Customer Reviews

What Scientists Actually Do

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A great book for anyone who has ever watched the Discovery channel and shows like How it's Made, Dirty Jobs, or Mythbusters. Joan Horvath talks to scientists from all walks of life and gets a variety of views on what is a scientist, what do they do, and the sometimes strange paths that lead to a career in science. The best part of the book is the second half, which concentrates on how to tell good science from bad and the ways in which science can be twisted by advocates of a particular position (global warming, endangered species) or misunderstood by the media (genetically modified organisms). A quick, fun read that makes its points very well!

For me, this book strayed from its main topic and its promise. I was expecting some good contemporary case studies and perhaps a framework for understanding the variety and distribution of current scientific activity. There were some case studies (which I appreciated), but the author also used many pages to discuss other "science" topics (e.g. scientific method, science vs. science fiction, religion vs. science, and public perceptions of science). I didn't buy the book to learn about these topics, and I also felt that they were treated so lightly that I did not learn much. Maybe the next version of this book could provide more and deeper case studies and comparisons that would add meat and texture to our knowledge of what scientists do. I would be particularly interested to know more about the hierarchical differentiation of scientific activity (for example, what do graduate students typically do, what post docs typically do, what do lab directors typically do, and who decides what projects get funded).