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Dave Levitan

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Dave Levitan
NationalityAmerican
Alma materHaverford College, New York University
Genrenon-fiction
Website
www.davelevitan.com

Dave Levitan is an American science journalist. His work has appeared in Wired, Atlantic, Scientific American, the Guardian, the Washington Post, and Time. He is author of the book Not a Scientist: How Politicians Mistake, Misrepresent, and Utterly Mangle Science.

Life

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Levitan graduated with a degree in journalism from Haverford College in 2003.[1] He attained his MA Journalism from NYU's Science, Health and Environmental Reporting Program (class of 2008–2009).[2] He has been an active contributor to the "William E Burrows Science, Health and Environmental Reporting Scholarship Fund" at NYU since 2012.[3]

Levitan worked as a freelance science writer with FactCheck.org in 2015, and was hired to track the errors made by politicians discussing science.[4]

Since 2009 he has been active on Twitter as @davelevitan, where he describes himself as a "Journalist, mostly science and politics".[5] He is married and lives with his wife, Jamie, in Baltimore.[1]

Work

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Levitan has written for more than 50 mainstream press outlets and medical trade publications and has had his work republished by USA Today and Huffington Post, among others.[6] His work in journalism has been both prolific and far-ranging within the intersections of science, health, the environment and politics. In 2010 he wrote an article for Technology Review on sustainable energy and smart grids.[7] In 2018 he wrote an article for Cancer Network entitled "Can Surgery Type Predict Opioid Abuse in SCLC?"[8]

In 2012, he wrote a piece discussing the Red Sea–Dead Sea water conveyance system, a plan to pipe water from the Red Sea to the dead sea in an effort to save the Dead Sea. This approach was opposed by conservationists.[9] In the same year he wrote an article for Gizmodo entitled: "After extensive mathematical modeling, scientist declares "Earth is F**ked""[10]

In 2013, he wrote an article for Scientific American on the stagnation in primary scientific funding within the NIH. This had led to severe financial crises within organisations such as the Marine Biological Laboratory, Massachusetts, where Levitan had spent time as a teenager involved in research on squid.[11]

Several of his articles focused on the governmental position of science advisor to the president of the United States. In 2017, he wrote an article for "The Atlantic" in which he presented the origin and history of the position of science adviser, dating back to President Truman.[12] In late 2016 he interviewed John Holdren for Wired. Holdren had served as senior science and technology advisor to President Barack Obama. The interview touched on the attitudes towards science held by several presidents, including George W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Donald Trump.[13]. He also wrote an article for Time on President Donald Trump's "anti-science attitude"[14] and reiterated the argument in an opinion piece for the Guardian.[15] His article for the Washington Post in March 2017 further highlighted the Trump administration's views on science and science literacy.[16]

Published books

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The lessons learned during his time working at FactCheck.org led Levitan to write a book in which he outlined 12 common tactics that politicians employ to "butcher science", including “the Butter-up,” “the Undercut,” and “the Oversimplification.”

  • Levitan, D. (2017). Not a Scientist: How Politicians Mistake, Misrepresent, and Utterly Mangle Science. W. W. Norton. ISBN 978-0-393-35333-4. Retrieved 28 January 2019.[17][18][19][20]

References

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  1. ^ a b Lazaroff, Cat (September 19, 2017). "Science Journalist Dave Levitan '03 Publishes First Book". Retrieved 2019-01-28.
  2. ^ "Alumni - NYU Journalism". journalism.nyu.org. Retrieved 28 January 2019.
  3. ^ "Scholarship Funds - NYU Journalism". journalism.ny.edu. Retrieved 28 January 2019.
  4. ^ "Our Staff - FactCheck.org". FactCheck.org. Retrieved 28 January 2019.
  5. ^ "Dave Levitan (@davelevitan) | Twitter". twitter.com. Retrieved 28 January 2019.
  6. ^ "Dave Levitan - Full publication list". davelevitan.com. Retrieved 27 January 2019.
  7. ^ Levitan, Dave (21 December 2010). "Managing renewables". MIT Technology Review. Retrieved 29 January 2019.
  8. ^ Levitan, Dave (10 October 2018). "Can Surgery Type Predict Opioid Abuse in NSCLC?". cancernetwork.com. Retrieved 27 January 2019.
  9. ^ Levitan, Dave (12 July 2012). "The Dead Sea is Dying: Can A Controversial Plan Save It?". Yale Environmental 360. Retrieved 29 January 2019.
  10. ^ Levitan, Dave (12 July 2012). "After extensive mathematical modeling, scientist declares "Earth is F**ked"". Gizmodo.com. Retrieved 29 January 2019.
  11. ^ Levitan, Dave (5 September 2013). "Fate of Independent Research Institutes Hangs in the Budgetary Balance". Scientific American. Retrieved 28 January 2019.
  12. ^ Levitan, Dave (31 October 2016). "When a President Banishes Science From the White House". The Atlantic. Retrieved 28 January 2019.
  13. ^ Levitan, Dave (20 December 2016). "OBAMA'S OUTGOING SCIENCE ADVISOR WILL KEEP WATCH IN 2017". www.wired.com. Retrieved 28 January 2019.
  14. ^ Levitan, Dave (25 January 2017). "Donald Trump's Science Denial Is Becoming National Policy". Time. Retrieved 28 January 2019.
  15. ^ Levitan, Dave (21 April 2017). "The March for Science has a humble aim: restoring sanity". the Guardian. Retrieved 28 January 2019.
  16. ^ Levitan, Dave (24 March 2017). "Obama's science diaspora prepares for a fight". Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved 28 January 2019.
  17. ^ NOT A SCIENTIST by Dave Levitan | Kirkus Reviews.
  18. ^ "The most common tricks politicians use to muddle inconvenient science". Vox. Retrieved 2019-01-29.
  19. ^ Erickson, Amanda (2017-05-25). "Opinion | How to spot a misrepresentation about climate change". Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved 2019-01-29.
  20. ^ "When politicians link immigrants to disease, the science just doesn't add up". Popular Science. Retrieved 2019-01-29.
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