Scientists do "story selection" all the time, though they may be
reluctant to admit it. They (we) select the hypotheses to be tested,
then select the subjects, data to be collected, field and analytical
methods, presentation methods, etc. It's not much different than what
documentary filmmakers or journalists do. All are choices driven by the
need to make the best use of the medium you are communicating in.
Scientists shouldn't be so blind to the "subjectivity" that goes into
their work. Such blindness, as we have seen in the scientific
controversy over the past few years, has helped feed the erosion of
credibility that many institutions in our society have felt.
Dave
On 9/26/2010 10:43 AM, William Silvert wrote:
This is a very distorted response to CL's posting. The fact that Nick
had a story to tell does not mean that it was only for entertainment.
If I were making nature films the story I would want to tell is what I
as an ecologist think is going on in nature rather than what is easy
to photograph. For example, CL writes "Nick even managed to film
behavior that was suspected but not yet observed." which I suspect
meant filming actions that were scientifically significant but not
very evident.
An example of what I have in mind is films of whale corpses in deep
water being degraded by hagfish and other detritivores. The process of
recycling dead animals is very important, but ugly and often hard to
film. Coming upon a dead whale on the seabed would be a rare event
indeed, and I assume that to make these films they find a dead whale
that has washed up on shore and tow it out to sea for the filming.
Purists might cmplain that this is fakery, but I would call it
deciding what story deserves to be told and manipulating nature to
tell it. Entertaining? Not necessarily.
Bill Silvert
----- Original Message ----- From: "Warren W. Aney" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: domingo, 26 de Setembro de 2010 6:46
Subject: Re: [ECOLOG-L] Naturefaking in media
This is a good, explanatory message. However, the most telling line
in this
message is "Nick... [was]always filming in a way most likely to get
the shot
for the story he was trying to tell." This describes the difference
between
entertainment (the story the person filming wants to tell) vs. science
(recording the story the subject is telling).
Warren W. Aney
Senior Wildife Ecologist
Tigard, Oregon
--
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"No trespassing
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