Cocktail Party Physics

what do we mean by "how much oil is left" in the gulf?

If Shakespeare were alive today, he might suggest that PR/branding/marketing people should go before lawyers.  The spin doctor's job is to make their company look good - even when it shouldn't.  The existence of spin doctors is reason number one why we must fix our badly broken education system.  If science teaches one thing, it is skepticism:  People shouldn't be so anxious to be told what to think.

This week marked the first peer-reviewed study of the Gulf Coast oil spill.  Big disclaimer here - it takes weeks (sometimes months or years) for research to make it from research to print, so the results are from measurements made in June; however, there are many more research reports to come.  The Truth is likely to be known only after multiple research groups have published on different aspects - probably on a timescale of years - and all of their data is analyzed in aggregate.  Science aims for precision, not speed. 

The last few weeks have brought heated debates on radio and television arguing over exactly "how much oil is left in the Gulf".  Estimates vary from "none" to "more than seventy-five percent".  How can people looking at the exact same system come up with numbers that are so different?

How much oil was released into the Gulf?  The National Incident Command (mostly the federal people in charge of managing the cleanup) uses a figure of about 5 million barrels and, on August 2nd, noted that about 17 percent of the oil released from the spill has been removed.

On August 19th, Ian MacDonald (a biological oceanographer from Florida State) testified in Congress and presented a very interesting fact:  the 5 million barrel total includes oil that was pumped directly from the well onto ships after the first capping attempts.  Initially, this larger figure doesn't make sense - why would the government use a bigger number? 

Because if you include the oil pumped directly from the well to a tanker, you've "removed" a higher percentage of the oil.  MacDonald (who argues that the total amount of oil that actually was released into the water was 4.1 million barrels) says that six percent was burned and four percent was skimmed.  If you use his numbers, a total of 10 percent of the oil was 'removed' from the environment.  The government number of 17 percent isn't wrong - but you can't compare the two numbers head to head.  The higher number sounds better, but it's important for the consumer (of information) to know what that number actually represents.

A report from NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) in early August estimated - and that's an important word - that 74 percent of the oil from the leak had been: captured directly from the well; skimmed; burned; dispersed chemically; dispersed naturally; evaporated;  or dissolved into microscopic droplets. The rest of the oil washed ashore.  On August 4th, Carol Browner said on the Today Show that "more than three-quarters of the oil is gone."

Salad dressing made with oil and vinegar (or water) presents a challenge in mixing, as I've written about in the past.  Oil molecules don't like water molecules and water molecules don't like oil molecules.  You need to either whisk in the oil or shake it vigorously to form an emulsion.  An oil-in-water emulsion consists of very small droplets of oil suspended in water.  Most salad dressing recipes include dispersants of some type. Homemade dressings rely on things like mustard and egg yolk.  Commercial salad dressings use more exotic dispersants.  Few people call them dispersants, but these additives encourage the formation and persistence of the emulsion, which is pretty much what a dispersant does. 

I don't see any oil after shaking the bottle of vinaigrette in the fridge.  Is it 'gone''?  Evidently not, because the calorie count doesn't have separate columns for 'shaken' and 'not shaken'.  It's definitely 'not visible', but it sure the heck isn't 'gone'.

I happen to like my vinaigrette more on the vinegar side than the oil side, so I typically use a lower ratio than the recommended 3:1 oil:vinegar ratio for a classic vinaigrette.  My eating companions rarely agree with my acidic preferences, so I usually make the salad dressing with the 3:1 ratio and then add additional vinegar to a small container just for me.  That decreases the oil concentration, but not the absolute amount of oil - it's just spread out more than it was before.  That's not 'gone' either.

It would be really nice to have an equation that predicts how long oil takes to break down in seawater.  Such an equation does exist - in fact, a number of different models exist.  MacDonald's Congressional testimony makes the point that federal report (which makes no secret that its numbers/predictions are based primarily on theory) doesn't indicate which scientific formulae, models or predictors they used for their estimates. 

The Science paper researchers (along with researchers at other institutions that have peer-reviewed papers coming out soon) dropped sensors into the water and some even sent a submersible to look various 'plumes'.  The lead researchers on the Science paper (from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute) reported on over 57,000 chemical analysis on a plume "only" 200 meters thick and about 2 kilometers wide over two weeks in June.  The plume measured was about 3,600 feet below the surface and extended more than 20 miles southwest of the well, traveling at about four miles a day.  The caveats, of course, are that this study occurred before the well was capped and two months ago. 

The use of the word 'plume' may be a little misleading because this is a collection of small oil droplets, presumably formed by the dispersant or natural actions.  It's not the billowing cloud you might picture. The Science paper reports significantly higher concentrations of a number of toxic compounds, including benzene at a rate of 50 micrograms per liter (which is 0.05 parts per million).  One part per million is about one drop in 40 gallons. The maximum allowable concentration of benzene in drinking water is 5 parts per billion, which is 0.005 parts per million or ten times less than the concentrations they measured. (Incidentally, commercial salad dressing is required to contain 30% oil.)

Dispersing is (in my opinion) not the same thing as removing.  How do we actually remove oil?

Crude oil is a collection of many different types of hydrocarbons, the exact composition of which varies from location to location.  The molecules, all of which are carbon and hydrogen atoms in various configurations, are separated into fractions according to their boiling points. The lighter fractions have fewer carbon atoms (and by association, fewer hydrogen atoms) and lower boiling points.  The pie chart below is representative of what might flow through a pipeline carrying Gulf Coast crude (See Appendix 6-A). Boiling points are shown in parentheses after the specific fraction name.

The light ends through medium naptha generally have a composition like gasoline, while the heavier components are more like oils.  A representative molecule from the gasoline range would be octane or isooctane (both C₈H₁₈), while a representative molecule from the oils side would be paraffin wax (C₂₅H₅₂).  The heaviest components of crude oil are like the binders for asphalt.

What everyone is counting on to actually 'remove' the oil are specific types of marine bacteria that eat oil.  The bacteria with the best PR appear to be Alcanivorax borkumensis, which loves hydrocarbons for breakfast, lunch and dinner.  They prefer alkanes, which are saturated hydrocarbons and very prevalent in crude oil.  David Valentine of UCSB has a nice video showing the dispersant and the bacteria's effects on oil in water on the PBS Newshour website.

If you've ever watched bacteria grow on bread (either due to a science project or reluctance to clean the fridge), you know that the growth of a bacterial colony depends on specific environmental conditions.  A. borkumensis likes water temperatures in the range of 20-30 C, and a 3-10 percent salt concentration, which makes it ideal in marine applications. 

A group at Bangor University studies the limiting factors this bacteria's growth. We already know that the bacteria population won't grow unless there is plenty of food (not a problem in this case).  The Bangor group has been studying whether you can 'fertilize' these bacteria to get them to grow faster.  They are examining how nitrogen and phosphorus may stimulate growth of the bacteria to allow them to deal with very large oil spills.

These oil-gobbling bacteria need oxygen to survive.  You may also have heard reports that scientists are concerned that the bacteria colonies could grow so large that they significantly de-oxygenate the water.  So far, that doesn't look like a problem.

The federal report, which has been widely quoted, says that early signs suggest the oil is “biodegrading quickly."  A number of scientists quickly challenged this assertion.  Bacteria's metabolism decreases as the temperature decreases.  Water gets colder with depth, so bacteria metabolizing oil will be less efficient at lower depths. One of the problems with dispersants is that, at some oil droplet size, the force of gravity exactly counterbalances the buoyant force, so droplets are stuck at a particular depth.  It may take a very long time for these smaller droplets at lower depths to be eaten - remember that the Science paper looks at a plume 3600 feet below the surface.

There are also a lot of unknowns.  We have precious little data about how the dispersants used may change the bacteria's ability to digest oil.  I've been looking for hard information about exactly which components of crude oil the bacteria eat and - sort of importantly - the by-products of the eating process. Some groups have engineered bacteria so that they eat oil and produce plastic. I am suspicious that CO₂ might be a by-product of the metabolism, since it's released in human metabolism of sugars (hydrocarbons with oxygen) and combustion of gasoline. 

This is an interesting case study in communicating science.  The federal report that came up with the 75% 'gone' number was very specific about what they meant by 'gone', even though they included some things I wouldn't necessarily include.  By the time the information got reduced to a soundbite, though, the details were 'gone'.

Research scientists have been pretty unanimously vocal about their skepticism of the 75% figure. It is interesting because we usually go out of our way to emphasize the limits of validity of our conclusions, we make all kinds of caveats and generally put so many conditions on our results that our PR people want to pull out their hair (or ours).  I think the vocal outcry from the scientific community is because conclusions are being presented as 'known', when in fact, they are very tenuous.  There is nothing like drawing conclusions before the data are all in to get scientists riled up.

A very important role of science education - usually overlooked because it isn't easy to test - is teaching people how to think logically and rationally.  This becomes even more important when people are inundated with information from all sides, including professionals whose job it is to promote specific agendas.  It ought to be an attractive theme for today's students:  Don't take anyone's word - prove it for yourself.

oily hair is not a problem - its a solution for the gulf coast

I had my own oil spill this weekend in the kitchen and got a bit of an appreciation for just how hard it is to clean up the slippery stuff. 

What is oil?  Basically, it's the polar opposite of water.  (OK, it's actually the non-polar opposite of water, chemistry joke!).  A hydrophilic material is one capable of making transient hydrogen bonds with water.  Hydrophilic molecules are polar - one end has a net positive charge and one end a net negative charge.  Water is the prototypical hydrophilic material, with a slight positive charge on the end of molecule with the hydrogen atoms (mickey mouse's ear) and a slight negative charge on the oxygen (the head, as shown below).  The total charge of the molecule is zero, but each end is slightly polarized.

That polarity makes hydrogen bonding possible.  Like dissolves like: A hydrophilic material is soluble in water, while a hydrophobic material -- like oil -- is insoluble in water.  Hydrophobic means water hating.  Hydrophobic molecules are nonpolar - like oils.

Oils are primarily hydrocarbons.  These are nonpolar molecules, so when you mix oil with water, the oil hangs out with the oil and the water hangs out with the water.  This leaves a large glop of oil in the middle of the water, which (in addition to being really bad for the environment) is embarrassing.

When you're doing the laundry, the hardest stains to get out are the oily ones because the water in which you wash your clothes literally doesn't want anything to do with the oil.  Special surfactants -- molecules with one hydrophilic end and one hydrophobic end - surround small globules of oil with the hydrophilic end pointing out.  The surfactant is sort of a mediator molecule that allows the oil-encapsulated glob to be carried out in the rinse water.  The strategy boils down to: get the oil to let go of the fiber, break it into smaller globules, surround it with surfactant and wash it out.

In the Gulf Coast, the oil is being treated with dispersants like DISPERSIT and COREXIT.  COREXIT is the particular dispersant being used.  COREXIT's active components include "light petroleum distillate" (hydrocarbons like mineral spirits and kerosene), propylene glycol (an alcohol and emulsifier, which facilitates the mixing of oil and water and is a primary ingredient in stick deodorant) and organic sulfonic acid salt.  The dispersant is dumped on top of the oil.  It breaks the giant oil glob into smaller globules, surrounds it with surfactants and disperses it out to sea.  Dispersants don't remove the oil, they just break it up into smaller pieces so that it's not as obvious.  Natural processes biodegrade the oil over time.  Yuck.  They've dumped about 190,000 gallons of this stuff in the Gulf at this point.

Ideally, you'd like to be able to separate oil from water, just like you remove fat from gravy.  My favorite way of separating out the oil from the broth for gravy is to cool the mixture and let the fat solidify.  Hard to do in the ocean, I know.

I tried cleaning up my oil spill on the counter with a paper towel.  This works for about three milliseconds and then you're mostly just moving the oil around the counter.  The paper towels absorb the oil quickly then they are no good.  So you basically use up a lot of paper towels  because you can't rinse them out and reuse them.  So anything that absorbs oil  but doesn't let it go again is a problem because it has to be disposed.  On the other hand, that's better than just breaking it up and leaving it.

Some companies are looking to aerogels - gels with so many air pockets that they look like sponges, but are very lightweight.  Aerogels pores can be treated to be hydrophobic, which is important because you want a selective mop.  If it attracts oil and water, that's not as helpful as just picking up oil.  Those technologies aren't ready for use yet.  Even after proven effective for picking up oil, they have to be tested for effects on the environment and the animals in the sea.

Most of the sorbents currently being used to deal with oil spils are made from the polymer polypropylene.  Selectivity (oil, but not water) limits what we can use in the ocean. Common sorbents for racetracks are clays with pores that suck up and hold oil.  The problem with clays and clay substitutes is that they absorb water as well as oil. 

Polypropylene is hydrophobic, so fibers absorb oil, but let water pass through.  I understand that there is now a polypropylene fiber shortage and its price is going up because of the high demand.  Another company, MOP Environmental, uses recycled cellulose fibers that have been surface treated to minimize water absorption.  Like the polypropylene, these fibers are placed into mesh bags and formed into booms, sweeps, etc. that can be put in the water and later collected. One of the disadvantages of absorption is that the oil is absorbed so strongly onto the polypropylene, for example, that you can't get it out again.  The whole assembly has to be disposed of.

The MOP product also includes some oil-digesting bacteria.  I remember during the Valdez disaster people predicting that someday, we would just be able to release bacteria and they would clean up spills in moments.  These aren't special bateria, really.  Some soil-dwelling bacteria naturally eat oil.  Actually, it turns out you can find naturally occurring bacteria that specialize in eating just about anything, from sugar to starch to detergents.  A couple of years ago, a 16-year old found a bacteria that eats plastic lunch bags.  The problem is producing enough bacteria to make a dent in the millions of gallons of oil in a reasonable time.  Also, the specificity of the bacteria as to what oils they will eat can be a problem, as "oil" contains a huge number of different types of hydrocarbon molecules.  Most of these bacteria are as picky eaters as three year olds.

One of the more interesting solutions proposed (aside from dropping trash in the pipe to block the oil) also involves using fibers; however, the fibers in question are human hair.  Chicken feathers, straw, and wool have all been used to collect oil in the past, but human hair seems to work particularly well.  A big advantage is that the oil is adsorbed rather than absorbed.  Adsorbed oil forms a very thin layer - a molecule or two thick - at the surface of the hair.  Because the molecules are only weakly bound, the oil can be removed, meaning the hair can be reused.  

Hair is naturally rough, as shown in the scanning electron microscopy picture to the left.  The overlapping scaly things are your hair's cuticle.  (This clearly isn't my hair because I dye my hair and that roughs up the cuticle quite a bit.  This hair is in pretty good shape)  All the roughness is good, because that means more surfaces onto which oil can adsorb. Every notch and bump on the cuticle is more surface area for oil to adsorb on.  A pound of hair can pick up a quart of oil in about a minute.

Given that people of different races and ethnicities have very different hair, I am curious as to whether there are any studies out there about whether particular types of hair are more useful at adsorbing oil than others.  I couldn't find any in the scientific literature, but that doesn't mean it isn't worth it.  After all, hair is a renewable resource.

Although there have been a number of articles on using hair for the Gulf oil spill, this isn't a new idea.  It's been brought up every time there's been a spill.  In the Internet era, that means starting with the Exxon Valdez and an Alabaman hairdresser inspired by pictures of oil-drenched Alaskan otters.  The enterprising hairdresser thought, "if otters get this stuff on their fur so easily, shouldn't it stick to any hair?"  He even named his company Ottimat.com in honor of the otter.  The company's website has a video showing how the product works - it works pretty darn good.  They claim that 98% of the oil adsorbed can be recovered.

The problem is that we're talking about billions of quarts of oil.  That doesn't dissuade people who figure that every quart of oil recovered is one less that has to be dispersed.  All across the Gulf Coast, grassroots organizations are getting people together to stuff old nylons with leftover human hair.  Ironically, Matter of Trust, a nonprofit in San Francisco that specialized in making and distributing human hair mats for oil adsorption, got nailed by the recession.  The companies that had been turning the hair into mats went out of business and the organization couldn't find others that would do the job for a low enough price.  The woman running the organization has 18,000 lbs of hair just waiting for to be used. 

The brown pelicans, sea turtles and fish in the Gulf don't really care whether the oil is adsorbed or absorbed.  They just want it out of there.  And so do we.  Talk about hair power.

China report

  I've been back from China for about a month and I'm still processing the experience, but I thought I'd tell you all a little about some of my observations in and out of the classroom. I was hired to teach English language and culture but really, in three weeks, there's not much language teaching you can do, so it mostly winds up being an English culture summer camp and conversation program. Which is great. There's a lot more learning of language that goes on in informal sessions than formal ones, and it was really a pleasure to get to know both the students and faculty of the Harbin Institute of Technology (HIT).

Harbin is an industrial city in the north of China, with a population around the same size as New York's. As Chinese cities goes, it's pretty new, springing up in the late 1800's when the Russians built a railroad from Vladivostok to a sleepy fishing village on the Songhua River for trade purposes. Russian Jews migrated there and helped build the city, giving Harbin its first hospitals, schools and libraries as well as two synagogues and a sizable cemetery that's still lovingly cared for by the Chinese. At one time the city housed an international, multiethnic population and was called the Paris of China, and passed through both Russian and Japanese hands before becoming wholly Chinese. Now, its population is almost exclusively Chinese, with a few Japanese and Korean residents. (If you're interested in pictures, you can see what I took at my Flickr account, or our fearless leader, Marcy Bauman's. You can also take a look at my blog posts about the trip.)

The city has a number of universities and top-notch schools. HIT is the third-best university in China, on par with our MIT and like MIT, focused on science and technology fields. The students are chosen from the top 2.5 percent of those taking the national admissions exam, so they are smart, smart kids, and HIT tends to promote from within its graduate population. One thing the language barrier often does is disguise just how darn smart folks are, and I know I was underestimating the intelligence of most of the people I was talking to. The few technical conversations we had were as much hampered by my lack of technical vocabulary as their lack of English vocabulary. I met aerospace, civil, environmental and all other kinds of engineers, materials scientists, chemists, computer scientists and new media specialists, economists and architects, and people specializing in technological innovation, with research areas as diverse as composite materials, solid oxide fuel cells, optical thin films, and microporous and mesoporous materials. Many of my students were studying alternative energy technologies and environmental sciences.

These last two subjects are big issues for China, and you can see the need for them all over Harbin itself. The weather was beautiful during the first week of my stay: warm and dry and windy. I was really puzzled when people kept asking me if I found Harbin's air dirty. And then the next week we had a temperature inversion and I understood the question. You can see the difference in the two photos I took from my 15th floor window on campus:

There's blue sky underneath that smog, believe it or not. And that's the way it was for most of my visit. It's not eye-stinging or smelly like the air in Pittsburgh was when I lived there in the late 70's, but it makes New York on a bad day seem edenic. Ozone shmozone. Most of what's in the air is not car exhaust but coal smoke. There were several coal-fired electricity plants on campus, and that's where most of China's power comes from. At least in Harbin, cars are a relatively small part of the problem because there just aren't that many per capita yet (not so for Beijing and Shanghai). That doesn't stop the traffic from being completely insane, but that has more to do with the total disregard for signs (if there are any) and rules of the road than numbers. And the donkey carts don't help, either, I'm sure. Especially the ones on the expressway. Or the massively laden trikes.

If Harbin is any indication, one of China's biggest priority has got to be infrastructure. I'm used to not being able to drink the water when I go somewhere out of the country, but in Harbin no one drinks the water. You can wash in it, and wash your clothes and dishes, but you can't drink it because there are no purification plants and largely unregulated wastewater dumping. Cooking and drinking water is all bottled, which adds its own problems in recycling (that's what the guy on the trike is hauling, incidentally). In one of the first conversations I had with the faculty when school started, I spoke with a prof whose specialty is construction materials and engineering and we talked about the lack of regulation in China, not only in building materials and codes but in industry as well. Where we have legislation like the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts (however badly they're enforced), China has nothing but local committee oversight, which is subject to bribery and corruption. (Interestingly, while I was writing this, the New York Times published the first of a series called "Toxic Waters: America's Growing Pollution Problems." So it's not like we're doing such a great job either. But the major difference is that we have the legislative framework to deal with it.) There seems to be a major push in Harbin, to correct some of these issues, at least on the wastewater front; streets all over the city were torn up both for new sewage and water lines and for a new subway the city is putting in. And many of my students were keenly interested in environmental issues and abatement technology. I got a lot of questions from both faculty and students about how pollution is managed in the States (and was grateful for 10 years of editing environmental impact statements to give me the background to answer them).

But the two issues that really struck me as an educator and a science geek were the attitude toward education in general and how different it is talking about science without religion getting in the way. I was teaching mostly incoming freshmen and sophomores, and not only were they some of the brightest students I'll ever have the privilege of teaching, I've never had students who were so eager or so respectful. This program was basically a three-week summer camp and still there was nothing my students balked at doing. Homework? Sure, no problem! Write in class? No problem. Ask me awkward questions about Tibet? Sure, happy to. Eat lunch with you? Absolutely. Students were on time, every day, or almost humiliatingly apologetic if they were late. They stood up to answer me in class. And thanked me after each one. After day one, I was reeling with culture shock. This is not to say my students here are not hungry or grateful, but in a completely different way. My students here know they've missed out on something and want to make up for that so they can get good jobs and support their families. The intellectual hunger in Chinese students is just that: intellectual hunger for new ideas, new ways of thinking, new information.They have a visceral love of learning you see in some of the best schools here and with individual students even at third tier U.S. schools. In part, that's because getting into college is so competitive, even more so than here. The major difference, and something I missed, was that Chinese students won't often argue with you. They're so respectful, and often used to learning by rote, that disagreeing with a professor seems rude to them. Teachers are really important people in China, and paid accordingly. We could really learn something from that.

And yet, one of the faculty and I had a conversation about this and he insisted that U.S. schools were still superior because we taught students to think independently. Gosh I wish that were still true. As I recently said in another conversation over here, our schools are leaning more and more toward shaping students for particular careers and offering them skill sets, rather than the ability to learn quickly and think for themselves, which can be applied in any career. (I'm not saying you don't need skill sets, especially in the sciences, but along with that, you need critical thinking skills and imagination, rather than just the skill sets. It's what sets a technician apart from a scientist.)

The unit that I taught was about science in the U.S. and covered a little history of science (the development of the scientific method, major discoveries, major players); the two-way exchange between science and culture; women in science; science in entertainment (thanks, Jen!); communicating science; current controversies; and how the public views science. We watched a couple of CSI episodes, Minority Report and The Matrix, and a couple of clips from Babylon 5. Some of the entertainment was familiar, and some not, but the references that went right over everyone's head were the religious and mythological allusions in The Matrix—not surprising, since that same stuff goes right over my head in Chinese opera. More confusing for them, though, was the whole idea that people would actually disbelieve scientific fact in favor of religious teachings or myth. When I described the controversies about teaching evolution in public schools and what ID and creationism were, they were clearly boggled. When I asked how many of them had some sort of spiritual belief, whether Buddhism, Confucianism, Islamic, or Christian, not one hand went up. (Just to clarify, each of those religions is legal in China; there is an active Buddhist temple in the city, some of the faculty are Buddhist, and though the Jewish population is long-gone, their synagogues were not razed during the Cultural Revolution as were most of the Christian churches. So this wasn't fear of reprisal that kept them from professing religious belief. It was simple lack of interest.) For the Chinese, if anything plays this role in forming or deforming scientific thought, it's politics, and I think that's less true now than it was during, say, the Cultural Revolution.

And these two facts, if anything, are what's going to allow the Chinese to roll over us economically in ten or twenty years. Not their sheer numbers, but their respect for education and their lack of muddying religious issues. They're intensely proud of their country and their accomplishments, which are indeed impressive, and that pride and ambition and ability will carry them a long way. Unless the US gets its priorities straight (more money for education, better pay for teachers, more access to quality education for everyone), we're soon going to be buying more than cheap tchotchkes, outsourced electronics, and pirated movies from China. We'll be importing technology we should have invented and produced ourselves.

get the lead out

And that's what we're doing here at the cocktail party. Let's just say it's been a little crazy since March, not just for me but for the rest of my fellow CPP bloggers. But don't abandon us! We're planning a delicious and intoxicating non-stop party for the summer, with lots of posts, designed to make you not even miss Jennifer, our intrepid leader, while she's making the last sprint on finishing her calculus book.

So hey, did you see the new "X-Men Origins" film with Wolverine? And how about that horrifying scene where they dunk the gorgeously half-nekkid Hugh Jackman into what looks like an acid bath and inject his bones with adamantium and he comes up wearing eyeliner and a floppy haircut? Oh wait no. Wrong element. That would be AdamAntium. Never mind. Ba-dum-bum. SSSSSSS.

Oddly enough, when I wasn't thinking of fallen British pop stars or Hugh Jackman's half-nekkid body while watching this scene, I was thinking about . . . lead. And bad puns about Iron Man. No really. Cuz that's the kind of geek I am. See, during my stint with the environmental and hazardous materials engineers, I learned a lot of fun facts about pollutants, of which lead is a major one, especially in urban areas. Stick with me here, and I'll get to the Wolverine connection, I promise. But first, a little about lead.

Lead has been a hidden yet common ingredient in a number of familiar objects and substances for centuries. It was used as piping in the Romans' extensive aqueduct system (more on that later, too), and as an additive to ceramic glazes, where it functions to lower the melting point and enhance colors. It was and is added to crystal (as lead oxide) to give it brilliance and a crisp ringing tone (important if you're playing music on them). Lead was a key component of cosmetics (giving medieval and Renaissance faces that sought-after paleness), home remedies, and condiments, and used as a spermicide and preservative for wine. It was made into tankards, cooking pots, and dishes as well. The Romans also knew it could cause some strange symptoms, which they called "Saturnine gout" because lead was associated with the god Saturn, but that doesn't seem to have stopped them or anyone else from using it.

In the modern world, the two biggest sources of exposure are, or were, lead in gasoline and lead in paint. Lead was clearly recognized as a  health hazard in the U.S. and Europe as early as the 19th century but steps to limit its use, at least in gasoline, were not taken until the 1970s. The nasty truth is that it was actually known that adding tetra-ethyl lead (TEL) was a health hazard at least as early as the1920s, but this evidence was ignored in favor of profitability. Leaded gasoline was finally phased out entirely in 1996 with a few exceptions.

Lead was originally added to gasoline as an "anti-knock" agent, to prevent pockets of air and fuel mixtures from igniting at the wrong time and wrong place in your engine's piston stroke cycle, which it did by controlling the volatility or explosive characteristics of gasoline. The extraneous ignition shock wave causes the pinging or knock, and can be harmless or extremely destructive depending on when it happens in the cycle and how energetic it is. Lead was added to increase the octane of gasoline, or its resistance to detonation. The more resistance, the more efficient the fuel because it only ignites when it's supposed to, i.e., when lit by the spark plug. Although there are a number of anti-knock agents that have far less toxicity, TEL became the additive of choice for a number of complicated reasons, including plain ol' greed. As a result, something like 7 million tons of it were burned during the 20th century, and remain in the soil and water, making our current exposure levels 300-500 times greater than the normal background exposure. As Jamie Lincoln Kitman points out in his lengthy and horrifying article on lead in The Nation, "'Britain's Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution concluded that lead was dispersed so widely by man in the twentieth century that "it is doubtful whether any part of the earth's surface or any form of life remains uncontaminated by anthropogenic [man-made] lead.'"

Yikes!

The introduction of unleaded gasoline cut airborne emissions, but the stuff was still around not only in the soil (leaching into food) and air, but in the gallons and gallons of paint slowly peeling off interior and exterior walls, mixing with dust and becoming airborne or sinking into the soil. Lead is added to paint to increase its durability, color-fastness, and drying speed, and to make it moisture resistant. This latter quality means that lead is still used in paint for industrial purposes, especially ship paint, but it's been banned for use in residential settings. Lead poisoning from paint was (and still is) a huge problem in low-income neighborhoods where the buildings are often old and not well-maintained. When lead paint flakes, children often ingest it in chunks (pretty colors!) or it gets ground up into particulate matter and inhaled. I remember PSAs from my childhood showing a teething toddler gnawing on a flaking windowsill, as kids do, as part of a warning about how easily lead paint can be ingested by children. Lead paint removal has now become an environmental justice issue in many inner city communities, despite initiatives by city governments to mandate its removal in all residential buildings. The removal process is time-consuming and expensive because it must be done using hazmat precautions by trained technicians and involves basically scraping, sanding, ore peeling with heat or chemicals down to the bare surface in most cases. Not cheap or easy.

So what's the problem with lead, anyway? Lead is what's called a heavy metal (no, not that kind, although there may be some headbanging involved if you're poisoned by it). It's kind of a slippery term, but in general, non-scientific usage, it refers to the transition metals: among them, copper, zinc and lead, which are also pretty dense (hence the "heavy" part) and fairly toxic to humans. One of the factors that makes them toxic is their ability to bind to organic molecules and accumulate in tissue, as mercury accumulates in fish, for example.

And here's where the Wolverine connection comes in: Bones have a special affinity for lead, reacting to it by replacing calcium with it, so it stays in the body. In the x-ray at left, the white bands you see above and below the knee of this child are lead deposits, which look eerily like Wolverine's skeleton in the early stages of the adamantium injection. Ew. Lead also winds up in the blood and soft tissues too, like your liver,  heart muscle, and kidneys. The most damaging effect, though, has to do with its interactions with the central nervous system. Because it acts so much like calcium in the body, and calcium is one of the chemicals responsible for electrical activity in your brain, replacing it with lead is a real problem. Basically, it leads to a kind of short circuit, disrupting synaptic connections. In adults, it can produce cognitive deficits, abdominal cramping, constipation, tremors, and mood changes. Poisoning from the TEL put in gasoline is particularly ugly and manifests itself in several ways, including as "a mental disorder suggestive of schizophrenia."  It's also associated with violent behavior, which is not surprising, given the changes in the brain that it causes. What's interesting is that since the ban on leaded gasoline, studies have shown that violent crime has fallen in the countries most affected. The correlation is interesting, but not necessarily conclusive.

In children, whose brains are still developing, it can cause permanent mental retardation, seizure disorders, aggressive behavior, developmental regression, and cerebral edema (brain swelling) leading to seizures, coma, and death. What makes lead so insidious is that it takes a lower concentration of it to mess up your synapses than the concentration of calcium necessary to run them smoothly.

And toys, sadly, have in the past been another delivery system for lead. Many older toys were made from tin or lead and/or used lead paint as well. In the U.S., this is now illegal, but last year, there was a big stink in the media and retail circles about toys manufactured in China which made use of lead-based paint. Mattel, venerable maker of many an action figure (though not our Wolverine; wouldn't that have been ironic?), suffered extreme embarrassment at having to recall approximately 9 million toys it contracted to have manufactured in China, where production standards are not as closely monitored. Many of the recalled toys were in the Fisher Price brand, which is geared toward infants and toddlers, a stage at which kids put just about everything in their mouths, offering an easy conduit for loose chips of lead paint. In response, the Feds developed some stringent rules about product testing intended to protect children from ingesting lead paint.Unfortunately, this turned out to be a real burden on independent toy makers, but that's another story that's still being hashed out. Suffice to say that although there are relatively inexpensive kits to test for lead in your toys or other objects, laboratory-grade testing is beyond the means of most small, cottage-industry-level manufacturers.

Humans aren't the only creatures affected by lead poisoning. One of the more unusual ways to be poisoned by lead (or at least one would think so) is from being shot with lead bullets, but this is exactly what contributed to the death of one California Condor, recently, who was peppered with lead shotgun pellets. And it's not the only kind of run-in with bullets that's been dangerous for the condors. They're scavengers and often dine on shotgunned varmits and deer in their habitat. Once those lead pellets come into contact with the acids in the bird's stomachs, uptake into the system begins and lead poisoning results. So lead bullets have been banned in their habitat, which has apparently made some hunters really unhappy.

Ingesting lead in your food isn't just for condors, either. As I mentioned above, Lead is added to a number of ceramic glazes used on dishes in other countries (it's illegal here, and imported and local dishware that uses it must be marked "not safe for food"). Remember that acid reaction in the condor's stomach? Citric acid (from citrus fruits) has the same effect, as does the acetic acid in grapes, wine, and vinegar, and other acidic foods. Citric and acetic acid are chelating agents, which means they form bonds with metal molecules to produce soluble molecules (which is why they're great for dissolving hard water stains). Once in your body via the food, those molecules break down again and your bones and tissues absorb the lead as above.

But that chelating power can be used for good! Turns out that sprinkling citric acid crystals on fields with, say, radishes can help mitigate or abate the presence of heavy metals in the soil. The citric acid binds with the heavy metals and is drawn up through the roots, where the chemistry of the plants turns it into a less toxic form and sends it into the leafy shoots. This is a process known as phytoremediation and some plants don't even need the citric acid boost because they naturally accumulate heavy metals at a concentration that would poison most. Radishes aren't the usual choice for this job, but they do work pretty well. Sunflower, corn, wheat, and a number of weeds including ragweed also work well. Even better, the metals can usually be recovered from the plant matter. It's nature's recycling process. As remediation processes go, it's not quick, but it's definitely a lot cheaper than soil caps (PDF) or excavation and disposal.

Finally, you may have heard those rumors that lead was responsible for the fall of the Roman Empire because their lead water pipes (like the one at left, running through the bath at Bath) slowly poisoned them all. A geochemist at University of Michigan's School of Public Health, Jerome Nriagu, wrote an interesting article to this effect in the New England Journal of Medicine. It's hardly conclusive, and there are some strong objections to it, one being that flowing water, as long as it's not terribly acidic, is not going to leach much lead out of pipes. But the Romans had some other habits that certainly contributed to the prevalence of "Saturnine gout" among the rich, one of which was boiling down grape must in lead pots. Remember how the lead gets out of the glazes? Same principle here, with highly acidic grapes. There's still a fair amount of argument about the idea, but without forensic samples, we'll probably never know just how much lead Romans ingested in their daily diet.

And wouldn't it be interesting to run a few forensic tests on Wolverine, to see what's leaching into his blood from that new skeleton? Adamantium is a steel alloy whose "properties do not qualify it for any know space on the Periodic Table of Elements," according to its creators. So I wonder if that might not account for some of Wolverine's mood swings? Just sayin'.

physics politico

So, the Spousal Unit and I had dinner with a good friend this weekend (a physicist), who offhandedly asked if I really thought an Obama Administration would be that much better for science than a McCain Administration. Bear in mind that he loves to play Devil's Advocate, but it is, nonetheless, a valid question. Regular readers know that I rarely delve into politics on this blog, except as an occasional aside or to highlight something that directly impacts science. I keep informed, but prefer not to immerse myself in political news -- mostly because it makes me want to take a shower to wash off all the crud and slime after just a few hours' reading. But there comes a time when even folks like me need to speak out, stand up and be counted. Consider this one of those times. (We'll return to our regular science programming with the next post. And within a week I hope to announce the Top 100 popular science books, culled from the outpouring of suggestions from the science blogosphere. A secret inner cabal of "Deciders" begins deliberations soon!)

For the record, I really, truly, am a registered Independent. It's not for reasons of "journalist integrity", but because I loathe being limited by pointless labels, and/or having some political party platform dictating what I "should" think on any given issue. The fact that so many people automatically assume I am a Democrat kinda proves my point. (The Spousal Unit, as anyone who reads his blog knows, actually is a stalwart Democrat. Somehow our marriage survives. And Jen-Luc Piquant? She follows the creed of the Rogue Ninja and considers herself above petty politics.)

I think our creaky two-party system is unnecessarily divisive, hopelessly outdated, and inadequate to serve the country's needs in an increasingly complex 21st century world, with an increasingly diverse citizenship. And I believe that blind partisanship is the enemy of sound reasoning and responsible governance. If I have opted for the Democratic presidential candidate in the last several elections -- which I have -- that is because the Republication Party has been hijacked by right-wing social extremists and morally corrupt, money-grubbing corporations. Also? I'll take a "tax and spend" liberal over a "spend and spend" conservative any day; at least the former understands that money doesn't grow on trees. Dear GOP: Kick those bums out, start showing some fiscal restraint, and become the party of Lincoln again, and you might just win back my vote. 

Now, the John McCain of 2000 might have been able to do that. Sure, he was always conservative, and not nearly as much of a maverick as he pretended to be, but he had energy, verve, and he really did speak out eloquently against government abuses of power. But where does McCain stand today on the critical S&T issues? Because let's face it: science and technology are going to be key to meeting future challenges in virtually every sphere. We ignore it at our peril. [UPDATE: My sincere apologies to the folks at Physics Today, who have been laboring tirelessly to cover the current election with regards to science, for forgetting to link to them in this post. Check out their site!]

Whither the Maverick?

McCain's campaign hasn't responded yet to questions from Science Debate 2008 (in fairness, they're in the middle of a campaign muted by the onset of a hurricane, and fighting off a media feeding frenzy on the new VP pick -- they're kinda busy). [UPDATE: As of September 15, the McCain campaign's response to Science Debate 2008 can be found here. It's nice to see more fleshed-out answers on these issues than can be found on the official Website, but they don't change my conclusions below.] So I spent a couple of hours browsing his official campaign Website. Disappointingly, there's very little specific science policies outlined there, apart from space science. Tom Levenson gives a bare-knuckled breakdown of McCain's position (and Obama's) on space science (i.e., NASA) over at Inverse Square. But it's not very encouraging to find so little about science on the site.

Still, there are some promising statements scattered throughout. McCain certainly recognizes the need to cut carbon emissions as rapidly as possible and offers a reasonably detailed plan to do so, from a cap-and-trade system to set limits on greenhouse gas emissions, to substantial tax credits for consumers who buy zero-emission vehicles, as well as incentives to automotive companies to get off their butts and introduce an affordable electric car already. Scientists are kinda divided on biofuels, particularly corn-based ethanol, but it's certainly a worthy area of R&D investment, given the energy challenges we face, and the McCain plan will make that investment.

On the downside, he's made it pretty clear that he supports offshore drilling for oil and natural gas in previously protected regions -- a short-term, stop-gap measure that won't do anything to stem rising oil costs because those are as much the result of speculation trading by unscrupulous investors as anything else. At least McCain also supports cracking down on these sorts of abuses (the site denounces empty "wagering in our energy markets"). Too bad he makes no mention of the notorious abuses of the Bush administration on squelching scientific data on climate change, except to say that "Climate policy should be built on scientifically sound, mandatory emission reduction targets and timetables." This is so laughably vague and filled with bureaucrat-speak, it could mean almost anything. 

More pluses: McCain advocates incentives to develop green alternative technologies, the "greening" of the federal government (the largest consumer of electricity on Earth), and wants to invest in more nuclear power plants. (I am not a huge fan of nuclear power because of the waste issue, but I recognize it is necessary to include it in a broad energy portfolio for the next 50 years, until fusion or hydrogen sources become more viable. I just hope those new McCain plants draw on newer closed-fuel cycle designs, rather than just recycling the old plant designs of yore. Sadly, I suspect the latter.)

More minuses: He advocates a permanent R&D tax credit for companies investing in innovative R&D, which might be promising if he had said anything, anywhere, on his site about how important S&T is to building a strong economy. He says nothing about declining federal funds for basic research, at a time when Fermilab narrowly avoided a shutdown, and many science departments and labs across the country are struggling to keep their research programs alive. (It's not as bad as it is in England, but unless something changes very soon, it could be.) Given that, his tax credit seems more like yet another example of favoring businesses and large corporations. Hopefully he'll address that by answering Science Debate 2008's questions.

Enter the Upstart.

Unfortunately for McCain, the soundest of his science-based policies are also addressed by Barack Obama -- in far more detail, and in far more sweeping, forward-thinking ways. (Anyone who repeats the talking point that Obama is short on specifics needs to spend an hour or so browsing his Website. It's all right there.) Funding for renewable energy technologies like wind and solar? Check. Foster innovation and entrepreneurship? Check. Permanent R&D tax credit? Check. Greening the federal government? Check. Reducing carbon emissions with a market-based cap-and-trade system? Check. Invest in biofuels, nuclear power,  and new vehicle technologies? Check, check, and double check.

Furthermore, Obama supports a doubling of federal funding for basic research over the next 10 years, and vows to "embrace" science and technology expertise rather than squelch it. He also shares the goal of increasing the number of PhDs earned by Americans, particularly those in under-privileged communities. He even plans to appoint the nation's first Chief Technology Officer. Oh, and he says this: "Policies must be determined using a process that builds on the long tradition of open debate that has characterized progress in science, including review by individuals who might bring new information or contrasting views." This is a man who will listen to reason and respect scientific expertise. Imagine that! Apparently he's already assembled a team of top-notch science advisors to help "shape a robust science agenda for my administration." His answers to Science Debate 2008 reflect that.

Nowhere is the difference between the two candidates more stark than in their stated policies on education. McCain predictably champions No Child Left Behind (NCLB), when every educator I know considers the program to be a major FAIL. Beyond that, his education policy is inexplicably vague and obsessed with giving parents greater control over where their kids attend schools -- so much so, that I suspect it's a bit of a "dog whistle," i.e., code for something else that only those tuned to that particular frequency can hear, especially since there is no specific mention of math and science education. (Yet there is a lot of harping about how parents are the ones who should decide what their kids should be learning.) At least he recognizes the potential for online learning through virtual schools, and offers financial support to help low-income students pay for access to those online resources. 

But again, Obama also supports online educational tools, with far broader financial support for educational opportunities of all kinds, and offers many point-by-point specifics. He supports the need for accountability in schools, but recognizes that NCLB has failed in large part because funding promises weren't kept by the Bush Administration. His policies seek to address not just teacher training and retention, but also high dropout rates, soaring college costs, and the need for high-quality childcare to assist working parents (particularly single moms). And he wants to make math and science education a national priority.

Obama also specifically addresses a number of key issues near and dear to those of us in the blogosphere. He's a champion of network neutrality, for starters, and favors the "sanity not censorship" model for protecting under-aged children online while preserving freedom of expression. He wants to create Public Media 2.0, what he calls "the Sesame Street of the Digital Age," featuring Web-based video and interactive educational programming. He hopes to bring about "the transition of existing public broadcasting entities and help renew their founding vision in the digital world."

And he supports diversity in media ownership: "Unfortunately, over the past several years, the FCC has promoted the concept of consolidation over diversity. As president [Obama] will encourage diversity in the ownership of broadcast media, promote the development of new media outlets for expression of diverse viewpoints, and clarify the public interest obligations of broadcasters who occupy the nation's spectrum." You know, my folks are evangelical Christians and staunch Republicans of the far-right variety; mostly, we agree to disagree on key issues, and focus on our mutual love and respect for each other. But the sorry state of broadcast news coverage is one of those issues almost everyone can agree upon -- even those of us who make our livings in the media. It's been turning into a red-faced shouting free-for-all between pompous, bloviating, partisan talking heads for years, more crass entertainment than useful information, all in a desperate bid to boost ratings. Meanwhile, public broadcasting is hanging on by a thread.

Anyone who's caught the numerous clips from The Daily Show on YouTube has seen Jon Stewart's withering montages revealing just how shamelessly the major media outlets mindlessly repeat the same talking points. And MSNBC's commentators practically had a nuclear meltdown during the Democratic National Convention last week with some truly embarrassing unprofessional displays: Olbermann sniping at Scarborough, who sniped at Shuster, coming full circle with Chris Matthews butting heads again with Olbermann -- all on the level of the classic schoolyard taunt, "I know you are, but what am I?" Hug it out, guys, will ya? And grow up. We need a return to basic standards of professionalism, decency, and yes, even altruism if our profession is to survive. So I'm glad Obama has included that, even if he's uncharacteristically a bit short on specifics on that issue.

Finally, while both McCain and Obama favor more accountability and transparency in government, Obama offers more than just vague rhetoric. He provides a detailed plan for a degree of openness that is nothing short of astonishing. Live public Internet feeds as various agencies debate critical policy issues? Requiring Cabinet officials to hold periodic town meetings to answer the public's questions about issues of the day? Giving the public a chance to review and comment on the White House Website for five days before signing any non-emergency legislation? Broad use of federal blogs, wikis, and other online tools? Wow. Oh, and scientists should find this encouraging: Obama wants to restore "the basic principle that government decisions should be based on the best available, scientifically valid evidence and not on the ideological predispositions of agency officials."

In a Nutshell.

In short, Obama offers a comprehensive, sweeping plan to bring the government, the health care industry, the media, and all Americans boldly into the 21st century, while McCain is -- well, learning how to send an email and conduct his very first Google search. His age is no excuse; my parents are around his age, and they've both been online for years. Heck, my mom even has a Facebook account. The charge that McCain is out of touch with the 21st century Internet technology that is increasingly shaping our culture and national discourse is a valid one. He clearly lacks a well-defined vision for tapping into the vast potential of Web 2.0 and beyond.

Even more damning points against McCain: he notoriously flip-flopped on the abortion issue, and now is opposed to stem cell research. Obama supports stem cell research. Plus, McCain's shiny new VP pick, Sarah Palin, is a far-right social conservative, global warming denialist, anti-choice advocate, (and is thus anti-stem cell research), plus she supports teaching creationism in public schools (via the "teach the controversy" strategy). If McCain thinks he can co-opt Obama's message on the need for change by calling it "reform," he's got his work cut out for him. Reform isn't change; it's business as usual with a fresh new coat of paint to hide the rotting wood underneath. With Palin at his side, and a party platform filled with ideological rhetoric so stale it's developing icky green moldy bits around the edges, he's offering a change, all right -- all the way back to the late 1980s. (Cue chorus: "And that's not change we can believe in!")

Honestly? Regardless of how McCain answers (if he answers) the questions from Science Debate 2008, his selection of Palin pretty much makes it impossible for anyone who values the science and technology enterprise to vote for him. I've got nothing against Ms. Palin as a person. I could care less about the tawdry family squabble that has her under investigation back home in Alaska, and like Obama, I think her teenaged daughter's just-announced pregnancy should be off-limits in this campaign. I object to her solely on the basis of her policies, particularly given McCain's advanced age. And while it's nice to see a woman in that position, it's not unprecedented: the Dems had a female VP candidate in the 1980s.

As so many have observed, Palin's selection is a bold move, a bit of a wild gamble, and it might even pay off in the short term, despite being an obvious gimmick. It's a close election, and all McCain has to do is pick up more votes than he loses with his controversial pick. But to paraphrase Scripture, "What does it profit a man to gain the whole world, if he loses his soul?" This is not the McCain we once knew. That McCain would have told the Rove Squad to go f%$& themselves, and picked the running mate he wanted (Lieberman). That he didn't, tells me he's a slave to the GOP Machine now, potentially sacrificing the long-term interests of our nation to win an election -- McCain 2000 would have found this unthinkable. How can we trust him to stand up to special interest groups in the White House if he can't even do it in his own campaign? It might explain why his campaign thus far has been curiously lacking in his characteristic energy and passion; either that, or he's been replaced by one of the Pod People. (John McCain: The Stepford Candidate.) It actually breaks my heart a little, to see the once-proud Maverick so bound and chained.

A Defining Moment.

McCain's choice of Palin certainly proved an effective strategy in one respect: drawing attention away from Obama's electrifying acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention (full text here). And that's too bad, because -- whether he wins or loses come November -- his are words that will echo down through history as a defining moment in our national politics. Consider this:

"These are the policies I will pursue. And in the weeks ahead, I look forward to debating them with John McCain. But what I will not do is suggest that the senator takes his positions for political purposes, because one of the things that we have to change in our politics is the idea that people cannot disagree without challenging each other's character and each other's patriotism. The times are too serious, the stakes are too high for this same partisan playbook. So let us agree that patriotism has no party. I love this country, and so do you, and so does John McCain."

Or this:

"America, our work will not be easy. The challenges we face require tough choices. And Democrats, as well as Republicans, will need to cast off the worn-out ideas and politics of the past, for part of what has been lost these past eight years can't just be measured by lost wages or bigger trade deficits. What has also been lost is our sense of common purpose, and that's what we have to restore."

And finally, this:

"If you don't have any fresh ideas, then you use stale tactics to scare voters. If you don't have a record to run on, then you paint your opponent as someone people should run from. You make a big election about small things. And you know what? It's worked before, because it feeds into the cynicism we all have about government. When Washington doesn't work, all its promises seem empty. If your hopes have been dashed again and again, then it's best to stop hoping and settle for what you already know.... But I stand before you tonight because all across American something is stirring."

That's the kind of soaring rhetoric you get to hear maybe once a generation, at best. You don't have to agree 100% with him on each and every issue to know that Obama is the real deal: a true leader, capable of igniting a spark of hope in people who've given up on their ability to make any kind of difference in this country's governance -- people like me, who rarely dare to hope because we've been crushed so many times in the past. Mostly, we hope the person elected president isn't too terribly awful, and at least marginally competent, so we can go about our lives with minimal interference from Uncle Sam.

Obama is right: something is stirring. The jaw-dropping failures and gross incompetence of the Bush Administration changed everything. People like me can't afford to stand on the sidelines any longer; we need to stand up and fight for it if we want our country back. That said, Obama is a politician, not the Messiah, and very much a human being. He'll disappoint folks eventually -- his vote on the FISA bill was very disappointing (and against his own stated policies). Even sincere campaign promises don't necessarily translate into concrete action -- not right away -- and he's inheriting a godawful mess from Dubya. Realistically, Obama probably won't be able to accomplish very much on his ambitious policy agenda until the economy rebounds and we stop hemhorraging funds on the Iraq war. Real change takes time, a bit of compromise here and there, an exhausting amount of effort -- and an inspiring leader to boost flagging spirits when the going gets rough.

Honestly? This election shouldn't even be close, at least among moderates and independents. (The partisan extremes will never budge from their respective positions.) Obama should win in a blowout, except he's black, and he has a funny, foreign-sounding name. Anyone who thinks race isn't an issue in this election is deluding him/herself, just as sexism most definitely played a role in Hillary Clinton's primary campaign. We are not always aware of our own partisan biases and gender/racial prejudices -- in fact, we are hard-wired to view ourselves in the most flattering light possible -- but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try to see past them.

I'm reminded of the climactic scene in A Time To Kill, in which Matthew McConaughey's character, a white small-town Southern lawyer named Jake, is defending a black father for killing the white men who raped his 11-year-old daughter. The odds of acquittal, frankly, are not good; the father gunned down the rapists in a public courthouse, in plain view of dozens of witnesses, and wounded a (white) policeman in the bargain. He's facing a hanging jury. So Jake asks the jury to picture that little girl on that fateful day, visualize her innocence, how horribly she was violated and left to die, and how her life was irrevocably changed in just a few terrifying minutes. Then he pauses, and delivers the coup de grace: "Now imagine... that she's white."

Okay, it's just a movie, and I would never advocate vigilante justice. But I wish those people who smear Obama on comment threads (there are some truly ugly ones on the Internet) and via mass emails, those who call him "elitist" and "presumptuous" (make no mistake, that is code for "uppity ni***er"), those who think he's a closet Muslim in league with terrorists just because his background is multicultural, his middle name is "Hussein" and his last name rhymes with "Osama" -- I wish all those people would take the time to listen to what Obama is actually saying, while picturing him as if he were white, Republican, Independent, blue-collar Democrat, or however they self-identify, instead of some scary Other. Because he is "one of us." He is the face of 21st century America. Get used to it.

imagine that

Those of you who have a vested interest in the bipartisan efforts to stage a Science Debate 2008 among the presidential hopefuls might also be interested in perusing the new online "Campaign 2008" elections Website at Physics Today. Launched yesterday afternoon, it's described as "a comprehensive source of information about the positions of the presidential candidates on science, technology, and energy issues," and includes not just official position statements, but also news articles, media interviews and other relevant commentary. The plan is to update it continually throughout the year. As I've said before, it matters not whether you're Democrat, Republican, Independent, Libertarian, or a member of a special interest group like the Standing in the Back of the Room Dressed Stupidly and Looking Stupid Party (Blackadder fans will grok the reference). What's important is recognizing that it's vital for our next president to recognize the importance of science in shaping national (and international) policy, and to respect scientific expertise. Consider this most recent statement by Republican hopeful Mike Huckabee currently resounding through the blogosphere:

"I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution," Huckabeee told a Michigan audience on Monday. "But I believe it's a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living god. And that's what we need to do -- amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards rather than try to change Gods standards so it lines up with some contemporary view."

Fortunately for the country, Michigan voters didn't buy it -- or rather, only about 31% of them did. ("Thirty-one percent? Who are those people?" Jen-Luc Piquant marvels in disbelief.) Here's a radical thought for Mr. Huckabee: why not respect the American tradition of the separation of church and state and leave the Constitution the hell alone? Render under Caesar that which is Caesar's, and unto God that which is God's. The Constitution was never intended as a means of legislating morality or a particular religious credo; anyone who claims otherwise is deluded, misinformed, or deliberately prevaricating. And anyone who thinks Huckabee wouldn't bring this same attitude to science -- "I think we should amend the science so it's in line with God's standards as outlined in the Holy Bible, rather than let science describe how the world actually works" -- isn't thinking very clearly on the matter either. 

We've had nearly eight long years of abject contempt for science (and scientists) in the White House; we don't need more of the same. Look at all the altered reports attempting to deny the reality of global warming, in the face of a vast scientific consensus on the issue. Still not entirely convinced? How about the recently approved Omnibus spending bill that so decimates the budget for science in general (and physics in particular) that major physics facilities such as SLAC and Fermilab are cutting short operating runs and planning for massive layoffs? (The Quantum Pontiff urges us to take action on that.)

And then there's yesterday's breaking news that Bush, in his wisdom, has decided he knows better than the US judiciary system what course to take on sonar testing by the US Navy (the link is to my own post last week on this topic; James H. at the Island of Doubt has more). Since the courts were consistently ruling in favor of environmental groups, he simply went outside the courts and decided that the Navy doesn't have to comply with federal environmental regulations. "National security" has become his catch-all excuse for trampling all over the rule of law. No more, people! Let's pay attention to what really matters this election, instead of which candidate has the best hair. Or whatever. We're very much in danger of being left behind by the rest of the developed world in terms of cutting-edge science and technology. 

Okay, I'm off my ranting soapbox now. You can come back. Don't be afraid. Here's some good news. Yesterday the Spousal Unit and I attended a "conversation" with Alan Alda -- actor extraordinaire, and longtime friend of science -- hosted by K.C. Cole in the University of Southern California's Bing Auditorium, as part of the "Visions and Voices" series featured by the Annenberg School for Communication. Alda is a genial, highly intelligent man, the more so because he's smart enough to admit when he doesn't know something. Apparently this is self-knowledge hard-won: he told a very entertaining anecdote of an early taping as host for Scientific American Frontiers. He'd done exhaustive preparation in advance to avoid looking foolish, and after the interview (with Carl Sagan), he was feeling pretty chuffed at how well it had gone. Then the director sat down with him over coffee and asked, "So... why are you trying to act smart?" Alda quickly embraced my own personal motto as a science writer: Dare To Be Stupid! That is, don't be afraid to ask dumb, obvious questions. Let the scientists be smart.

There's a more practical reason for this approach, namely, that you get more accessible, more human answers out of scientists when you focus on the most simple, basic questions. It's so easy for someone with that much expertise to assume a level of background knowledge in his/her listeners that simply isn't there, and asking obvious questions is a useful reminder to keep the level simple enough for non-scientists to grasp the concepts. Another problem we're all too familiar with is the tendency of scientists to lapse into "lecture mode" rather than having an actual conversation with their listeners. It's that tendency that inspired this Walt Whitman poem (which Alda read aloud during the event):

When I heard the learn'd astronomer,

When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me,

When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them,

When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,

How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,

Till rising and gliding out I wander'd off by myself,

In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,

Look'd up in perfect silence at the stars.

A product of his era, Whitman clearly bought into the Romantic notion that scientists made the mysteries of Nature all dry and boring by reducing everything to a stultifying quantification. As Alda phrased it, the Romantics "liked daffodils, but they didn't want to know too much about how those daffodils actually worked." Anyone who's spent significant time around scientists, however, knows that their sense of wonder is very much intact: they're just not always effective at communicating the joy and enthusiasm they find in their work. Like his hero Richard Feynman (and also like me, for that matter), Alda knows that "scientific knowledge only adds to the beauty and mystery of nature." It doesn't lessen it. In fact, as K.C. observed, poetry shares some common ground with science in its emphasis on reductionism: distilling a complex situation (or metaphor) down to only what is most essential. (That said, Alda admitted that he'd rather cross a bridge designed and built by a structural engineer than a poet with a gift for metaphor -- although "an engineer who also had a gift for metaphor would build a really interesting bridge.")

But how to bring out the "true voices" of scientists so that they can "show the love" to a broader audience? Alda adopted a truly innovative approach: the day before yesterday's event, he visited  with the engineering students and had them in engage in various improvisational exercises commonly used in drama classes. The results (as described more fully here): their presentations showed a vast improvement in terms of bringing out their passion for their subjects.  Of course, as I mentioned to the Spousal Unit afterwards, while being open about one's enthusiasm is a terrific start, it's not automatically sufficient. I've heard more than one scientist speak who was clearly thrilled about the research in question, yet as far as the non-scientists listening were concerned, might as well have been speaking in tongues.

I especially liked Alda's description of science as a form of "play" -- not in the sense of not taking one's research seriously, but a sort of looseness in one's approach that enables the scientist to think outside the box, outside rigid boundaries, explore avenues that might seem silly or unpromising -- all part of the creative process of imagination that informs both brilliant scientists and brilliant artists, poets, actors, etc. By letting the avenues of inquiry unfold non-linearly (so to speak), you can find yourself discovering unexpected breakthrough insights. Everyone can benefit from a fresh perspective on an intractable problem. That's what writing this blog does for me: it enables me to "play" with scientific ideas, make odd connections, try out new analogies or metaphors or approaches for making science accessible, and also to sift through my own attitudes and opinions on various issues. Some of the posts might seem silly, many are overlong, and more than a little rambling, but it's all part of my process. And hopefully my readers get some benefits, too.

Feynman was the epitome of a physicist with a strong sense of play -- one of the reasons Alda admires him so much, and why Feynman remains one of the most-loved physicists in history. How could you not be just a little charmed by a guy who taught himself safe-cracking and picked the locks of top-security vaults while at Los Alamos in the 1940s, who dabbled in painting, nudism, and playing the bongo drums, and who sometimes worked on equations in strip clubs?

One of Alda's favorite stories is the anecdote of the plate. Feynman went through a period of depression after the successful Trinity Test and the death of his first wife, Arlene -- so much so that it affected his research as a young professor at Cornell. One day, he was in the Cornell cafeteria when a student prankishly tossed a plate in the air -- one decorated with the university's signature red medallion seal on the rim. As the plate went up, Feynman saw it wobble. He saw the red medallion spinning around. The wobble was faster than the spin! Intrigued, Feynman went home and calculated the exact ratio between the two, and found that when the plate is angled very slightly, its wobble will be twice as fast as its spin. He shared this "discovery" with one of his stuffier colleagues who asked what the point of the exercise had been. "It has no importance -- it's just for fun!' Feynman exclaimed. And much like writing the odd blog post or free write unclogs my writer's block, he found himself tackling his bona fide research with renewed enthusiasm and vigor.

We don't need more clones of Feynman, but we certainly need more physicists who openly embrace their sense of play. While I was writing The Physics of the Buffyverse, I benefited greatly from a handful of physicists who weren't too embarrassed to apply their expertise to the occasional silly premise from a TV show about vampires. For instance, I'd ask a pal to crunch some numbers to figure out how hard Angel would hit the pavement after being thrown out the window of an office high rise, or how many kilowatt hours of energy you'd need to create sufficient mass to turn Mayor Wilkins into a giant snake-demon. One materials scientist (and fellow Buffy fan) spent part of his Thanksgiving weekend determining whether the piezoelectric properties of certain varieties of wood might be sufficient to spark-cut a hole in an uber-vampire's breastplate armor, as well as investigating the viscoelastic properties of raw cookie dough with his wife's assistance. Silly? Yes. But also fun. Sometimes it helps to lighten up a little. We're very fortunate to have people like Alda working tirelessly to bridge the communication gap between scientists and the general public.

a matter of debate

It's been a really bad year (or seven) for science and technology policy, and not just from a funding angle. Science lies at the heart of some of the most critical issues facing our nation -- in fact, the world -- today, and yet scientific expertise is sadly lacking in the corridors of Congress and in the White House. It took decades for our government to wake up to the realities of global warming, for instance, and despite the broad global scientific consensus on this issue, our energy policy is only now beginning to fully reflect the need for finding renewable alternatives to fossil fuels. We're falling way behind other countries in stem cell research, which has been shamelessly politicized by extreme right-wing sorts who are wildly ignorant of what, exactly, stem cells are, and how they're actually being used by scientists, yet still feel free to fuel the flames of public hysteria with their uninformed diatribes.

That's just two of the most obvious examples. Major policy decisions are being made every week in Washington by politicians who either don't know, or don't care (and sometimes both) about the scientific underpinnings of their decisions, and therefore remain (willfully) ignorant of any potential consequences. Our tax dollars pay their salaries, and personally, I don't think it's unreasonable to expect them to do their jobs -- which includes making well-informed policy decisions about what is best for the country, based on the best possible evidence. Yet instead of informed decision-making, we have people like Alaska Senator Ted Stevens, who last year infamously described the Internet as "a series of tubes," while pontificating on the issue of "net neutrality," in the process revealing an appalling ignorance of the most basic aspects of the Internet.

There used to be an Office of Technology Assessment to advise Congress on such matters, but that was disbanded in 1995, and Congress has been pretty much flying blind ever since. As for the White House -- sure, there's a presidential science adviser, but in the Bush Administration, that position has been relegated to being largely ceremonial. For all we know, current PSA Jack Marburger is giving perfectly sound advice to the president behind closed doors, but it's obviously not being followed. In fact, the White House has a nasty habit of actually altering any reports it receives where the scientific consensus is at odds with what the administration wants to do. Because, as Stephen Colbert has observed, "Reality has a well-known liberal bias!" Can't have that! Not in a conservative White House! Scientific facts be damned! (Jen-Luc Piquant reminds me that Colbert hilariously skewered this tendency to unnecessarily politicize science this past April, when he declared that Einstein's relativity was simply "science's way of flip-flopping. Space or time? Mass or energy? Which is it? Pick a side!")

This state of affairs can't continue indefinitely, and change starts at the top: i.e., the President. It's crucially important that the next occupant of the Oval Office -- regardless of his or her political party affiliation -- have some smidgen of scientific understanding, or at the very least a healthy respect for the scientific method (and critical thinking in general). So I was pleased when Chris Mooney emailed me over the weekend with news of a new coalition he's set up with his Intersection co-blogger, Sheril, calling for a science-themed debate among the presidential candidates in 2008. The Website describes it as "a grassroots initiative spearheaded by a growing number of scientists and other concerned citizens." This is the call to arms:

"Given the many urgent scientific and technological challenges facing America and the rest of the world, the increasing need for accurate scientific information in political decision making, and the vital role scientific innovation plays in spurring economic growth and competitiveness, we, the undersigned, call for a public debate in which the U.S. presidential candidates share their views on the issues of The Environment, Medicine and Health, and Science and Technology Policy."

Chris and Sheril have recruited some heavy hitters to the cause already, including several "Nobel Laureates and other leading scientists, presidents of universities, congresspersons of both major political parties, business leaders, religious leaders, former presidential science advisors, the editors of America's major science journals, writers, and the current and several past presidents of the American Association for the Advancement of Science." There's also a growing coalition of bloggers. Case Western physicist (and coalition board member) Lawrence Krauss has an Op-Ed on the topic in the Wall Street Journal, which you can also read it here now. Needless to say, the Cocktail Party is fully on board -- because we're as sick of sound science being ignored or twisted for political ends as everyone else. C'mon, join the bandwagon and demand a science-oriented debate!

Anyway, the announcement reminded me that I've been meaning to write about a terrific book I read on my honeymoon: Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me!), by social psychologists Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson. We met Tavris back in August, when the Spousal Unit participated in a Categorically Not! event in Santa Monica. The theme was "mistakes," so it was an ideal forum for Tavris to discuss the book, whose subtitle is "Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts." Not surprisingly, the co-authors maintain that human rationalization is a very powerful thing -- and also very natural behavior. We all do it instinctively; the more self-aware among us occasionally recognize that fact, and even more rarely, we cop to it. One of my favorite scenes from The Big Chill is when Jeff Goldblum's (somewhat neurotic) character declares that rationalizations are more important than sex. When one of his pals expresses skepticism ("C'mon, nothing's more important than sex!"), he ripostes, "Have you ever tried going an entire day without a single rationalization?"

It all comes down to cognitive dissonance: that internal conflict that ensues whenever we find ourselves holding two conflicting beliefs, or acting against our own professed beliefs -- you know, like Larry Craig campaigning against gay rights while secretly indulging in illicit liaisons with men. We all have an innate need to maintain a positive self-regard, per Tavris and Aronson. So, faced with this sort of internal contradiction, the human brain seeks to reduce the dissonance as quickly as possible. We are capable of jumping through quite a few implausible semantic hoops ("I have a wide stance") to convince ourselves that our actions, or beliefs, are entirely justified. (That doesn't mean we necessarily convince anyone else; it's much easier to spot these patterns in other people.) That's why it's extremely rare for someone to hear an opposing argument to a cherished belief, and change their mind -- or to hear a politician publicly admit they've made a mistake. (There's evidence this phenomenon might not be limited to just humans. According to this November 6 article in the New York Times by John Tierney (h/t: 3 Quarks Daily), a group of Yale researchers has reported finding the first evidence of cognitive dissonance in capuchin monkeys.)

What I found interesting, listening to Tavris speak, is that this tendency is actually a kind of survival mechanism to help the human brain cope with enormous amounts of incoming -- and often confusing or contradictory -- data. It can be useful in helping us make decisions, such as what kind of car to buy -- there's a huge number of options, so we've got to winnow down the playing field somehow. But once we've made that decision and committed ourselves, an interesting thing happens: we have to justify that decision. That car becomes the best possible choice we could have made, and if, after we make the purchase, we encounter some negative information about it, chances are, we'll block it out. And we'll keep blocking out negative information; if challenged, we'll become belligerent and defensive about our choice. The more zealous among us might feel compelled to condemn anyone else who didn't choose the same model of car we did.

Sound familiar? It should. (Personally, I found myself hanging my head in shame upon reading a couple of the passages in the book detailing mistakes I've definitely made in the past.) It doesn't just apply to consumer products, either. The more we have invested in our product, or opinion, of choice, the more fiercely we will defend it, and the more we will refuse to consider any evidence to the contrary. We only notice or embrace those things that confirm our biases. What started out as a strength becomes a serious shortcoming. Our biases blind us to our mistakes even as we vehemently deny that we have them. And if we are blind to our mistakes, we can't correct them, or learn from them, so we end up repeating those same mistakes, over and over again.

Heck, we're even blind to our biases. Tavris told a compelling story about visiting the Museum of Tolerance here in LA, which can only be entered through one of two doors, side by side: one marked "Prejudiced," and one marked "Unprejudiced." Only the former actually opens and leads into the museum, since the point is that we all have ingrained biases. Yet, when she visited, Tavris witnessed a group of Hasidic Jews, angrily pounding on the "Unprejudiced" door demanding to be let in. And this was after watching a preliminary video presentation in the foyer emphasizing that we are all, in  one way or another, prejudiced.

There was a controversial study in neuroscience back in September that caused quite a stir in the scientific blogosphere, since it concluded that those darned left-wing liberals were slightly more open-minded and willing to consider opposing points of view than their right-wing conservative counterparts. In actuality, the way Tavris tells it, this whole process of using rationalization and confirmation bias to decrease cognitive dissonance is kinda hard-wired into human cognition, and has little to do with political preference. I certainly know my share of liberal-leaning folks who are just as rigid and unyielding in their opinions and beliefs as the most extreme conservatives.

Tavris cited separate studies that found that test subjects of either political orientation rejected negative information about their favored candidate or party. For instance, if they read two articles -- one that verified their opinions, and one that challenged them -- they would invariably deem the former a competent, well-written piece, while finding all kinds of nitpicky faults with the article that challenged their opinions. The entire blogosphere runs on this kind of thing, which is why I try to read a smattering of blogs across the political spectrum (within reason, of course -- there's absolutely no excuse for the likes of Matt Drudge or WorldNut Daily). Apparently, this built-in selectivity has something to do with the "reward" center of the brain; the fMRIs showed an increase in activity in those areas whenever the subjects encountered information confirming their preset opinions.

So, are we all just helpless pawns to our own cognitive conditioning, doomed to refuse to consider other views, change our minds, or admit mistakes, thereby ensuring that we never learn or evolve? Tavris says no, pointing out that the scientific method is the best defense against our all-too human tendency to self-justify. Which is not to say that scientists don't sometimes fall victim to this as well. They do. Scientists are human, after all. It's just that the very nature of the scientific method forces one to set aside, as much as possible, our deeply ingrained biases or preconceptions and consider what the actual evidence is telling us -- even if we don't much like what we're hearing. For instance, plenty of physicists in the 1920s were unhappy with the inescapable conclusions of modern quantum physics, yet ultimately, they trusted the evidence... even if they didn't like it.

That's why we need more "science-minded" leaders in both Congress and the White House (and on the Supreme Court, for that matter): people who are sufficiently aware of their own capacity for bias, self-delusion and justification that they actively take steps to counter it. And the best defense, per Travis, is learning to think more like a scientist.