What do writers and forensic scientists have in common?

[pbray]

Curiosity. Because the field of forensic science is changing so rapidly, curiosity and the desire to continually keep learning new things is considered an essential trait of a good forensic scientist.

It's also extremely helpful if you're a writer. At the current moment I'm researching the history behind the Human Genome Project (particularly the politics), requirements for a career as a high school science teacher, the history of the Military Tract of Central New York, and looking for first hand accounts of women police officers from the late 1970s/early 1980s, just to name a few. I need to know more about DNA analysis as well, but that's such a broad field that I need to frame my questions first before I go digging.

Resding: Just finished Forensic Casebook: The Science of Crime Scene Investigation by Ngaire E. Genge. It's a good introduction to the field for those considering a career in forensic sciences, and also appropriate for fans of mysteries and crime shows such as CSI as it includes numerous examples showing when they got the science right, and when they got it wrong. Showing how quickly the field moves, since this book was published in 2002 it's already out of date in some areas, but still worth reading.

Comments

[sylvia-rachel.livejournal.com]

I don't think it's entirely the writers' and artists' fault, though. Around here, anyway, we've been through long periods of the arts' being regarded as an expendable frill in education, and most of us are informally taught throughout our lives that maths and science are difficult, that they require just oodles of brainpower, while art and drama and creative-writing classes are scoffed at as "bird courses" in university and considered "hobbies" for both kids and adults. Proponents of arts education have had to resort to the instrumental rationale that kids who are involved in the arts do better at maths and science (according to a number of studies) to plead their case, when the truth is that (as elizabeth_welsh points out) you need all those areas of knowledge to be a well-rounded, thinking, learning person.

It's certainly true that scientists seem to be more willing to dabble in the rest of life than anyone else is to dabble in science.* I've even had articles on veterinary medicine with epigraphs from Julius Caesar.**

* But don't forget Tom Stoppard and Connie Willis.
** The epigraphs were misquoted, but you have to admire the authors for even thinking of using them.

[elizabeth-welsh.livejournal.com]

while art and drama and creative-writing classes are scoffed at as "bird courses" in university and considered "hobbies" for both kids and adults

I was a music major in college (which seems like a century ago at this moment) and the major actually required students to attend a course called "Career Planning 101." What is this you asked? Just what it sounds like -- a course to help you figure out what you were REALLY going to do with your life. In it we took "aptitude exams" and did questionaires to find where our interests lay. We also did the stupid right brain/left brain test (coincidence there, huh?) What did it say I was most suited for? IT COULDN'T DECIDE! Basically, it said I could probably be anything my little heart desired -- completely not helpful, especially given the fact that I would never have taken it if I hadn't been forced to. Two months into the course, I was so frustrated that I talked to the professor at great length. She eventually signed me out, saying I'd tested out of it to satisfaction, so I could get my absolutely useless associates degree.

It is sad when even a trumped-up test is fickle. I joked for a long time that I was voted (by a computer) most likely to succeed at the great, ambiguous "SOMETHING".

What did it all REALLY mean? My head is filled with useless trivia on a thousand subjects that makes me very good at trival pursuit and little else. After this thread today, I think I must be incurably curious about everything.

[sylvia-rachel.livejournal.com]

Yeah, we had to take all those tests in junior high and high school, and as far as I can remember they never yielded useful results...

[pbray.livejournal.com]

Au contraire! I learned how to beautifully bubble in circles with a number 2 pencil, a life skill that has served me well... err, no, wait.

Yup, it was all crap.

[sylvia-rachel.livejournal.com]

::snork::