Actor Alan Alda, famous for his timeless role as Hawkeye Pierce, MD, offered physicians and scientists a bitter pill. Plain language, says the former host of the PBS series "Scientific American Frontiers," will go far in advancing science and medicine. Alda’s latest gig is a founder and visiting professor of journalism at the Stony Brook University Center for Communicating Science, recently renamed the Alan Alda Center for Communicating Science.