Science for citizens
| 24 June, 2010 | Adie Chan |
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Meet citizen science’s answer to match.com – https://scienceforcitizens.net/. The new website, brainchild of Darlene Cavalier (AKA – The Science Cheerleader) and colleagues, seeks to hook researchers up with members of the general public who want to volunteer for duty in the scientific process. “We hope to enable regular people to do real science by connecting them to existing citizen science projects,” Cavalier told The Scientist.
Citizen scientists can search for thousands of research projects on the site, including Galaxy Zoo, where volunteers are asked to help classify galaxies according to their shapes, and Firefly Watch, an effort to track the distribution and activity of lightening bugs during the summer.
Researchers can use the site to find ready, willing and able volunteers to help with data collection.
Citizen scientists will also be able to network with each other, sharing experiences, photos, videos and all the other trappings of modern social networks, in the near future, according to Cavalier.
Do you see this as a site you might use, either as a volunteer or as a way to tap into the citizen scientist talent pool?
– Bob Grant, Associate Editor, The Scientist
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I am a science enthusiast that would love to help do the legwork on interesting projects and tests.
Dear Bob,
I, a scientist, would not use the volunteers at scienceforcitizens (http://scienceforcitizens.net ) because I cannot image anything relevant to be done by people, who have not received a scientific education including the knowledge of how to write scientific documentations. These skills are learned as master and/or PhD student taking up to 4 or 5 years. These things absolutley essential to any scientifc work. Additionally, it is necessary to handle various high tech instruments. Even the simple work with e.g. a microscope needs to be tought otherwise these equipments break and need to be replaced. At the end uneducated or unskilled people cost more than they bring in.
Sounds like a great way to raise the awareness of the value of science to the general public!
I think these type of websites are both useful and not.
First of all, although it seems almost rude and intolerant, I have to agree with the anonym comment here… up to a point. I’m a PhD student, and my project ,for example, can’t use any uneducated help. On the other side, there might be some scientific work, even some bench work, that might use some outside help -educated or not. But there will be a natural constraint on this, whatever is done with the science enthisuats will have to be double-checked, or at least the volunteers will have to be educated “enough” for the subject (including some practical training) before getting involved.
But I think, there might be some side-projects created just for this type of websites and organization for the people to get involved and to comprehend the importance of the science. It is also very important for motivating the scientist to build bridges to communicate better with the public.
I think the communication of scientist and the public, especially with the scientist using a simple, tolerant and descriptive language, is much more important that recruiting voluntary workforce for the experiments. So, I think the website will be more useful if it’s directed more towards this purpose
To anonymous, July 6th:
Oi, Grumpy-pants, read the article mate!
“Citizen scientists can search for thousands of research projects on the site, including Galaxy Zoo, where volunteers are asked to help classify galaxies according to their shapes, and Firefly Watch, an effort to track the distribution and activity of lightening bugs during the summer.”
no one is suggesting you get Joe or Joanna Bloggs off the street to do your damned electronmicroscopy for you, or that Mr. & Mrs. Smith could come in at the weekend and help out with the patch-clamping. No one in their right mind would consider that for any number of reasons, let alone the expense, danger and liability of chemicals, equipment and environment.
This is a great effort to bring larger scale, socially-network science projects to the fore.
Hi Snooty-Nosed Little Upstart,
your are one of the people believing to
I agree with tideliar. As a Girl Scout trainer and leader, I am interested in these kinds of things to get our kids interested in and excited about science. No one is asking these people to do gene splicing or electron microscopy. But by doing things as simple as counting fireflies, maybe the next entomologist will be born. And by the way, I too , am a scientist!
As a girls scout and leader you should go out, have a campfire and observe fireflies at dawn. Catch some, keep them in a jaw and observe them. That is the time to excite kids and identify the next entomologist. Just do it for fun. However, this has nothing to do with a scientific questions which needs to be answered. What I say is: There is always the right time and the right location for everything, but don’t mix up things. As seen by the comment from Mike Stahl, the website describes being part of interesting scientific projects and test. If a person is intersted in science there are ways to receive an education to execute the job, but it would be wrong to do shortcuts and put the believe into the mind that everything can get published.
First of all, anonym should stop with the rebuttal time, hogging so much space to prove his/her point. He or she is so totally antithetical to everything the internet stands for. These forums are interesting because people do not agree and many different points of view are aired and put out there. That does not mean that one has to dogmatically defend his or her position every time someone is against it. Longstanding power structures around the world that put science, journalism, art and many other fields in the hands of power barons (i.e. the educated ruling class who had monopolies on everything for centuries), but thanks to technology and the internet mentality of democratically sharing knowledge (i.e. the great equalizer concept where the small guys cannot be distinguished from the big guys) , we now have citizen journalizm (exV.P. Al Gore’s Current TV was one of the first), Citizen Art (especially in the area of photo websites where great amateur photographers are now posting their magnificent work and ultimately being paid for their photos) and now Citizen Science. Giving interested, enthusiastic, stimulated people a chance to get involved with Science on the level that everyone but anonym understood is brilliant. By the way, I am a Scientific Editor and teach Scientific writing at a European university and I possess only a Bacellors degree!!!!(but have helped researchers publish many articles in the most prestigious journals). The students love my class and could really give a darn about my credentials (of course my C.V. of successfully published articles is what got me the job). Of course, qualifications are important for some things in all fields, but like I said, Anonym does not want to grasp the concept because he/she is too full of himself/herself.
I’m going to agree with ofandbythepeople here.
Anonymunchkin, just because you got out the wrong side of the bed years ago is not excuse to conflate the publish or perish nature of modern biomedical science* with potential pitfalls of exploiting the desire and need to engage “the public” in large scale observational studies.
The entire point of being able to use public outreach for large scale observational studies is that they are general classification efforts, not fine detail efforts, and importantly that any error is lost in the noise of having *thousands* of observations.
Arrogant posturing like yours simply appears petulant and outmoded. These sorts of efforts are perfect for engaging young people and non-scientists. By your reasoning we would wait till all children had grown up and decided to study science before we tried to inspire them with a love of science. And as for those who might have chosen another path in life, I see that you consider them simply beneath your contempt. How dare they besmirch the purity of your Ivory Tower!
*And for what it’s worth, ‘modern’ science has always been like this; it’s no new phenomenon. In the 1920’s Bohr criticized one his trainees for waiting too long to publish and being pipped to the post by Pauli.
Here I am again. Did not work just to demand that I stop to post. Shocker!!!
By the way the internet also stands for rebuttel opportunities. Passionate people do that. But definetly nobody has the right to demand that somebody else should stop to write his/her opinion just because the person has a different opinion. I wondering if one of your students disagrees with you what you will do, forbidding him/her to talk. If such a person undermines somebody else like this and describs what a great guy he is than I wonder who is full of himself.
One more time, I disagree with you ofandbythepeople and tideliar on a website such as scienceforcitizens because none of you both provided any real argument. The information that
And you’re still not making sense, nor providing any cogent argument for avoiding large-scale public outreach projects.
things like Galaxy Zoo *cannot* work without public engagement, but by your argument it’s better not to have them and thus make no progress? Why? You haven’t given anything resembling an argument for this.
“The information that