The Language of Science

Carol Reeves

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2005
• ISBN:
  9781134280179
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Linguistics
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

The communication of scientific principles is becoming increasingly important in a world that relies on technology. Exploring the use of scientific language in the news and examining how important scientific ideas are reported and communicated, this title in the Intertext series takes a look at the use and misuse of scientific language and how it shapes our lives.

The Language of Science:

• explores the goals of, and problems with, scientific language and terminology
• demonstrates the power and misuse of scientific discourse in the media
• examines the special qualities of scientific communication
• explores how science and popular culture interact
• is illustrated with a wide range of examples from the MMR vaccine to AIDS and the biological weapons debate, and includes a glossary as well as ideas for further reading.

This practical book is ideal for post-16 to undergraduate students in English Language, Linguistics, Journalism, Communications Studies or Science Communication.

Discourse and facts

As we know from Working with Texts (238, 291–2), the term ‘discourse’ refers to the system of rules for language use that evolve in a community, whether by conscious choice or through cultural and other forces. ‘Discourse’ also refers to the patterns of language that can be identified as bound to a particular community and context. We can talk of ‘scientific discourse’ as the general language of science, the patterns of rule-governed language used among scientists.

All language is rule-governed. That is, when we speak or write, we must follow rules guiding pronunciation, word order and idiom as well as more specialized rules for communicating in a specialized community. In specialized communities, such as science, rules or conventions evolve over time, in response to new pressures and needs. Sometimes journal editors and writers make conscious decisions to change or add new rules for written communication that will ensure greater efficiency and clarity, but mostly these linguistic or discursive rules develop over time as a result of cultural norms and internal and external pressures. For example, the experimental article has shortened, become more technical and lost the narrative or ‘storytelling’ voice of its earliest forms.

Activity

Examine the two excerpts in Texts 10 and 11. What differences do you see between them? Examine the use of pronouns, active and passive voice. In what other ways do the two passages differ?

Text 10

The first paragraph of a paper from Science, 1.2 (16 February 1883): Ira Remsen, ‘Influence of Magnetism on Chemical Action’

More than a year ago I gave an account of some experiments which I had performed with the object of determining whether magnetism exerts any influence on chemical action. I succeeded in getting what appears to me to be strong evidence in favor of the view that magnetism does, at least in one case, exert a marked influence on chemic action. The principal experiment upon which this conclusion is based may be briefly described here. A vessel made of thin iron (ferrotype-plated were used) was placed on the poles of a magnet, and a solution of sulphate of copper poured into it. Instead of getting a uniform deposit of copper on the bottom of the vessel, the metal was deposited in distinctly marked lines, the direction of which was at right angles to the lines of magnetic force. Further, directly over the poles, the deposit was uniform; and this uniform deposit was bounded by a band of no deposit, from one-sixteenth to one-eighth of an inch in width.

Text 11

From Inorganic Chemistry, 40.22 (2001): 5581–4: Tosha M. Barclay, Robin G. Hicks, Martin T. Lemaire and Laurence K. Thompson, ‘Synthesis, Structure, and Magnetism of Bimetallic Manganese or Nickel Complexes of a Bridging Verdazyl Radical’

Introduction

The design and construction of new magnetic materials from molecular components is a major contemporary theme in materials research. Among the many approaches to molecule-based magnets, hybrid materials comprised of paramagnetic metal ions and stable radicals offer several advantages. Direct metal-radical exchange interactions are possible, and the use of bridging radical-based ligands allows for the creation of extended metal-radical structures with cooperative magnetic properties. In the latter context, most work in this area has been carried out with bridging nitroxide radicals and diradicals. Complexes containing coordinated radical anions, for example, cyanocarbons such as TCNE or TCNQ or the semiquinones, have also received attention. However, the paucity of high Tc magnets in these systems highlights the continued need to explore alternative metal-radical assemblies.

We and others have recently demonstrated that judiciously substituted verdazyl radicals chelate to metals with structural features reminiscent of chelating oligopyridines. Thus, mononuclear Ni(II) and Mn(II) complexes of pyridine-substituted verdazyl 1 and related derivatives have been shown to possess strong metal-verdazyl magnetic exchange interactions, while bis(verdazyl) 2 has been incorporated into one-dimensional chains with Cu(I) halides. However, to create metal-radical assemblies with macroscopic magnetic ordering, there is a need to explore the efficacy of paramagnetic metal ions in conjunction with bridging verdazyls, in particular metal-radical exchange phenomena in bridged systems. As a first step toward creating extended arrays of transition metals and bridging verdazyls, we present herein the synthesis and characterization of two model binuclear compounds containing the bridging ligand 1,5-dimethyl-3-(4,6-dimethyl-2-pyrimidinyl)-6-oxoverdazyl radical, 3, a structural mimic of 2,2’-bipyrimidine, 4.

Commentary

Several changes in scientific discourse have occurred in the years since our first example was published. The single author is now rare since complicated laboratory work requires the collaboration of several specialists with training in specific techniques. The collaborative enterprise also leads to the loss of the first-person pronouns and active verbs seen in the earlier text. In the later piece, the plural first-person pronoun ‘We’ signals collaboration and the passive voice creates a more objective tone in contrast to the more personal and subjective tone of the earlier text. The organization of the samples is also very different. While the entire papers are not reproduced here, if you were to read them, you would find that the older text follows a narrative progression in which our scientist simply tells the story of his experiment and what he found. The modern text follows the conventions of arrangement of the experimental report that have solidified over the years. The modern experimental report is usually divided into four clear sections: introduction, methods, results and discussion.

These changes over the years in how experimental findings are reported result from a combination of forces. One is economic; a shorter, more concise paper costs a journal less money to publish and allows room for other reports. Another is cultural; the solitary storyteller or experimenter does not chime with the modern reality of collaboration as the source of scientific knowledge. In fact, the passive voice verb constructions in modern experimental papers support a cultural norm that displaces human agency, as if humans simply record, uncover, see a waiting world rather than manipulate that world to fit their presuppositions. So the experimental article is an artifice that displays science as an objective enterprise; it serves to promote and represent an objectivity that may be intended but never fully achieved, if only because scientists are human beings who must use human language to report their experiences.

THE EXPERIMENTAL REPORT IN SCIENCE

One rule-governed activity in science is the presentation of the results of scientific research. The form and style of the experimental report in science has solidified into a recognizable and repeatable genre. When scientists write papers to be published in their professional journals, they follow patterns and rules governing organization, diction and register as well as graphic and mathematical representation. The experimental report contains the following parts, all having their own complex rules about what can and cannot be said:

1 An abstract summarizes the report's main findings.

2 An introduction provides the background knowledge or general consensus in the field about what is known and unknown about the topic. It is also where writers justify their research and state their research hypothesis, which is the working idea that they either support or falsify in their experiments.

3 A methods section explains how the research was conducted.

4 A findings section summarizes the main results.

5 A discussion section offers an interpretation of the data, providing arguments in support of that interpretation.

Generally, the report follows a predictable pattern. The introduction moves from the known – what scientists agree are the facts surrounding a topic – to the unknown – what scientists need to better understand. Introductions also move from the background knowledge to a description of what the current research hopes to establish, their research purpose. The writers also explain their hypothesis, their working theory of what their research would reveal.

Here we will examine parts of a scientific research report in astronomy:

Activity

Read the abstract of this report in Text 12. What main findings are summarized?

Text 12

Abstract

In preparation for the advent of the Allen Telescope Array, the SETI Institute has the need to greatly expand its former list of ~2000 targets compiled for Project Phoenix, a search for extraterrestrial technological signals. In this paper we present a catalog of stellar systems that are potentially habitable to complex life forms (including intelligent life), which comprises the largest portion of the new SETI target list. The Catalog of Nearby Habitable Systems (HabCat) was created from the Hipparcos Catalogue by examining the information on distances, stellar variability, multiplicity, kinematics, and spectral classification for the 118,218 stars contained therein. We also make use of information from several other catalogs containing data for Hipparcos stars on X-ray luminosity, Ca ii H and K activity, rotation, spectral types, kinematics, metallicity, and Stromgren photometry. Combined with theoretical studies on habitable zones, evolutionary tracks, and third-body orbital stability, these data are used to remove unsuitable stars from HabCat, leaving a residue of stars that, to the best of our current knowledge, are potentially habitable hosts for complex life. While this catalog will no doubt need to be modified as we learn more about individual objects, the present analysis resul...

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• The Language of Science
• The Intertext series
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Itroduction
• Unit one: Language
• Unit two: Metaphor in science
• Unit three: The grammar of science
• Unit four: Discourse and facts
• Unit five: Understanding the rhetorical in science
• Unit six: Science and culture: the interaction of discourses
• Unit seven: Science and society
• Index of terms