Has it really been almost 2 months?

Snoqualmie Pass, WA (taken through the window of a charter bus...). Copyright (c) 2013 Wendee Nicole

Wow. I guess I'm slacking on the blog posts. I have been writing like a madwoman, with a tiny bit of travel thrown in. Here are links to my latest articles...

• Game On! Businesses have used behavioral science to influence consumers for decades. Can it be used to save the planet? Ensia Magazine (formerly Momentum) Spring 2013. [This one came out of attending the SXSW-Eco Conference in Austin last year! It is about the emerging trend of "gamification" and how it's being used to help spur conservation action.]
• Think for Yourself: Critical thinking skills are more important than ever in today's information environment. Ensia magazine online. Mar 7, 2013. [This idea arose from the Science Denial conference I attended at University of Wisconsin-Madison last March, which also led to the article in Environmental Health Perspectives, Flavors of Uncertainty: The Difference Between Denial and Debate?]
• An Obesogen Over Time: Transgenerational Impact of Tributyltin. Environmental Health Perspectives, March 2013. [This is a "Science Selection" piece, or summary of a peer-reviewed article in EHP. The research relates to the feature I did on Obesogens for EHP for their Feb 2012 issue.]
• Road Traffic Noise and Diabetes: Long-Term Exposure May Increase Disease Risk. Environmental Health Perspectives, Feb 2013. [Another "Science Selection" piece]

I traveled to the Pacific Northwest a couple weeks ago to attend the Wild Mountain Memoir Retreat held at the gorgeous Sleeping Lady Mountain Resort in the Cascades (WA State), with Cheryl Strayed as the keynote. It was 3 days, and I met some amazing women (only a handful of men attended) and had a breakthrough about my book structure, which was worth the cost of the retreat! Theo Nestor is a great teacher! I'll try to post some photos soon but just want to give a quick update.

I'll be traveling to Costa Rica soon, and soon after that to receive my..... drum roll please... Award from the American Society of Journalists and Authors (ASJA) for best magazine article in the science/technology/business category! I was and am over the moon! It was for the article, Did Tap Water Kill Lou Gehrig? for Miller-McCune magazine (now Pacific Standard), a piece that I really am proud of. That's enough for now... hope to update again before another 2 months pass!

media bias, science & critical thinking

This is just sad, but this is the best grizzly picture I could find! This was a grizzly eating vegetation in Yosemite National Park. Everywhere I go, I see bears. I think they're my totem animal! I have seen them in Alaska, at Glacier NP, at Yosemite, at Yellowstone, oh and the black bears I saw when writing an article on them in Louisiana...and then I studied grizzlies when I was at A&M grad school (see below)!
Copyright (c) 2007 Wendee Holtcamp

Since someone commented on bias in the media on my last post, I want to start talking about this issue a bit more because it's near and dear to my heart. When I spent 2 years earning a Information Technology in Science - ITS - Certificate from Texas A&M (a collaboration of the Departments of Education and Department of Science), critical thinking was my main interest. (I worked in Larry Griffing's lab studying the behavior of grizzly bears at McNeil River, Alaska via remote camera, before transferring to Rice).

While working on the ITS Certificate, which was part of my doctoral studies, I developed an "Evolution in Action" Excel workbook. I then used this tool to teach my Biology students at Kingwood College (now Lonestar College) scientific/critical thinking skills and also to introduce students to evolution. Students would watch video of grizzly bears engaged in various behaviors, including fishing for salmon, fighting with one another, and infanticide (in this case, a male bear killed a female bear's cub), while thinking about the questions, "Why might aggressive behavior have evolved in grizzlies? Is the reason different for female versus male bears?"
(I just uploaded it here - Evolution in Action. It's an Excel file and the link will open a window asking you to open in the browser or to save it to your computer where you can view it). After developing the workbook and using it in class, I did a study analyzing whether the workbook helped enhance student critical thinking (see my publication, "Grizzly Bears, Evolution, and Critical Thinking: Analyzing a Scaffolding IT for Teaching").

The workbook involves several different exercises but the last one was to analyze various print sources of information on grizzly bears - book chapters from various authors, a website, a scientific publication. There's a lot of controversy and misinformation surrounding grizzlies! After reading each source, they would then answer the following questions (below), and fill out a worksheet that assigned numerical values to their answers. This enabled them to rank the reliability of that source of information.

These are the questions:

• Are the authors' names and credentials listed on the publication?
  
  
• Does the info source provide more than one viewpoint or hypothesis?
  
  
• Are specific studies mentioned or cited in the text? (Do not give a YES answer if the article contains general phrases like "studies indicate" or "research shows" unless the article/source explicitly mentions a specific study and researcher mentioned).
  
  
• Does the paper test a prediction?
  
  
• Are the authors trying persuade you to accept a particular viewpoint?
  
  
• When was it published? (decreasing points for older pubs)
  
  
• Is the article or website sponsored by a company or by advertising?
  
  
• Do the authors blatantly or implicitly insult other perspectives?
  
  
• Does the perspective presented seem exaggerated or extreme?
  
  
• What is the purpose of the publication? (inform/share data; Disclose information; persuade; sell or entice)

By answering those questions and entering a numerical value (explained in the workbook) to each answer, they would come up with a numerical way to judge and analyze the reliability of a particular news source. I'd love to develop this tool more and make it available to the public. It's far from complete or fully comprehensive, but it's a start. (The video links won't work in the online version, unfortunately, and you have to click on the tabs at the bottom to get to the different "Exercises.")

I also have some views on objectivity in journalism that may differ from the typical J-school trained journalist because, well, I'm not one. I'm a science-educated writer who covers wildlife, the environment, conservation, and outdoor travel. I outlined some of my thoughts on Objectivity in Journalism when I gave an invited lecture at the University of North Texas' 2007 Nature Writing Symposium.

Magazine writing, especially for magazines mostly published by nonprofit organizations, don't necessarily hold to the same standards as, say, the strict guidelines of the New York Times. There is a difference between being fair and truthful, and doing the whole "present both sides" thing which in many ways can be a sham, particularly when journalists present two or more sides on an issue when there are NOT two sides! Do we give equal time to lunatics or fringe ideas? Doing so only makes their ideas seem more accepted unless they're clearly labeled as such.

But worse, in my opinion, is when a news source gives the illusion of being unbiased, but clearly is! I believe that sources providing information should put their biases out there on the table. Most know Fox News has a conservative bent -but they don't tell this clearly to their listeners. Some people believe the media has a liberal bias but present information as if they don't. It is a problem when news sources act "as if" they are not biased but bias creeps in.

We should know that a magazine published by a wildlife nonprofit is going to not run certain stories, but that does not mean the stories they run are not accurate, fact-checked, and presented with attention to both sides of an argument. However they may come out a bit more persuasively argued toward one side of the argument than another. But when the same information is presented in say a conservation magazine, the New York Times, and various other sources of news and information but not in a right-leaning news source, that is when you should be concerned that maybe the story has merit. There's no doubt that while the internet has revolutionized the world into an information age, one of the downfalls is that so much information can be overwhelming and it becomes difficult to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Another thing is that there are a lot of "thinktanks" and organizations with great-sounding names ("Center for Truth" - I made that up - but that kind of thing) - but in reality they are funded by particular groups with very specific agendas. When they're quoted in newspaper articles without that article clearly addressing this issue, it passes along "expert" quotes when that expert may just be paid to spout off a certain perspective (and most likely they believe it too, or they probably would not work for that organization). But sometimes, it takes digging to find these things out, and most people don't take time to dig. Who has time? But with the internet it's often not that difficult. Sometimes journalists must do FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) requests - demanding governments release information that should be public but that they don't want to release - and then writing expose's to expose some of the more "hidden agendas." FOIA requests are not a tool your average citizen typically uses, but why you should indeed pay attention to the more prestigious newspapers and news sources. They do their homework and have high standards. They're not perfect, but in my experience, journalists take great pride in their work and being the "4th branch" of a healthy democracy.

I think that bias still does creep into supposed bastions of objectivity like the NY Times, but that does not mean that one should not still read it and pay attention. Just have a critically thinking mind when doing so. Those who pretend to not have bias may just be fooling themselves. We all have biases. The trick is to do our best to understand and make clear our biases, even while still doing our best to write truthfully and accurately. I believe it's better to be clear about biases than to pretend one does not have them.

However when it comes to science - and this is one of the most misunderstood things in society I believe - the whole field of science, the scientific method and the whole process of science (developed during the Scientific Revolution) was designed specifically to REMOVE bias from the the practioner's research so that scientists could reveal facts and ultimately truth. In science, this is done through the various things, including the scientific method, double-blind experiments, the use of statistics to analyze data (rather than merely philosophical reasoning and logic), and the peer-review system of scientific publication.

being a bad patient

Sam and Savannah running free at the outdoor lagoon in Airlie Beach, Australia
Copyright (c) 2006 Wendee Holtcamp

Yeah yeah yeah I'm a lot to handle
You don't know trouble but
I'm a hell of a scandal
Me I'm a scene I'm a drama queen
I'm the best damn thing
that your eyes have ever seen
- Avril Lavigne, Best Damn Thing

I love this CNN article/interview with Evan Handler, who played Harry Goldenblatt on Sex & The City, Being a bad patient can save your life. He had leukemia, and what he means by being a bad patient is not just sitting back and doing whatever your doctor tells you. You have to be your own advocate for your healthcare. You have to research treatments, medications, and so on if you really want to heal because no one cares more about your life - or your children's if you are an adult caring for your kids' health - than you do.

I strongly believe that the medical industry has become very corrupted by pharmaceutical industry incentives and greed, and doctors rarely do good jobs at diagnoses these days. They give you medication and hope your symptoms go away, and if they don't, well come back in a few weeks and we'll try something different. Doctors are not required to take any nutrition class during their entire medical school education, which is truly sad (And one of the reasons I chose a midwife for my childbirth). There's no lesson in proactive medicine without nutrition. I have talked to Savannah about this because she wants to be a doctor and I've talked to her about looking into the interface between eastern and western medicine because being holistic about your health is the way to go. And it's being more accepted by the mainstream medical complex in the Western world anyway. Today many insurance companies cover acupuncture, massage therapy, midwifery, and other things that were not covered even ten years ago. When I wanted to use a midwife I had to pay out of my own pocket for a midwife despite having excellent health insurance at the time. I bartered, and designed a website (SoCalbirth.org) for my midwife!

Anyway, there are so many natural treatments out there that do not require you ingesting weird manufactured chemicals or rubbing them on your body. And when it comes to even natural things, I am a huge skeptic -- but let me tell you an example of how something natural healed an ailment. My friend Amy sells Young Living Essential Oils products and I had a plantar's wart on the bottom of my foot that I've had doctors burn to no avail, and give me medicine for, to no avail. I've used over the counter wart medicine, and prescription. Nothing worked. She told me that she put oregano oil on a wart she had and it went away. I was like, ya, whatever. She said she put a bandaid on it every day also so I thought to myself, I'm going to try an experiment. And so for a month I put little round bandaids on my wart to see if just "starving" it of oxygen may be the thing that did the trick rather than the oregono oil. Nope, no cigar. Didn't work. So I said ok, give me a sample and I'll see what happens. She gave me oregano oil and I used it a couple times a day for about a month, and.... the wart is now completely gone. No joke. Oregano? Who knew.

Then just the other day, another friend who had an infection on her skin who had gotten all kinds of treatments from the doctor, changed her laundry detergent and soap, and everything eventually did some research of her own and then was telling me she decided to start taking multi-vitamins and oregano oil. Turns out she determined the rash was some sort of fungal infection. I was like, you're joking! How did you hear about oregano oil? (I hadn't told her about my own story with oregano oil). And I can't remember how she found out about it but some online research or something. Apparently oregano oil has very strong anti-fungal and antibacterial properties. She takes it in pill form. And so how much money do we people spend on anti-fungal medicines and wart medicines that have all kinds of horrendous chemical compounds that cause yet other problems, when something totally natural, totally healthy, and made by God will heal our ailment?! And there are no doubt dozens of other examples out there. It's partly why I do the lemonade cleanse regularly because I believe in refocusing my energy on purity, health, and eating healthily.

I'll also say that many doctors do not usually take too kindly to patients who question their wisdom. It takes a confident and understanding doctor to have his or her authority challenged. Most patients don't, so they're not used to it. I've had a few that respected me for taking the time to research the issues myself, but most of them make you feel bad for doing things like questioning the necessity of certain vaccinations, or certain medicines. Case in point, Savannah just had an ear tube removed that was placed in there when she was a toddler. Usually they fall out naturally but one of hers didn't so she had to have it surgically removed.

As I blogged about when I had my own surgery, I completely disagree with the concept of getting an Amnesiac (a medicine given by the anesthesiologist to make the patient not remember). What is the point? First of all, doesn't it seem kind of 1984 or Brave New World-ish? It's like, if the patient can't remember something, there's less chance of a malpractice suit. When I told this to Savannah's doc, he was like "I can promise you there's not a conspiracy going on here." I said "it's not that I think there's a conspiracy, I think that it's in the best interest of the doctor, not the patient..." He said, well for younger kids I won't do it without the amnesiac (propofol is what they use) because they get terrified, and why would you want them to remember that?

I didn't continue the conversation with him because he was getting defensive, and he'd agreed to my terms already anyway, but in my head, I was thinking, I'd rather myself or my kids remember whatever happens, no matter if it is scary or not, simply for the sake of knowing the truth. An Amesiac reminds me of the date rape drug, to be honest. It's bad enough that women get raped with that horrendous drug, but it makes it harder to deal with in any kind of therapy, because they have to wake up from the event with a part of their memory stripped permanently. If a child (or adult for that matter) gets terrified in surgery, I would think if it has some lasting impact it would be better to have that memory fully alive so they can then talk about it and work through it than have it buried in the subconscious so that it's all muddled and fuzzy.

Anyway the second reason I disagree with the use of the Amnesiac is that the fewer medicines given to someone, the better in general because there's less chance of a freak negative reaction (I just saw that movie Nights in Rodanthe where a doctor's patient had died from a freak reaction to anesthesia). You have to sign all that fine print paperwork that 99% of people don't read, but the reality is, most people do not think that a freak reaction will happen to them. But it might, and why increase the risk unecessarily? I'm lucky that the kids' dad is 100% behind me on things like this.

I pretty much feel this way about just about everything that is important. If it's important, whether health, relationship, education, religion, politics, parenting, or whatnot, question it! Question authority! Question the status quo! Do not just believe blindly what someone has handed to you as the "truth." It makes life a little more challenging because it takes more work and more effort, but in the end it's well worth it. And when you're making decisions for your kids who can't make as informed of decisions for themselves, and their lives, it's very worth it to do your research.

As philosopher Immanuel Kant wrote in 1784 in his essay, What is Enlightenment:

"If I have a book which understands for me, a pastor who has a conscience for me, a physician who decides my diet, and so forth, I need not trouble myself. I need not think, if I can only pay -- others will easily undertake the irksome work for me."

And he continues:
"Immaturity and dependence are the inability to use one’s own intellect without the direction of another. One is responsible for this immaturity and dependence, if its cause is not a lack of intelligence or education, but a lack of determination and courage to think without the direction of another. The motto of enlightenment is therefore: Sapere aude! Dare to be wise! (ie. Have courage to use your own intelligence!)"

I talk about these issues in my book which I'm working on (to be published by Beacon Press in 2010) about making peace between Christianity and science and reason - about balancing a Christian life in a scientific world.