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• Date of publication Sep 19, 2008 Category: Commentary

  From Land art to the “global era”

  by Gaia Salvatori

  In the globalisation era, arts have provided food for thought on “how latitudes became forms”, to stress again that now, at global level, one should no longer define art as a contemplation “space”, but as an “environment”, a place for experience. On the other hand, already when Bern saw the inauguration of the historic exhibition “When Attitudes became Forms” in 1969, people realised that the problem was lying in the behaviour, in the attitude, of making arts towards the world. Basically, the formalistic concept of self-referentiality in a work of art was to be overcome, and attention was to be paid to procedures and contexts. In search of a new humanism in contact with the natural universe.

  Volume 7 • Issue 03 • 2008

• Date of publication Sep 19, 2008 Category: Letter

  Science and scientists turned into news and media stars by scientific journals. A study on the consequences on the present scientific behaviour

  by Carlos Elías

  This article explores whether some scientists have now actually been developing a type of science apt to be published as a piece of news, yet lacking a relevant scientific interest. Possibly, behind this behaviour there may be the present working culture, in which scientists live under the pressure of the dictatorship of the Science Citation Index (SCI) of the reference journals. This hypothesis is supported by a study demonstrating that there is a direct relation between publishing scientific results in the press and a subsequent increase in the SCI index. Many cases are here described, selected among the papers published in Nature that – according to experts – have a media interest rather than a scientific one. Furthermore, the case of the Dolly sheep cloning is studied as a paradigm for a situation in which media coverage actually destroyed the research group.

  Volume 7 • Issue 03 • 2008

• Date of publication Sep 19, 2008 Category: Editorial

  The better you know, the better you make your choice. The need for a scientific citizenship in the era of knowledge

  by Pietro Greco

  Martin W. Bauer is right, two evolutionary processes are under way. These are quite significant and, in some way, they converge into public science communication: a deep evolution of discourse is unfolding, along with an even deeper change of the public understanding of science.

  Volume 7 • Issue 03 • 2008

• Date of publication Sep 19, 2008 Category: Article

  Language and science: products and processes of signification in the educational dialogue

  by Martin Dodman , Elena Camino , Giuseppe Barbiero

  Global changes such as urbanisation, new ways of travelling, new information and communication technologies are causing radical changes in the relationships between human beings and the environment we are both a part of and depend on. Relationships which – according to a multiplicity of researches in various fields – are crucially important. Science education and the language of science risk exacerbating a tendency towards objectifying nature and inhabiting a virtual reality, thereby rendering ever more tenuous the dialogue between people and the natural world. This article examines two approaches to science and language – as products or as processes – and suggests how awareness of the dynamic relationship between language and knowledge can help restore that vital dialogue.

  Volume 7 • Issue 03 • 2008

• Date of publication Jun 20, 2008 Category: Commentary

  Collaborative Web between open and closed science

  by Alessandro Delfanti

  “Web 2.0” is the mantra enthusiastically repeated in the past few years on anything concerning the production of culture, dialogue and online communication. Even science is changing, along with the processes involving the communication, collaboration and cooperation created through the web, yet rooted in some of its historical features of openness. For this issue, JCOM has asked some experts on the most recent changes in science to analyse the potential and the contradictions lying in online collaborative science. The new open science feeds on the opportunity to freely contribute to knowledge production, sharing not only data, but also software and hardware. But it is open also to the outside, where citizens use Web 2.0 instruments to discuss about science in a horizontal way.

  The future of the scientific paper

  by Bora Zivkovic

  Grid computing and e-science: a view from inside

  by Stefano Cozzini

  Public domain, copyright licenses and the freedom to integrate science

  by John Wilbanks

  Science via podcast

  by Ilenia Picardi and Simona Regina

  To blog or not to blog, not a real choice there...

  by Elisabetta Tola

  Volume 7 • Issue 02 • 2008

• Date of publication Jun 20, 2008 Category: Commentary

  The future of the scientific paper

  by Bora Zivkovic

  Will the use of the Web change the way we produce scientific papers? Science go through cycles, and the development of communication of science reflects the development of science itself. So, new technologies and new social norms are altering the formality of the scientific communication, including the format of the scientific paper. In the future, as PLoS One is experimenting right now, journals will be online hosts for all styles of scientific contributions and ways to link them together, with different people contributing to a body of work and making science more interdisciplinary and interconnected.

  Volume 7 • Issue 02 • 2008

• Date of publication Jun 20, 2008 Category: Editorial

  Cultural determinants in the perception of science

  by Pietro Greco

  Those studying the public understanding of science and risk perception have held it clear for long: the relation between information and judgment elaboration is not a linear one at all. Among the reasons behind it, on the one hand, data never are totally “bare” and culturally neutral; on the other hand, in formulating a judgment having some value, the analytic component intertwines – sometimes unpredictably – with the cultural history and the personal elaboration of anyone of us.

  Volume 7 • Issue 02 • 2008

• Date of publication Jun 20, 2008 Category: Commentary

  Grid computing and e-science: a view from inside

  by Stefano Cozzini

  My intention is to analyze how, where and if grid computing technology is truly enabling a new way of doing science (so-called ‘e-science’). I will base my views on the experiences accumulated thus far in a number of scientific communities, which we have provided with the opportunity of using grid computing. I shall first define some basic terms and concepts and then discuss a number of specific cases in which the use of grid computing has actually made possible a new method for doing science. I will then present a case in which this did not result in a change in research methods. I will try to identify the reasons for these failures and analyze the future evolution of grid computing. I will conclude by introducing and commenting the concept of ‘cloud computing’, the approach offered and provided by major industrial actors (Google/IBM and Amazon being among the most important) and what impact this technology might have on the world of research.

  Volume 7 • Issue 02 • 2008

• Date of publication Jun 20, 2008 Category: Article

  Analysis of Japanese newspaper articles on genetic modification

  by Ryuma Shineha , Aiko Hibino , Kazuto Kato

  The rapid spread of technologies involving the application of “Genetic Modification (GM)” raised the need for science communication on this new technology in society. To consider the communication on GM in the society, an understanding of the current mass media is required. This paper shows the whole picture of newspaper discourses on GM in Japan. For the Japanese public, newspapers represent one of the major sources of information on GM. We subjected the two Japanese newspapers with the largest circulation, the Asahi Shimbun and Yomiuri Shimbun, to an analysis of the full text of approximately 4000 articles on GM published over the past to perform an assessment of the change of reportage on GM. As for the most important results, our analysis shows that there are two significant shifts with respect to the major topics addressed in articles on GM by Japanese newspapers.

  Volume 7 • Issue 02 • 2008

• Date of publication Jun 20, 2008 Category: Commentary

  To blog or not to blog, not a real choice there...

  by Elisabetta Tola

  Science blogging is a very useful system for scientists to improve their work, to keep in touch with other colleagues, to access unfamiliar science developed in other fields, to open new collaborations, to gain visibility, to discuss with the public. To favour the building of blog communities, some media have set up networks hosting scientists' blogs, like ScienceBlogs.com or Nature Network. With some interesting features and many potential uses.

  Volume 7 • Issue 02 • 2008