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About Bonny P McClain
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Blog postAs much as I tried to thwart video-gaming in my household -- I was not successful. An upside to the pull of gaming was the impact it had on creative efforts to keep them both engaged. We traveled to the beach where games have always been verboten--hard to argue with the impracticality of lugging large computers onto a ferry or suggested family activities to offer alternatives to single-player games even while engaged with friends remotely.
But alas, here we are. Even old analogs lik -
Blog postEverybody wants to skip ahead to the fun bits. Think data visualization. I bet most of you are not interested in the workflow of formulating the question, finding the data, and cleaning what remains. I reach this conclusion by my own n of 1 experience teaching dozens of workshops but I also read your books. I know, I know, it's the eye catching images that sell. Edward O. Wilson, famed Harvard professor
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Blog postThe monotony and solitude of a quiet life stimulates the creative mind--Albert EinsteinI didn’t pick the biggest spot for my home office. I wanted a cozy coveted space that I could command and protect. I remember watching my youngest son, liberated from his crib on the floor above, instinctually crawl down the hall and toward my office. If when he peered inside, the room was empty he would sit in quiet contemplation and try and solve the puzzle.
Over the years I have added a dog bed -
Blog postThe free sharing and teaching of open source is incompatible with the notion of the solitary genius
Golan Levin ( Artist)Are you on Clubhouse? I joke that someone left a door open in the hallway and I wandered in. I like the breaks from the computer screen where you can simply engage through your phone. Think of it like a podcast style conversation. Data + AI hosts a room, Data Geek Weekly. This past room was right up my alley.
The panel discussed social (structural) determin -
Blog postThe practice of leaving bread on the hook is a beautiful Turkish tradition called, askida ekmek. You buy a loaf for you and an extra loaf that is hung on a hook. When someone in need enters the shop, they are gifted the donated loaf.
This reminds me of my work as a data analyst. We serve our clients while simultaneously giving back to our data community through either mentorship, collaboration, or teaching insights learned along the way. -
Blog post“It is easy in the world to live after the world's opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.” -- Ralph Waldo Emerson “I am an introverted extrovert”. I hear this claim quite often in this era of solitude, Zoom, and whispered declarations. Maybe it's one of those things you comprehend if you also share this archetype. The way I see it--I want to be alone--unless th
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Blog postIt should come as no surprise that what you see is not determined solely by the patterns of light that fall upon your retinae. Indeed, that visual perception is more than meets the eye has been understood for centuries, and there are several extraretinal factors known to interact with the incoming sensory data to yield perceptual experience. Perhaps foremost among these factors is information learned from our prior encounters with the visual world—our memories—which enables us to i
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Blog postI have been spending unsupervised time with my thoughts. It sounds noble but I assure you, it is completely involuntary. As far as sleep goes if you know me you know that around 9 p.m. I am already heading upstairs to begin my post-menopausal moon salutations.
I do an abysmally short--some may say neglectful--skin care routine of washing my face. I can’t moisturize at night because apparently my face dreams it is a teenager and invites acne to the party. Next, there is a truncated r -
Blog postReductionism might seem a little hoity toity at first glance but you might be surprised how elegantly it applies to not only the brain and art but to data visualization in general.
The Matisse on the right, “The Snail”, uses swirling color blocks to mimic the swirl or pattern of a snail shell.
This only works if we have seen a snail shell, and our brain knows to compare this image to images stored in our memory. Reductionism -
Blog postThe full blog is here on data & donuts but there are sufficient followers receiving these posts that might miss out.
There are 46 million Americans with Alzheimer's disease in their brain right now, but no symptoms. --Richard Isaacson
I have two blogs. One is sort of a repository for information. I don’t pay for that one and at times I think it may have run its course but then I think of something else I want to park over there. The name of it is Alzheimer’s Di -
Blog postI simply don’t enjoy the remote bits as much as I thought I would. Following a series of Zoomy webinar formats (for scheduled speaking events) I felt hollow. Although I request attendees be allowed to raise hands and leave their video and mics live--not one host has acquiesced. Interactivity is paramount to engaging with your data or your data questions no?
Maybe you don’t realize how weird it is but basically you are talking to your own face for 45 minutes to an hour. Narrative sto -
Blog postI teach people how to formulate a data question and the downstream ramifications and skills aligned with collecting, tidying, analyzing, and communicating the ensuing narrative. What we measure is a choice, which reflects implicitly our value system--Measuring What Counts The Global Movement for Well-Being I repeat the description of my role in the diverse health ecosystem because it evolves along with everything else. As an avid reader, I am intrigued by the depth of resources freely availabl
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Blog postWe seem to be forgetting what the science tells us. Perhaps it's the giddy enthusiasm or hope associated with being the first one to break the curse of an Alzheimer's disease cure. But let me remind you, we are not able to diagnose Alzheimer's disease. Not yet. We can speak in probabilities, probable Alzheimer's is as close as we can go. Yes there are biomarkers and brain tissue biopsies but if we don't know the causative pathway--what are we measuring exactly?
Fortune magazine earl -
Blog postI still dramatically arch an eyebrow when cures or proclamations in general are made about Alzheimer's disease. But when Peter Attia, MD weighs in--he has my attention. I am confident that you are able to Google with the best of them so hope you will do your due diligence and appreciate the insights and appropriate level of granularity he is able to deliver. I mention him here and here if you are short on time.
The Peter Attia Drive podcast with Richard Isaacson, MD is long and in d -
Blog postThere is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world--Carl Sagan The similarities between space travel to Mars and the latest attempts to discover a blockbuster monotherapeutic cure for Alzheimer's disease are (or should be) self evident.
On the space exploration frontier get those check books out to the tune of ~ 19 billion dollars. Can you even imagine what we could do to mitigate the environmental challenges here -
Blog postA few years ago I was looking for data. Not a strange occupation as I make my living as a data informed analyst and medical writer. But I always felt there had to be something driving the increase in chronic diseases in the general population. Not only the upward climb in reported rates of dementia but across the board. It seemed there was something. I thought maybe food policy was to blame. There are a lot of potential correlations to be examined. Why isn't this a larger priority?
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Blog postWhat is going on here? A well-funded "volunteer" non-profit should do better. What is race a placeholder for? I am certain they know that risk is not determined by pigment. If there are social determinants of health--give them voice. If there are biologic measures, name them.
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Blog postThe news that Pfizer is re-allocating budget away from Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease is newsworthy. It is likely a smart move. The complexity of chronic metabolic derangement in older age combined with potential discoveries of mysterious lymphatic systems hidden within the dura mater should point to "innovation" away from a monotherapeutic cure. It is not sufficient, he argues, to simply collect and store massive amounts of data; they must be intelligently curated, and th
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Blog postEveryone is hurling content over the pay-wall. In a time when we should be diffusing knowledge, the monetization beckons and many move deeper into their echo chamber.
That is why my favorite read has been QuantaMagazine. Light-Triggered Genes Reveal the Hidden Workings of Memory saved my morning.I am a big Systems Thinker and you should be too. The cost of being a one-dimensional thinker plays out in the latest R&D efforts in Alzheimer's disease. Believe it or not--we are s -
Blog postBill Gates is making a bold move. I like his commitment--both financial and personal as well as his search for " a lot of ideas." I hope he hasn't spent the last year in the R&D drug focused echo-chamber because if he has, my enthusiasm will wane--quickly. "You have a nearly 50 percent chance of developing the disease if you live into your mid-80s. In the United States, it is the only cause of death in the top 10 without any meaningful treatments that becomes mo
Titles By Bonny P McClain
Continuing Medical Education: What to do when good outcomes go bad (Content Media & Analytics Book 3)
Feb 15, 2016
$2.99
Other Formats:
Paperback
5 Sources for the Right Healthcare Data: Bigger isn't Always Better (Content Media and Analytics Book 1)
Apr 28, 2015
$7.99
Other Formats:
Paperback
