Impact of the Arizona NExSS Winter School on Astrobiology Knowledge and Attitudes. Astrobiology. 2018.

Astrobiology is an inherently interdisciplinary area of study, demanding communication across multiple fields: astronomy, geochemistry, planetary science, and so on. Successful communication requires that researchers be aware of the basic findings, open questions, and tools and techniques of allied fields and possess an appreciation and respect for what these fields consider good science. To facilitate this communication between early-career researchers, the Arizona NExSS Winter School was hosted in February 2016, bringing together graduate students and postdoctoral researchers from backgrounds spanning the field of astrobiology. Students virtually attended a scientific Workshop Without Walls and participated in lectures, discussions, field trips, and hands-on activities, culminating in the writing and review of mock proposals by interdisciplinary teams. We assess the impact of the school on interdisciplinarity using a pre- and posttest survey of 24 students, informed by National Science Foundation impact categories (Friedman et al., 2008) within the Impact Analysis Method (IAM) described by Davis and Scalice (2015). We demonstrate that students gained knowledge, especially in fields outside their home discipline. Furthermore, an underlying disciplinary divide between geochemists and planetary scientists on the role of life in planetary evolution is observed and interpreted. These findings demonstrate that the Arizona NExSS Winter School had measurable impact on interdisciplinarity and that the IAM rubric has utility in measuring impact. We make recommendations for further research to understand the interdisciplinary gaps in astrobiology and how best to bridge them. Read more

Creating narrative scenarios: Science fiction prototyping at Emerge. Futures. 2014

Scenarios are stories. In the diverse field of scenario planning, this is perhaps the single point of universal agreement. Yet if scenarios are stories, their literary qualities are often underdeveloped. Scenarios used in business and government frequently do not contain a relatable protagonist, move a plot toward resolution, or compellingly use metaphor, imagery, or other emotionally persuasive techniques of literature. In these cases, narrative is relegated to an adjunct role of summarizing the final results of the workshop. While this neglect of narrative may be reasonable in some contexts, the power of narrative should not be underestimated. Scenario planning methodologies can benefit from using diverse narrative techniques to craft compelling and infectious visions of the future. This article explores the relationship between science fiction and scenarios as story genres and investigates a creative story-telling technique, “Science Fiction Prototyping” (Johnson, 2011). While the method is promising, it is an ultimately problematic means to incorporating narrative into scenario planning. Read more

Drone Wars. Cairo Review. 2012

Warfare is partly defined by the images of its weapons, from medieval knights in armor clashing on the battlefield to the mushroom clouds of modern nuclear weapons. For warfare in the twenty-first century, consider the image of a video screen. In September 2000, the counter-terrorism advisor in the White House, Richard A. Clarke, watched a video of a tall man in white robes. The man was probably Osama Bin Laden, who by that time had organized the attacks on the American embassies in Tanzania and Kenya. The man’s location was a compound outside Kandahar, Afghanistan. The videographer was a robot, an RQ-1 Predator drone aircraft. Read More

In Defense of the National Science Foundation. Science Progress. 2011

A new report produced by the staff of Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) rails against the National Science Foundation while illustrating a profound misunderstanding of how science is done and how the agency operates. “Under the Microscope” claims $1.2 billion in waste, fraud, duplication, and mismanagement, and $1.7 billion in unspent funds. Sen. Coburn’s review, however, is unscientific and deeply misleading, ignoring 95 percent of the foundation’s activity to pick on “silly grants” and the moral failings of its managers. Read More

Waves of Innovation. Science Progress. 2011

Innovation is a serious matter. It is the key to American prosperity, security, better jobs, and better health, as well as responses to coming challenges like energy security and global warming. But it’s not as simple as the president’s State of the Union address, or his Strategy for American Innovation would suggest, according to a recent study of economic history. The authors argue there are historic patterns in innovation and industry that can inform science policy in the 21st century. Read More

Rise and Decline of Military Human Enhancement. Science Progress. 2011

In the past decade, the U.S. military’s interest in human enhancement technologies has waxed and waned. An initial surge of interest, fueled by a desire to create the “Future Force Warrior” has given way, over time, to the more mundane challenges of meeting the needs of soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq. We would be fooling ourselves, however, if we believed that the U.S. military had abandoned efforts to upgrade the soldier’s body and mind to match the pace of modern warfare. We are in, at best, a lull in military investments in human enhancement research. That is why now is good time to start asking hard questions about how—and indeed if—we should proceed along this course. Read More