Comments on: Ask Podblack – Could Sex Sell Science?

By: podblack

podblack — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 03:45:52 +0000

Ang-Gee, did you mean for your first comment to be on this post? Whilst I can see it is kind of relevant, it looks like it should be on this post instead: http://podblack.com/?p=1490

By: Ang-Gee

Ang-Gee — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 03:24:05 +0000

“As for audience, I think Darlene Cavalier is really just starting out right now, trying to build up an audience for this. I asked the same questions to her that you asked about this and she said:
“I’d love for schools and family oriented to start using the “citizen science” area of the site.”

Could that particular demographic be ‘turned off’ by the primary content that seems more adult-orientated? How do you segregate the ‘eye-candy’, which is clearly for guys, from ‘getting the younger years into it’?

By: Ang-Gee

Ang-Gee — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 03:21:47 +0000

Quote from another site I liked “Yyou ARE judged on what you look like, especially in the things you can control like clothing styles. I also judge people that chew with their mouths open, drive drunk, open the doors for little old ladies, strange people waving guns on a city street, and so on. When you don’t have a chance to meet and talk, it’s all you have.
Reminds me of my youngest son, who many TAM-goers know. When he hit his teen years, he became all about ‘wanting to show my true individuality and not fitting other people’s notions of what I should look like.” Yea, he was an individual, all right. I couldn’t tell him and his other ‘rebel’ friends from the back at 20 yards. It wasn’t about being an individual, it was about being non-conformist with the prevailing attitudes. Same thing, here, I think.”

By: Tara Laskowski

Tara Laskowski — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 20:02:30 +0000

Sorry about that. This link should work, or just clicking on the Brain Makeover link from the main Science Cheerleader web site will bring you to it. http://sciencecheerleader.com/brain_makeover/

As for audience, I think Darlene Cavalier is really just starting out right now, trying to build up an audience for this. I asked the same questions to her that you asked about this and she said:

“I’d love for schools and family oriented to start using the “citizen science” area of the site.

I see the Brain Makeover section as more appropriate for college age and up…it’s really designed for people who missed their first opportunity to learn this important information for a variety of factors but who want a second chance. Community colleges, liberal arts schools and universities requiring science for non-science-majors are ideal. As are sites catering to personal enrichment and development.

The citizen science audience and brain makeover audience should (ideally) feed into the science policy section of the site. This is where people can apply their knowledge and interests in ways that shape policies…”

So…she seems to be thinking seriously about it. I’m interested in it because of our George Mason professor–who really does try to engage people in science. (Sometimes seems to me a losing battle). But really, if you don’t actually know what a stem cell is, how can you be ‘for’ or ‘against’ it in policy? So I think he’s got a good point in what he does. And the cheerleader thing, while I guess can be seen as kind of campy, is at least an attempt to make science amusing. Whether it works or not remains to be seen, I guess.

By: podblack

podblack — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 02:11:10 +0000

Tara – I’ve looked over the site overall and noticed that it has the ‘endorsement’ of Penn and Teller, which is clearly a coup. The link you’ve given doesn’t work though – it just goes to a blank page?

But I’d like to ask – are there records of the demographics that are attracted to those videos? Is this designed with schoolkids in mind? Who exactly is meant to be the audience for them? Because I’m really not sure what’s being touted there…

By: AndyD

AndyD — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 01:28:16 +0000

Wow. I was just thinking that “feminist” is a tainted word and of how every time I see it I immediately think “misandrist lesbians” (it’s a historical bias I won’t go into here) and then you go and say that it’s a tainted term often associated with hating men. Get out of my head!

I don’t see any end to the promotional power of sex, or more correctly “sexy”, until we all become a bunch of androgynous clones. Thirty years of feminism, good or bad, hasn’t achieved it yet.

By: Tara Laskowski

Tara Laskowski — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 19:15:22 +0000

Interesting post here. I like especially what you say about science literacy…what is exactly being ‘sexed up’? And is it really necessary to sex up science?

We have a professor at George Mason University who would say yes. Jim Trefil is huge on getting more people interested in science, no matter what the tactics. He just partnered with some 76ers cheerleaders, believe it or not, on a project called the Brain Makeover. Thought you might be interested in yet another angle on this topic: http://www.sciencecheerleader.com/brainmakeover