A note about the blog posts

I appreciate everyone's attempt to post to the blog regularly, and while I can't always comment on all the posts, I do read them. For me it is also a good way to get feedback from the class. try to do more than simply rehash the article. I'm looking for application. Did anytthing stand out in the articles you read that you thought might help you in your careers/in class? We all know what an elucidating explanation is---take the time to reflect on that--or even use the class blog to post an elucidating explanation of your own.

COMMUNICATING SCIENCE

To know wisdom and instruction, perceive the words of understanding, and receive the instruction of wisdom gives us knowledge and discretion. Being able to communicate in a way to make this happen, however, is not always easy. Montgomery states his opinion on the importance of attitude, and stresses the importance of being confident and knowledgeable in the topic of which one is communicating. I agree with this and also agree with his idea that we need to be aware of the audience to whom we are addressing. This will give us power in our words. We need to have firm control over what we say and what we communicate. We need to do so, however, with a couple different methods. Elucidating, comparing, and using quasi-scientific explanations aid in the process of communicating more clearly. It is wise to have flexibility in our language. How we explain things to each other should not be limited. A wise individual will hear, and will increase in learning. For this reason, being a well prepared speaker will allow your audience to benefit from the words you are speaking. Good explanations will result in good understanding.

Communication of Technical Information

I liked how this paper listed the three major ways to explain technical information. One can modify their speech according to their audience using these three major methods described by Katherine Rowan. The three major methods described by Rowan include the quasi-scientific, elucidation, and transformative explanations.
The quasi-scientific method can be used much like the scientific method is used; first explaining known facts and building on them through a sort of experimentation of them with the audience. This is good for the "scientific" crowd.
The second method, elucidation, uses more analogies and examples. If enough is known about the audiences' background to give good examples, this method could work a little better than the first quasi-scientific method.
The third and final method, transformative explanations, is useful to lay audience. Transfotmative explanations first credit the audience for their primary interpretation of the subject. It then leads them into questioning their view of the subject, and the speaker then offers the correct view with supporting statements.
All three of these can be useful, but each has it's advantages with different types of audiences.

The Speech to Explain Difficult Ideas

The author makes several good points. These three types of explain material can be very useful depending on the topic being spoke about. I found this reading interesting because I figure after having written so many papers and speeches throughout my years at school that I would inherently do what the author talks about. Although it's one of those things that I didn't really know the reason behind it, why it is we explain the way we do. I found this article interesting in its own way.

Length could have been a factor

After all these positive blogs about the science I feel bad that I’m posting a not so positive one. I feel that this article was not very beneficial to my learning and understanding of technical presentations. I don’t know if it is because of reading the first pages I read before I got to pages that actually helped. And by then I was just reading to get it done. I feel that the length of this article affected what I got out of it. All I got out of the article was that every technical professional is faced with both writing technical papers and giving oral presentations of technical data. By the time I believe the actually helpful information was presented I was just reading the article to get it done and wasn’t absorbing the information.

Comments on Explaining Difficult Ideas

I found this article to be very helpful because it gave different styles for delivering explanatory speeches covering difficult information. The three styles mentioned by the author were elucidating, quasi-scientific and transformative explanations. Elucidating explanations were are used to show what something is and what it is not. The author described quasi-scientific explanations as models of complex ideas similar to some scientists models of the earth or atmosphere. One example of this style that was given used echos from sound waves being used to describe how a radar works. The last style mentioned was transformative explanations which allows audiences to transform their experiences into a way to understand difficult theories or information. The discussion of each of these styles gave me some greater insight into how I could structure some of my speeches throughout the semester. I look forward to seeing these styles surface in my future speeches of technichal information.

John Dale

science

The article though lengthy, gave me great insight for my future writings and speeches that I will be producing. It was intereesting to see how the author pointed out that the grammer of the writing became simpler in comparison to the level of technical information provided. If this is acceptable practice than I will just start trying to use more technical terms in my writing to help cover up my inability to use proper grammer and sentence structure while helping to eliminate chances of errors. I think that one of the main points of the article is to bring to light the importance of properly writing and conveying the technical information you have. If you can present a paper that satifies the technical aspect needed while making it an easy read(cliche), than you have accomplished your task.

RBarber

Comment on Communicating Science

I found this blog to be more interesting than what I had expected. I was surprised most by how well the author could convey his ideas in a logical sequence about a somewhat difficult subject. His writing incorporated emotion and technical language creating interesting and informative chapters. There's almost too much information here to cover in a brief blog, but I can say that although it took a while to read I feel it was worth while for it's information on oral presentations.

Relating to Audience

This article was about successful communication with an audience. Elucidating explanations, polling the audience (a simple hand-raise question to get them involved), and quasi-scientific explanations are seen as three ways to make a speech more successful and to make a speech more comprehensible for an audience. I agree that the techniques of using definitions, giving examples, and non-examples can be effective during a speech to inform the audience on the topic at hand.
Using these techniques aids a speaker to relay their information effectively to the audience with fewer barriers in the communication process.

SCIENCE

At first, I was a little disappointed about having to read such long article because I figured this was a speech class, not a reading class, but as I was reading the article I realized that this was not about the typical English class assignment. Instead it caught my attention because it was about improving your writing skills and that is something I can identified myself with. The reason I say this is because I have always had trouble trying to express myself, especially when it comes to writing it down, and this article happens to have amazing tips on bettering this type of problems.

In chapter two, there is a small quote that summarizes what I am trying to pint out:

“Bad grammar, if only occasional, does not destroy one. On the other hand, to communicate effectively you have to be able to produce decent sentence.”

In my case it is easier to say things than having to writing them down. This quote shows that if one could simply write down what is on your mind without having to worry about the grammar, it would be a lot easier for anyone to communicate! In my case this is very true. Sometimes I have great ideas that I can-not share with other simply because I have to write them down, and my ability to write is very poor, but if I simply followed the tips proposed in this article expressing myself through writing would be a lot easier.

Communication Related to Science

This article explained that communication practices are a doing of science. The higher the level of reading and writing you have, the more competent you will be perceived by society. Writing is a learned skill, and in reference to scientists, people do not read their work regularly. It is assumed that they acquired their writing skills as a learned attribute added to their abilities. People are seen and perceived in our roles as authors and scholars. In reference to science, a control is involved in speech as a measure of explaining and in science as a unit of measurement. Another term used in science is an absolute. Absolutes do not work well in the world of writing, but in science absolutes are prevalent and can be applied to various experiences. Energy is also directly related to science. Logic is needed in the structure and flow of a speech as well.
There are regulations within the realms of science and communication. They provide guidance, but in writing can condone limited experiences and not get across multi-faceted views of an author from studying another person’s works. Relating to science, an appreciation for history and present works must be prevalent in communication and are based on an understanding. Also, speaking is a form of science and conversing can relate to the roots of science. Oral presentations relate to feeling comfortable and being prepared. This will reflect a well-designed speech. Oral presentations include an energy that makes a person excited and nervous at the same time. The article also mentioned sign posts, time limits, and including digital graphics to enhance the experience. The use of software can also enhance the speaking experience greatly. This article reveals that history shows a line of evolution of communication while the internet has the potential to be the future.

The Reading "The Chicago Guide To Communicating Science"

This article had some good points in it. One of them being the way that many people in technology write, the author mentions that scientists will often write rules and standards down, not really entertaining writing, it also does not allow room for imagination, which is always important in science. I agree with this part of the reading, it is still important to include raw data but allowing room for imagination is more important.
The author makes an important comment about the history of writings by scientists. One example being Francis Bacon. Basically Mr. Bacon said scientists should always write like robots, and to shed all of the fluff and to tell just the facts. It seems the author wants us scientists to write with less of a hard edge, and try to add a little more to allow for imagination. I like these ideas. But even with more descriptive writing a writing is nothing if it doesn't flow write. The author says you can do this by including more transition sentences. I believe that this falls in to the category of writing like a human and like a robot. All in all I liked what this author said about writing about things that are very dry. I believe that even scientists must have emotion's about their work. If they learned to express these feelings in their writing (in a human way) then I think more and more articles by scientists would be read by a greater audience, and this in turn would lead to more broad view points, some of them from different fields. Especially with the Internet being so big, just because a paper is on the net doesn't mean people will want to read it, or take anything away from it.

Technology?

Technology is:

that form of cultural activity and behavior devoted to the transformation of material objects, or to the creation of procedural systems, in order to expand the realm of practical human activities and the rang eof human alternatives.

those material objects, techniques and knowledge that allow human beings to transform and control the inanimate world

a system based on the application of knowledge, mainfested in physical objects and organizational forms, for the attainment of specific goals

a system of rationalized control over large groups of people, events and machines by small groups of technically skilled people operating through organizational hierarchy.

--Lee Trachtman, professor emeritus, Purdue U.