All posts by Lora Pavlovich

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Do you have worms in your water?

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“Maybe,” answered a pair of presenters at the 10–12:00 Sunday (12/6) poster session. Samuel Berger and Lisset Duran of John Jay College of Criminal Justice looked through logs of 311 complaints about the city’s water quality. (The database saved complaint locations as coordinates [rather than as addresses or names of buildings], and going through the data proved tedious as each point had to be then put on a map.) Most of the complaints were regarding the smell of the water, which the group then further broke down by type of odor described. They also looked at the number of callers by borough, though noted that Brooklyn, Manhattan, and Queens likely had the most callers because of their greater populations. The graphs were laid out well and were clear in showing the main points of the poster.

One of the medium-level1 311 complaints, however, was of worms in people’s water. And when the group tried calling 311 to ask about said worms, the response was along the lines of “oh, that happens sometimes,” and to not worry about it. That reveal was somehow both surprising and expected, and the duo’s delivery made it even better. A key reason I enjoyed this poster so much was that the presentation was simultaneously informative and entertaining; I’d never considered the thought of worms in my water — much less encountered any — and the group did an excellent job of balancing potential squeamishness with a sense of levity. Their pitch made me laugh at times (which I appreciated), provided an insight into how the city 311 complaint system works, and overall was just really fun.

Image of poster: Do You Have Worms in Your Water?
“Do You Have Worms in Your Water?: Analysis of Water Quality Complaints from 2011–2015 in New York City”; pictured: Lisset Duran and Samuel Berger.

Another poster whose title caught my eye was “Greenery vs. Immorality in Manhattan” by Ansh Jain, Nazir Jalili, Dennis Mejia, Gustavo Ramirez, & Ben Stannis of Hunter College. The pitch was engaging; they’d found that despite hypothesizing that there’d be more crime in areas with fewer trees (more “urbanized” areas), there was a slight positive correlation, albeit statistically insignificant, between the number of trees and crime rate. When I first saw the title I hadn’t realized the poster was about crime rates, and had almost expected them to be trying to connect amounts of greenery with people’s morals.

Image of poster: Greenery vs. Immorality in Manhattan
Not “immortality,” as a presenter was quick to note.

 

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Americans’ Knowledge of Climate Change

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“Can you pass this basic climate change quiz?”

When researchers at Yale University gave American adults a quiz including versions of these questions, 52% scored an F grade.

Apparently not.

With the Paris 2015 UN climate change conference coming up, “now is a good time to test your knowledge of climate change” with this Buzzfeed quiz— because according to a 2010 Yale study, “63 percent of Americans believe that global warming is happening, but many do not understand why.” Though 45 percent of Americans say that they are “not very” or “not at all” worried about global warming, most of the people tested recognized their own lack of knowledge and agreed that they needed more information.

The first question on the Yale survey asked people if they “think that global warming is happening” after giving a brief overview of the issue; as discussed in class, people are more likely to disagree or be unsure when asked about their belief in climate change, than when asked in a way that presents the issues as simple “yes or no” facts. Other studies have been done looking at how people might discount the science behind climate change: people tend to evaluate the risks of global warming in ways that go along with the values or positions they already hold, termed the “cultural cognition of risk [and] of scientific consensus” — the social groups that an individual belongs to affect how they view climate change. So are there ways to educate people about the climate as the topic becomes (in some ways) increasingly politicized? Along with the school classroom and various media, you can start by taking this quiz; maybe you’ll do better than the 52% of study participants who scored an “F.”

 

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Must-Read: Plastiki: Across the Pacific on Plastic: An Adventure to Save Our Oceans

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The “Great Pacific Garbage Patch” has become an issue that is at times both forgotten and exaggerated. Group 3 is focusing on the Pacific Gyres, a multilayered phenomenon involving the ocean currents that lead to the plastic accumulation, the spatial distribution of the plastic debris, and the effects of the microplastics on ecosystems and on our lives. Plastic accumulation in the Pacific is clearly a problem with many components; aside from the research already done to lay the groundwork, it’s still an area of active scientific study, and many articles stress the need for more research. The use of advanced mathematical models and varied sampling methods, contributing to our still-developing understanding of the facts, might make the (dys)functioning of the Pacific Gyres seem too complex for most lay people to get involved with. David de Rothschild’s Plastiki, however, makes plastic accumulation in our oceans an extremely accessible topic.

The book deals with 12,500 plastic bottles that were built into the titular boat and taken on a 10,000 mile journey from the U.S. to Australia. One of de Rothschild’s primary goals was to raise awareness for ocean pollution, and he presents the voyage in an engaging format that makes the read as exciting as it is educational. He details the construction of the boat and then how he and his five-person crew take it on what’s billed as an “extraordinary journey” across the Pacific, describing “urgent study of ocean pollution, island nations threatened by rising seas, damaged coral reefs, and the acidifying ocean itself.” He was motivated by a desire to prompt people to learn about plastic as a material — the way we’re using it and disposing of it — and to further our understanding of how we’re dependent upon the viability of the planet for our survival. For that the earth needs people to be both aware and active. De Rothschild does an excellent job of communicating an environmental message and of providing an “entertaining adventure for sailors and explorers alike” (x), and Plastiki is full of graphics, diagrams, and photographs to both raise interest in the subject and to inform people of the facts through a digestible format. As both a “unique narrative [of a] first-hand experience” and a scientific investigation (A. Caruso), the book provides a singular introduction to the growing problem of plastic accumulation in the Pacific while giving readers further impetus to do something about it.

Check out the publisher’s website for a preview of the book, and this video for a sampling of the work that went into creating it: