) before graduation.  Ideally this will result in one or more publications and several glowing letters of recommendation.  Coupled with top grades and GRE scores (a side effect of studying hard for your major classes), this should get you into a top graduate school.  From there it’s not over, but that is the easy path.

I know it isn’t always that easy, but if science is your passion, you’ll love the work and it’ll be fun.

I do want to note that some people discover they like science but don’t love doing science as a practical matter.  If hours, days, weeks, or even months of doing tedious, careful, boring work is too much to pay for digging out one of nature’s tightly held secrets, you may not be cut out to be a scientist.  For me, I’ll wade through a lot of B.S. in order to finally put together a graph showing whether or not my hypothesis is a good one, and its prediction is borne out.  If you won’t, reconsider your future.  If you will, you’ll do good work, make good results, and be welcomed as a fellow scientist.

Permalink | Tags: advice, astronomy, Personal, Science | 32 Comments »

Common Misconceptions about Science Basics and the Multiple Methods of Science

July 27th, 2011

Continuing to think about science this week…

A lot of people think they know what science is, and some of them are quite smart and generally well informed, but not on this topic.  Let me give an a common misconception:

Many people think that there is a progress of scientific knowledge that progresses from hypothesis to theory to Law.  So, a theory is more likely to be true than a hypothesis, but until it’s really rock solid the theory doesn’t graduate to “Law” status.  Well, that’s just screwy.  A hypothesis is a generally a testable explanation for an observed phenomenon (e.g., the gravity that makes things fall on Earth makes planets move in their orbits).  A theory, or a “Scientific Theory,” is a well-developed hypothesis that has passed so many tests in so many situations that it’s about as close to the truth as we’re likely to get — at least pending a push into new realms (e.g., Einstein’s theory of General Relativity which continues to pass exacting tests and superseded Newtonian gravitational theory which fails in the limit of large masses).  A “Law” is just a mathematical relationship that works very well to describe a physical relationship, but may not be correct in every situation (e.g. Newton’s Law of Gravitation or the Ideal Gas Law).

OK, let me get to something a little more subtle.  A lot of people think that there is something called “the scientific method” and there’s only one such method that is scientific.  It goes something like this:

1. Make observations.

2. Make a hypothesis regarding relationships noted in the observations.

3. Carry out an experiment in a lab to test the hypothesis (usually where all factors but one under investigation are held constant).

4. If the hypothesis hasn’t been falsified, continue to test it with more experiments.  If it has been falsified, modify it or develop a new testable hypothesis.

And so on…

In reality, there are entire scientific fields in which this is impossible to do, or nearly so.  Astronomy is one of them.  Astronomy is what we call observational science, primarily, and the subfield of laboratory astrophysics isn’t a huge part of it.  I can’t run an experiment on a quasar to figure out how it works.  I can only watch it.  Oh, I can watch it in ways so strange and obscure that I might as well be a wizard, but I’m really just watching it, collecting light in one way or another.  The closest I can do to an experiment is testing a hypothesis by making some new observations that might might challenge it.  It feels like an experiment, but again, I’m just collecting some light and can’t control my subject at all.

Astronomy and many other fields also use computational methods.  Computer models have helped us understand a lot of things better, and are an invaluable tool in science.  With a computer model, you can vary parameters and see how the system behaves.  When the computer model matches observations and is based on understood physics, it often has good predictive power.  This is one way we study stellar interiors and evolution, for instance.  I’ve started hearing criticism of climatology in some quarters based on the notion that “writing a computer program” isn’t scientific.  That’s crap.  You test the models against reality, adjust them, improve them, and at some point their consistency and predictive power usually gets really good and you’ve got something akin to a traditional scientific theory, all without actually conducting an experiment in a lab.

Another area where it’s hard to do proper experiments is on human subjects.  Ideally a scientist could conduct proper experiments (double blind, randomized studies), but there are often ethical concerns.  In these cases sociology and medicine can start to resemble astronomy.  You get to watch, and hope you can draw some meaningful conclusions later.  Often it’s super complicated and the results are of limited value, which is why contradictory news stories come out all the time.

I don’t think science is really something with a single, clear method.  It is rather a system of rigorously testing ideas through observation and experiment, keeping ideas that don’t fail and have supporting evidence, and gaining trust in them over time.  There are a lot of quality-control elements like peer review, open publication of methods and data, consideration of uncertainties on measurements, and the like.

Some people seem to regard science as just another belief system, no different than religion or political persuasion.  Those people are silly and misguided.  Sure, there are assumptions in science and they are something like this: reality has consistent rules  and these can be explored through measurement and observation.  Since there’s a lot of evidence to support that statement, I’m not just choosing to follow a belief system, I’m letting the way things actually seem to work guide my beliefs.  Some of the silly people thinks that this neglects the supernatural, and it does.  If the supernatural has any measurable effect in our reality, it can be measured and studied by science, and if it has no effects that can be observed and measured, it doesn’t exist in any meaningful way and can’t have any effects on us.

So what’s the point of science?  I think there are misconceptions about that, too.  Some seem to think that it’s about making our lives easier, or making better technology to make more money, or to attack their own personal biases (religion, politics).  It’s just about developing reliable knowledge.  That’s it.  Knowledge is valuable.  Knowledge is power.  We’ve done things good and bad with our scientific knowledge, but not pursuing science and scientific knowledge is settling for ignorance, or worse: misconceptions, superstitions, and outright lies.

To conclude, science is messier than many people realize, but there’s a system of reviewing and testing that reduces mistakes and biases and eventually leads to better answers with ever increasing reliability.  Common sense, revealed knowledge, and wild-ass guesses are simply not always reliable.

Ask for the science, and don’t settle for anything less.

Permalink | Tags: Science | 3 Comments »

On Science and its place on the Spectrum of Thinking

July 25th, 2011

As I look over my list of topics I want to write about soon, it’s clear that I’m thinking a lot about science at the moment.  I’m a scientist and do science on a daily basis, or struggle to anyway, but I’ve had a lot of triggers to write about several aspects of science.  I’ve got kids telling me they want to be scientists and asking how to do it.  I was on a committee for a defending science education PhD student last week who is studying whether students are actually learning about science in practice rather than just scientific facts.  I’ve been reading some criticisms of science based on non-scientific thinking that makes me cringe.  I’ve also been discussing some issues of falling science funding in light of budget issues at the federal level.  Ugh.  A lot of thinking about science!

I don’t “worship” science or “believe in” science and I’m not a follower of “scientism.”  Those are a bunch of crap phrases and arguments by those who don’t understand science.  I respect science and empirically it’s the only way of reliably determining non-trivial things about how the universe really works.  That’s clearly empirically true based on the successes of science and demonstrated to people every day by our technology.

We all have our biases and I do, too, and science is the only hope for overcoming them and developing deep understanding.  Disrespect individual studies or individual scientists, but disrespect science and I consider you a fool.

Let me propose a spectrum of thinking, if you will, that describes ways of approaching knowledge in the world.  At one end is uncritical acceptance of information, and at the other is rigorous mathematical proof.  Both, usually, are useless in the real world.  Most people sit toward the accepting end of things, as is appropriate since a lot of information is trivial in some sense.  Amy Winehouse is dead, I’m pretty sure.  I didn’t see her body or check her pulse, but I believe it.  A lot of things can be taken in that way, and a lot of people stop there, unfortunately.  (Unless they are super biased and skeptical conspiracy theorists, but let’s move beyond them for now.)

Further along is argument of feasibility, legal thinking.  I’m not a fan, to tell you the truth.  It’s not about the truth.  It’s about plausibility.  Let’s say Amy Winehouse had not been seen for an extended period and someone argued that she was probably dead, and that seemed likely beyond a reasonable doubt.  It might not be true at all, but lawyers argue stuff like this all the time and juries decide…wrongly, often enough, it has been shown (the Innocence Project).  Just accepting what people say, or accepting plausible arguments that seem pretty good is not a way to get to highly reliable information.

To make a quick aside, let me repeat the story of a friend I may have mentioned before.  My friend was an astronomy major and then went on to law school.  One of his classmates was arguing to his friends about the origin of phases of the moon.  She suffered one of the standard misconceptions about this.  He stepped in and told them the correct explanation.  She then went back to her argument, saying, “Wait, I think I can convince you to come around to my point of view.”

That’s shocking and disgusting to me, a scientist.  I want to know the right answer.  I don’t want to be swayed by anything but an objective process of testing that’s largely independent of personal bias and verifiable.  But that’s legal thinking.  It’s about making a case, not about getting at the truth.  Not surprisingly, I’ve never been selected to be on a jury.  I actually think they made the right call in the Casey Anthony trial.  She may have done it, but the prosecution sure didn’t show it.  OJ probably did it, too, but I agreed with that jury as well: there was reasonable doubt since the police were racists and lied about it, and their labs were not to be trusted.  Moving on…

Then we get to SCIENCE.  It’s a thousand-handed monster, stumbling in the dark, blind, groping, but making progress.  Hoaxers and the biased get smacked down sooner or later.  In the long run, it’s fair, and it works.  Bitches, as they say.  In the real world science is thing that gets answers that can be trusted, at some level, even if they’re not ever quite perfect or proven.  Little is so ideal in reality.

Beyond science is philosophy and certain areas of math.  This is the ideal stuff, where things are proven.  And in most circumstances, as a descriptor of the real world outside of science, it’s totally useless in my opinion.  Mathematical descriptions are part of science of course, but I’m not talking about them, as they’re limited to theory and ideal circumstances.  Newton’s law of gravitation is perfect and precise, but limited in scope, a fact which physics encompasses but the perfect equation does not.

Let me turn my ire to one person I will term a “philosophy weenie” who challenges Sam Harris’s scientific approach to morality on the basis of philosophy.  I was skeptical myself of Harris’s claims initially, but after reading the Moral Landscape came around to the basic point, which is not unreasonable: science can inform our morality.  It’s not clear that it can solve every hard problem, but it’s a practical approach that works in the real world.  The weenie rejects his arguments based on “consequentialism” which is the philosophical equivalent of chaos theory.  If you change something, you cannot know the consequences.  But she missed the entire point and used a philosophical argument to tackle a scientific argument, which is very unreasonable.

She’s talking weather while Harris is talking climate.  She’s talking individuals while Harris is talking mobs.  She’s talking individual molecules while Harris is talking gas dynamics.

Philosophy, in too many cases, is worse than useless because it gets in the way of practical answers that work in the real work and develop real understanding.  I have little respect for many of these arguments.  Sure, science is a subset of philosophy — it’s the one that actually works and applies to reality.  You don’t have to agree with Sam Harris or his thesis, but you don’t disagree with it on the basis of this weenie argument or I ridicule it.  Science actually works in its regime, and saying it can’t is worse than stupid.

OK, that’s a little off my chest.   More science talk coming up.

Permalink | Tags: astronomy, Personal, Science | 3 Comments »

Argentus Celebrates Neptune

July 12th, 2011

Launch Pad is sucking up all my time, but I wanted to point out an article I wrote that’s just been released.  Check it out:

Neptune has just completed its first full orbit since being discovered in 1846. Steve H Silver marks the anniversary in his latest issue — Argentus: Neptune [PDF file] — with articles by Mike Brotherton, Michael A. Burstein, Brother Guy Consolmagno, SJ, Marianne Dyson, Heidi Hammel, Bill Higgins, Chris McKitterick, Christian Ready, Diane Turnshek and himself. There’s also artwork from Kurt Erichsen, Brad W. Foster, Sue Mason, MO Starkey, and Steve Stiles.

[Thanks to Steven H Silver for the story.]

My contribute focuses on the moons of Neptune.  Triton is pretty damn interesting.

Permalink | Tags: Argentus, astronomy, Neptune, Personal, Steve Silver, Triton | 1 Comment »

The Cold Legacies

July 6th, 2011

I have an essay titled “The Cold Legacies” that just went up over at Lightspeed Magazine.  This is based in part on an old blog post and lesson plan for my “Science in Science Fiction” course I’ve taught at the University of Wyoming.  Anyway, it’s about Tom Godwin’s story “The Cold Equations,” some controversy concerning the story, precursors, as well as responses.  They’re running the original story over there this month, as well as publishing a new response “The Old Equations” by Jake Kerr.  It’s an interesting twist that is amusing on the one hand, tragic on the other.  I suggest you check it out when it is released next week, or spring for a cheap subscription and get access to it and the whole month of stories now.

Permalink | Tags: Cold Equations, Cold Legacies, Jake Kerr, Lightspeed Magazine, Personal, Science Fiction, Tom Godwin | No Comments »

Defending Science and Science Fiction

June 29th, 2011

I wanted to point out two great articles standing up for things I think are wonderful and positive.

First, John DeNardo of sfsignal.com writes a thoughtful and balanced positive plea to literary types to read science fiction, in particular knocking down a number of misconceptions that might make some pass.  This is the kind of article where you reach out to those with another perspective and try to bring them over to the dark side (we have cookies!) rather than rallying the base against those snobby types.  I’m a week late linking to this, but better late than never.

I’m also a big fan of science, and think most of our scientific instituions do a pretty good job overall, although there are some reasons for concern (very valid criticisms with some obvious fixes that I hope are applied).  However, some conservative Republicans don’t even know enough science to make reasonable criticisms, to wit, Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma’s complaints about the National Science Foundation (why is science literacy so very very low among politicians from OK?).  I could write my own rebuttal, but an excellent and thoughtful one has been written already and is very much worth a read. I was going to snip out a paragraph or two here, but the whole thing is worth quoting, so go read it.  Disclaimer: I am and have previously been funded by the NSF, and have participated in several peer review panels — I think I know the strengths and weaknesses of the system pretty well and that knowledge is the basis of my opinion rather than a bias in favor of those who have funded my research and educational outreach.

Permalink | Tags: John DeNardo, National Science Foundation, politics, Science, Science Fiction | 3 Comments »

Improving Peer Review (AKA “Refereeing”)

June 3rd, 2011

In astronomy, and most academic fields, research is published in so-called “peer reviewed” journals.  These are the publications that count.  At least one other scientist, and sometimes several depending on the field, has reviewed all the papers.  That review process means an expert in the field has decided that the research is worth publishing and has often asked for corrections/improvements before recommending the paper for publication.

(I’ve written about peer review several times in the past, if you want to read more.  See also this article.)

What I want to write about here, briefly, is some thoughts on improving peer review.

Right now it’s pretty random in some ways.  An editor picks a potential referee, sends them the title, author list, and abstract, and acts them if they can write a report within 2-4 weeks.  If the potential referee declines, they often suggest someone else.  Editors are not experts in every subfield out there, and sometimes don’t pick the best people.  Or they pick the best person for one of the topics covered in a paper, but papers can span multiple subfields and it can be difficult or impossible to find someone expert enough in every area.  Or, the editor gets a real expert to referee the paper, and that referee turns out to be slow, sloppy, or just a plain obnoxious dick.  If the busy editor doesn’t look closely or get a comment from the paper’s authors, they might not make a note to skip that referee in the future.  Oh, and the referee can reveal themselves to the authors or remain anonymous, so you can’t easily request that an editor not send the paper to a particular super-obnoxious referee.

It’s possible to referee a paper without being obnoxious, but some people don’t seem to know it.  You don’t make personal comments.  You don’t comment on the authors themselves, only their work.  You do point out errors, missing information, issues with writing, etc., but you don’t have to include insults or put-downs while doing so (which is especially annoying when the referee turns out to be the one making the mistake, which happens).

If the initial referee’s report is negative, usually revisions follow followed by additional rounds of refereeing.  I’ve asked for 3 rounds of revisions myself in the past.  Sometimes the referee finds the paper totally unacceptable and the authors can request a second opinion from a new referee.

I know some editors and have talked with them about refereeing issues before.  They’re smart, capable people, but no one is perfect and the system is less than perfect or accountable.

From the referee’s side…they get little out of the process.  Serious researchers are expected to referee papers, but no one will ever get a promotion or miss a promotion because of their refereeing, or lack thereof.  Editors ask us to referee, and we carve out some time from our schedules to do it.  I’ve taken as little as an hour refereeing a paper (great, short, clear, simple paper).  I’ve also taken a week (flawed but not fatally, badly written, long, overly complicated paper).  I’m usually too busy to referee, but almost always say yes if it’s a paper I think I’m a real expert to judge, something that sounds fishy and wrong, or something that looks interesting and educational so that I learn something for my time.

Anyway, lots of introductory information and background so far.  Here’s my suggestions:

1. Journals should provide feedback forms for authors to rate their referee.  Some obnoxious referees provide great feedback and that should be acknowledged, but some kind referees also miss errors that the authors catch.

2. Journals should keep track of the number of papers refereed and the ratings of each referee.

3.  Journals should put bad referees on probation if their ratings are too low, and give them feedback about why they are on probation.  This might make some of the assholes out there think twice before they make unprofessional personal comments.  Repeated probations could lead to being blacklisted, which would be a win-win for everyone I expect.

4. Journals should issue awards to the most prolific and highest rated referees.  The rewards need not be monetary.  Just a “Top 100 Reviewer for the Astrophysical Journal 2011” title would be something a scientist could put on his CV that might actually mean something when going up for tenure or a merit raise.

This is a little extra work for the journal editors, who are not usually well paid for their effort, but the referees are not paid at all and have to weigh their effort versus their own research.  If no one was willing to referee papers, the system would break down.  As it is, it isn’t clear that the best people are encouraged to referee, and that the worst people are discouraged (or encouraged to improve).

Next time I’m chatting with one of my editor friends, I’ll make these suggestions.  One journal starts to do it, and starts getting their first-choice referees more often, and there will be pressure for others.

Permalink | Tags: astronomy, peer review, Science | 1 Comment »

On Taking Criticism

June 3rd, 2011

Scientists and writers take on a burden few others do (although a few other professions have it as bad or worse).  They accept that in order to have success in their careers, or just to maintain a longterm career, they will experience intense and frequent criticism.  That criticism, when done professionally and with insight, can be exceptionally constructive.

All too often it’s insulting or worse.

Good critique groups, good reviewers, and good referees/PhD committees, will review a story, a paper, a scientific result, and refrain from making personal comments or articulating negative assumptions that might well not be true.  Not everyone is good.  And it’s hard for anyone, no matter how thick the skin, to take it all the time.  I’m guilty of being less than professional when I’ve criticized some folks who I think are especially deserving targets not worthy of their fame/fortune/success: Ben Stein, Michael Bay, Ann Coulter, etc.

They’re big enough asses or just untalented hacks lucky enough to cash giant paychecks I don’t need to worry about hurting them.

But I want to talk about a bit more what it means to go into fields where you regularly get criticized.  Even if you’re really good, in an objective sense, someone will hammer you directly or indirectly from time to time.

I just looked over my student evaluations.  They were good this semester, better than 4 out of 5 in nearly every category.  I’m doing a lot of things right.  I can take that to the bank.  Still, however, some individual comments are tough.  Usually every semester I teach a big class (100+ students) one of them will say I am the worst professor they ever had, which I find highly unlikely given my experiences, but I get to read a paragraph slamming me for the same decisions that other students praised.  The next comment usually says, as it did this year, how effective I was, but the label of “worst professor ever” stings even as the other appreciative comments ease the sting.

It’s not much different with novel reviews.  Some writers read them, a few don’t, and most wisely avoid commenting on them.  Most of my reviews have been good, but a few say some very negative things.  Fine, that’s life.

The best lesson about taking criticism is not to listen to any one individual, unless they’re your editor or referee for a science article in which case you have no choice.  Any one person can and should be ignored.  If a majority says the same thing, listen.  If it’s a single person, no matter how passionate, best to ignore them unless it reflects your own self-criticism.

So, while I have my newest student evaluations, I also have a couple of grant proposals outstanding, but on the flip side I have two referee reports to send in and many dozens of Chandra X-ray observatory proposals to review (I fly to Boston in less than three weeks for a meeting to discuss those).  It’s a good thing, I think, that the reviewed are often the ones also asked to review.

Let me rant momentarily about the assholes who think no one who writes, does science, or puts themselves out there (e.g. just blogging like this) should complain about negative comments.  Personally, I’m unlikely to complain about heartfelt constructive comments (and do consider what that individual student each semester who thinks I was “worst professor ever” says even when dozens of others say I was good or great), but everyone can and should complain about assholes.  These are people who are unprofessional, extrapolate in unreasonable ways, make insulting comments rather than constructive ones, etc.

Life is too short not to be constructive!

I always try to take constructive comments to heart and improve.

Too many people can’t tell the difference between fact and their own very biased opinions.  Too many people forget that other people are the creators of the experiences they criticize, and they’re just doing the best they can.  Sometimes that’s not as good as it could be or should be, but being an asshole about it is rarely the way to go.

Yeah, I’ve been an asshole once in a while.  I try to reserve that for actions or works that are irredeemable in my opinion.  Attacks on science, immorality based on superstition, really bad work that has garnered attention and accolades far beyond its worth.  Asshole mode is reasonable when playing for a particular invested audience (e.g. in reviews, political commentary, etc.), but not when playing back to the originator.

Criticism is such an important thing in the development of young writers, scientists, and other creators.  It’s also one of the burdens we consistently live with our entire lives to be part of certain enterprises.  It’s the price to play, but no one needs to pay the assholes, and they show up sometimes.  We can complain about them reasonably I believe…

At some point I want to revisit the referee system.  It is somewhat effective, but not efficient.  I don’t think there are enough rewards or punishments built into the system.  While there are definitely some semi-competent assholes who should be banned, there should also be a way of rewarding the saints who do a great job often, without significant reward.

Permalink | Tags: criticism, Education, Personal, Science, writing | 4 Comments »

The Scientific Method

May 20th, 2011

Over on his blog, Jay Lake posted a link to this flowchart showing the scientific process. LOVE IT! It’s funny because it’s true… Every astronomer I’ve shared it with has loved it (one I overheard laughing out loud two offices away). And I just finished working on a NASA proposal to study the hot dust around quasars, and went through much of the flowchart this week. I not only managed to submit the proposal before the deadline, it looks like the preliminary work is very publishable, although a couple of times I was sure I’d found a paper that had already discovered the effect (“F F F F F FF UU U U U U U…”). Next week’s task, that paper, if I’m not taken up in the rapture tomorrow. I’m going to drink a lot, so I might not know for sure until Sunday…

Permalink | Tags: astronomy, cartoon, funding, nasa, Personal, Science | No Comments »

The Roger Ebert of Science Fiction Movies

May 19th, 2011

Apparently it’s me:

Call Michael Brotherton the Roger Ebert of science fiction movies. Known for his work relating to the study of supermassive black holes in the centers of galaxies, he also diligently pursues another passion: checking if the science is right in movies. An associate professor of astronomy at the University of Wyoming, Brotherton combines his love of science with his interest in science fiction. And he takes his science seriously.

“A lot of people might watch a documentary on TV, or maybe they’ll pick up a pop science book,” Brotherton says. “But for most people, the only science they’re going to get is going to be stealth education through entertainment. If it’s consistently bad, I think that’s a problem for our society.

“There are a lot of important scientific issues facing us.”

That’s the opening of an article about me and my fusion of science and science fiction that’s in the latest issue of the University of Wyoming magazine. It isn’t a long article, and it does have a decent photo of me…holding a piece of film in front of a telescope. Check it out.

Permalink | Tags: movies, Personal, Roget Ebert, Science, Science Fiction, Wyoming | 1 Comment »

Challenging Science Fiction Reads

May 11th, 2011

This is the subject of a new Mind-Meld post over at sfsignal.com, which I contributed to:

Mike Brotherton

Mike Brotherton is the author of the hard science fiction novels Spider Star (2008) and Star Dragon (2003), the latter being a finalist for the Campbell award. He’s also a professor of astronomy at the University of Wyoming, Clarion West graduate, and founder of the Launch Pad Astronomy Workshop for Writers (www.launchpadworkshop.org). He blogs at www.mikebrotherton.com.

In no particular order:

The Fifth Head of Cerebus by Gene Wolfe. This “novel” is a set of three novellas that can be read in a different order than packaged, with different insights each time. It’s a novel of identity, of the alien, and of perspective, coupled with Wolfe’s sophisticated skills in mood and style. It’s a challenging read, with great depth.

Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut. Like Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury, this novel jumps about in space and time. It isn’t the easiest thing to keep track of, but the net effect builds to an emotional climax worth the work.

A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess. Deep ideas join the invention of language. It’s easy to be distracted by the extreme violence, but this is an amazing and complex novel.

Stand on Zanzibar by John Brunner. A novel of the future with multiple points of view that can be read at different levels, this novel was billed as a “non Novel” in its day. Complicated, complex, inventive, but worth the effort.

The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson. Stephenson writes long, complicated books, and has a tendency to include long technical passages about Babylonian gods and cryptology. In this novel, it’s computing. Combining aspects of cyberpunk, steampunk, and old-fashioned hard sf, The Diamond Age deserved its awards, but isn’t the easiest read out there.

Very honorable mentions: Windup Girl by Paulo Bacigalupi (burdened by graphic rape scenes and challenging cultural/language jumps), Quarantine by Greg Egan (full of quantum weirdness), Einstein Intersection by Samuel R. Delany (reminiscent of The Fifth Head of Cerebus but perhaps more accessible), The Dispossessed by Ursula K. LeGuin (complex structure coupled with issues of the Cold War and theoretical physics).

I tried to stick to better known novels that aren’t too hard to track down, and to stick to science fiction rather than delving into fantasy. I tend to read fantasy for escape, and read easier books in that genre as a rule I only sometimes break, so I’m not as much an expert for challenging fantasy novels.

The other contributors had some interesting suggestions. It seems that Delany and Wolfe are big winners when it comes to “challenging but worth it.” Neal Stephenson, too. I thought more people would mention Greg Egan, who writes the hardest of the hard science fiction, with fantastic but challenging ideas involving math and science.

I suppose one person’s definition of challenging means “hard to read” for a variety of possible reasons, while another’s might mean “deep ideas requiring a lot of thought.”

Anyway, check out the other responses at the link above and feel free to make your own suggestions here or there in the comments.

Permalink | Tags: books, Mind Meld, Personal, Science Fiction | 3 Comments »

What’s Right and Wrong with the Hugo Awards

May 4th, 2011

The Hugo awards are based on fan voting for various science fiction and fantasy categories, such as best novel.  Hugo winners have always been part of my ongoing reading list my entire life.

First of all, one of the things that’s right this year:  my buddy Jay Lake is one of the hosts of the award ceremony in Reno.  I was initially planning to go, then leaning against it, and now I’m considering it again.  I would be tickled to death to see Jay hosting.  He and I go back nearly 20 years to when neither of us were close to being published, and now things are different.  So different.

I’ve been going to Worldcons (where the Hugos are awarded) off since 1988 and have done my share of voting.  Never nominated myself, but a number of good friends have been.  I have come to realize that I prefer a number of the nominees to the winners, and that sometimes the winners have winning personalities that help swing them some votes.  But I don’t want to criticize that aspect.  That’s fair and natural in any system with voting and the winners are still really good and deserving.

Let me make it clear how fundamentally important the Hugos have been to me.  A bunch of us aspiring and semi-pro writers were talking in Austin back in the 1990s about our ultimate writing goals.  One of them said that she’d like to win the Pulitzer Prize for Literature, even though she didn’t seem to ever write anything that would fit into that category, sticking usually to commercial genre fiction.  Myself, I said I wanted to win a Hugo someday.  I’d still like to, although balancing priorities had made pursuing that goal challenging.

No, my main complaint about the Hugos these days is that some of the categories are just stupid or confusing, and some that should exist don’t.  Let me elaborate.

Best Related Work: Awarded to a work related to the field of science fiction, fantasy, or fandom, appearing for the first time during the previous calendar year or which has been substantially modified during the previous calendar year. The type of works eligible include, but are not limited to, collections of art, works of literary criticism, books about the making of a film or TV series, biographies and so on, provided that they do not qualify for another category.

This is a catch all, and while I like the flexibility, it just seems like a mishmash.

Best Dramatic Presentation (Long Form): This Award can be given a dramatized production in any medium, including film, television, radio, live theater, computer games or music. The work must last 90 minutes or longer (excluding commercials).

I’m ok with the category, but would an 88 minute movie actually be shifted to the short form category? I’d hope not.

Best Dramatic Presentation (Short Form): This Award can be given a dramatized production in any medium, including film, television, radio, live theater, computer games or music. The work must be less than 90 minutes long (excluding commercials).

We should have TV episodes separate from actual shorts.  “Fuck Me, Ray Bradbury” is up against Dr. Who episodes.  Silly.

Best Editor (Long Form): This is the first of the person categories, so the Award is given for the work that person has done in the year of eligibility. To be eligible the person must have edited at least 4 novel-length (i.e. 40,000 words or more) books devoted to science fiction and/or fantasy in the year of eligibility that are not anthologies or collections.

Best Editor (Short Form): To be eligible the person must have edited at least four anthologies, collections or magazine issues devoted to science fiction and/or fantasy, at least one of which must have been published in the year of eligibility.

I’d like there to be awards for editors, but I don’t think fan voted Hugos are the way to go.  The long form is impossible to judge.  Did the editors acquire the novels or were the books forced on them?  Fans don’t get to see the books as submitted and the books as revised, so how can they judge?

For the short form, the authors decide where to send stories, and the editors do different sorts of editing.  Again, the readers don’t have a clue about why a given story ended up somewhere, who rejected it first, or how an editor helped improve a story.

Best Professional Artist: Another person category, this time for artists and illustrators. The work on which the nominees are judged must class as “professional”.

This should be tossed out in favor of best genre artwork, likely book and magazine covers.  There could be subcategories for color vs. black and white, for instance.

Best Semiprozine: This is the most complicated category because of the need to define semi-professional. A lot of science fiction and fantasy magazines are run on a semi-professional basis: that is they pay a little, but generally not enough to make a living for anyone. The object of this category is to separate such things from fanzines, which are generally loss-making hobbyist pursuits. To qualify a publication must not be professional and must meet at least two of the following criteria:
1. had an average press run of at least one thousand (1000) copies per issue;
2. paid its contributors and/or staff in other than copies of the publication;
3. provided at least half the income of any one person;
4. had at least fifteen percent (15%) of its total space occupied by advertising;
5. announced itself to be a semiprozine.

Who wants to announce themselves to be “semi-pro”?  Seems like something to do to announce you’re either overperforming amateurs or less than successful pros.  I don’t like mixing fiction and non-fiction publications.  Who can judge that?  This category has often been the Locus award over the years.  I like Locus and have been a subscriber off and on over the years, but I don’t think a Hugo should be for just doing a good job year in and year out, but for excelling in some specific way.

Best Fanzine: This is the other serial publication category. This Award is for anything that is neither professional nor semi-professional. The publication must also satisfy the rule of a minimum of 4 issues, at least one of which must have appeared in the year of eligibility.

Best Fan Writer: This is another person category. Note that it does not just apply to writing done in fanzines. Work published in semiprozines, and even on mailing lists, blogs, BBSs, and similar electronic fora, can be including when judging people for this Award. Only work in professional publications should not be considered.

Best Fan Artist: The final category is also for people. Again note that the work by which artists should be judged is not limited to material published in fanzines. Material for semiprozines or material on public displays (such as in convention art shows) is also eligible. Fan artists can have work published in professional publications as well. You should not consider it when judging this award, and also any artists who make the final ballot for Best Professional Artist may not also be on the final ballot for Best Fan Artist.

These are just weird and are a legacy of the fan origins of the Hugo awards, but they don’t make sense to me for the same reasons some of the above categories don’t work for me.  They’re awards for people who may be doing both pro and “fan” work, and voters are supposed to separate the two.  It’s not for any specific work, but for some impression of a body of work.  Some of the same people appear on the nominee list for decades.  I don’t like any awards for just being good in general.  I think awards should be for specific work.

I’m not the first or last to make criticisms like this, I’m sure, but maybe if enough of these are leveled regularly enough some inertia for a change of direction will set in.  I’m a fan of the Australian voting system for the awards, and the list of nominees almost always great reading even when I don’t agree with the ultimate winners.

But let me summarize how I’d change the Hugos, for starters:

The dramatic presentations should be separated into movies, TV episodes, and shorts.

Get rid of editor awards, perhaps adding them to the Nebula Awards which are voted on by professional writers who have a clue about who is good.

Get rid of artist awards in favor of best artwork (e.g. book covers).

Get rid of fan writer and fan artist awards in favor of awards for best genre-related article (e.g. in a fanzine, blog, where ever) and best genre-related comic (online, fanzine, wherever).  I was the Missouri Amateur Chess Co-Champion in 1986, and I know exactly what that means and what it doesn’t.  It’s not in the same class as being a professional champion, and it’s kind of embarrassing in my opinion.

Get rid of “semi-prozine” category and let there be just fiction and non-fiction categories, “pro” or not.  I’d prefer specific issues of periodicals to compete rather than annual runs.  It’s too easy for people who are casual readers to vote with as it is.

Add categories for best blog post (which can get 10-100 times as many reads as most of the pro magazines) or online commentary, best genre website (e.g. Tor.com, io9.com, etc.), best original anthology, best periodical in fiction and non-fiction, etc.  So much in the community has moved online and that should be recognized without having to resort to catch-all categories or shoving it into best fan writer.  Hell if I know what I write that qualifies as fan or pro at any given time.

How about best genre video game???  Writing in a video game, art in a video game.  There’s some fine work being done there, and the fan base is MILLIONS, not hundreds.

The whole problem of Worldcon attendance being small, the Hugo voters being small in number (hundreds at most for most awards, sometimes dozens), etc., is another big problem.  I don’t know how to get more people interested in reading science fiction again.  Maybe the Hugos will just diminish and vanish in the future.  Worldcon is small these days compared to Dragoncon and Comicon and a number of other cons.  I don’t want that to have happened, but it did.  The world has changed, and so has our ghetto, for better or worse.

I love the Hugo awards, but the system has problems.  I won’t even mention some travesties in past voting (although I will save them for a future post).  I’m too busy and probably don’t care passionately enough to get involved to fight for these, but I’ll give a shout out for some changes, because I do care enough to do that.  Screw the Pulitzer, I still want a Hugo someday.

Permalink | Tags: awards, Hugos, politics, Science Fiction | 30 Comments »