My so-called freelance life

Brandie — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 16:25:00 GMT

Well, the money may not be so great, and the hours are for the birds, but some of the publications I have been working with as a freelance reporter have been receiving pretty good publicity.

The Stimulus Times received a write-up in Brown University's Brown Daily Herald.

And the Brookline Tab not only featured MassDevice, but also a lovely picture of co-founder Brian Johnson on its front page.

No publicity is bad publicity ... especially good publicity.

Stimulus Times

Brandie — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 21:50:00 GMT

Yesterday was an important day for the East Side of Providence. No, not tax day. Yesterday the first issue of Stimulus Times hit the streets. It's a weekly newsletter, the brainchild of one of my former Journal co-workers, Scott Kingsley.

Check it out online at StimulusTimes.com.

It's a bit snarky, but so are we.

What a way to start: Origins

Brandie — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 02:31:00 GMT

Yes, that's yours truly with an intellectual hero of mine, Richard Dawkins. I'm not really into idolizing celebrities, but I now have a better understanding of how Michael Jackson fans, ca. 1985 must have felt.

Dawkins was one of an impressive number of scientists - astronomers, biologists, chemists, cosmologists, mathematicians, psychiatrists, physicists, and others - at the Origins Symposium at Arizona State University. The symposium was the kick-off event for a new, multidisciplinary program at ASU, aimed at understanding the origins of... well, of everything.

But before journalists can explain everything, we have to understand at least something. Thankfully, in the case of evolutionary biology, that shouldn't be too difficult. At least so says one of the world's leading evolutionary biologists.

"The theory [of evolution by natural selection] itself, you might think would be dead easy to understand," Dawkins said. "I’m continually amazed by the fact that it took until the mid of the 19th century for anybody to really understand it."

He's got no time for intellectual slackers, past or present.

Dawkins and Origins Director Lawrence Krauss -- cosmologist, astrophysicist and orator extraordinaire -- went back and forth, bestowing flattery on the others' respected fields. Dawkins insisted that Newton's achievement was much more impressive than Darwin's, while Krauss insisted that Einstein and Newton didn't approach Darwin in the amount of evidence that he was able to amass in support of his theory.

But neither flinched at an opportunity to respond to my question: what is the single biggest error or misunderstanding that they see repeated in science journalism.

Dawkins cringed at the description of evolution via natural selection as a "theory of chance;" Krauss at the abuse of quantum mechanics as a new-agey way to affect the world around us.

Dawkins and Krauss spoke Friday afternoon about science and the media to a group of two-dozen journalists and students.

What's the Word?

My so-called freelance life

Stimulus Times

What a way to start: Origins