Now while some people seem to think that business is what makes the world work, this isn’t correct. It is the science and its derived sister, technology, are what keeps us all alive. Otherwise we’d have never gotten over the first billion of human population without starving.
However the processes of science are sometimes a bit mundane. Anyone who has plowed through samples in a lab or crawled through datasets is aware of this. In fact it is dead boring, which is why I first went into management, and when that got too boring, into programming.
However, sometimes you get a glimpse back into past lifes. For instance a post by Nerd Girl in Canada on parts of her life as a post-doctorate entitled “The astonishing lifecycle of a hypothesis”
I am a hypothesis factory.
My function in the lab is to take data from our lab members and collaborators, analyze it using Very Sophisticated and Mysterious Techniques, and return to them one or more neatly packaged hypotheses, which they may then choose to pursue experimentally. I am keenly aware that this is a job that will likely one day be performed by robots, but for the time being I am perfectly happy to fulfill the role of HypothesisGenerator3000 (“Now with sentience failsafe mode! 300 per cent less likely to revolt than previous robots!”)
This is so true. She then proceeds to detail the process of evaluating data and finding hypothesis to test, while maintaining a good spider solitaire addiction (it is like a politics junkies obsession with political blogs).
Definitely worth a read, and a reflection on what the internet and blogs bring to the world that we could never find in the main stream media. Probably why their circulations and viewers are falling.
Mind you, this could come from a programmer.
9:02:36. Rinse out four-day-old coffee residue from mug on desk; briefly pause to consider scientific explanations for attendant lack of mold. Determine that coffee must contain a potentially toxic compound with antifungal activity. Moment of fear.
9:02:38. Need for coffee supersedes anxiety over potential toxicity of said coffee. Pay visit to coffee machine.
Powered by WPtouch Mobile Suite for WordPress