Sometimes I think I was born to be a scientist or a researcher. I keep coming up with innovative but utterly half-baked ideas. I also have a tendency to forget things under my mentally filed "unimportant" category, earning me quite a reputation for being absent minded. Which, I'm told, is an important qualification for being a scientist.
When I was about 10-11 years old and had just learnt about conductors and insulators, one day I was hanging around the kitchen making sure my Mom got my Pizza topping absolutely right. Then my Mom went to the living room to answer a phone call, and when I heard the buzz of the oven signifying that my Pizza was ready, I wanted to remove it from the oven. So I looked for an "insulator" to protect my hand while I opened the oven door, and picked up a plastic bag that had been lying around. Fortunately my Mom arrived then and gave me a scolding. Oops, I thought, I forgot about the melting point of plastics.
Years later, after I'd learnt that one of the functions of air-conditioners is dehumidification, I dried my hair in front of the A/C, figuring that the rate of evaporation would be only slightly less than using a drier because the air was dehumidified. The next day I caught a cold.
Actually I have a tendency to catch colds frequently. So I repeated the brilliant act mentioned above in order to condition my body to resist colds. Incidentally, it doesn't work.
I don't quite think I will reach the level of Thomas Alva Edison, even though I have considerably more common sense now than when I was a kid (though some might dispute that also!). My cousins swear that I will never make a good manager but I will surely make a brilliant scientist, and encouraged me to abandon my idea of doing an MBA in favour of doing a Ph.D. Even though I have drifted more towards engineering than the pure sciences, I guess research is research. Makes me feel more confident that I am in line, or nearly so, with my true calling.
Cheers,
Prashanth.
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14 comments:
Absent-mindedness is an absolutely wrong attribute for a scientist. U need to be extremely meticulous and systematic. U can't get around any problem when u can't get around ur lab. The stereotypical scientists that are kindred to comic strips created by the likes of R.K laxman are born out of totally misguided perception. A real scientist need not look like someone who has suffered electrocution his entire life (read Einstein look) or for that matter not know how to wear his tie. The scientists too need to know how to manage among other things human resource, time and money (the last being more important when u r faced with a stingy management). And finally a scientist is useful to the tech-fraternity and the society on the whole only if he manages to make his invention/discovery/theory useful to the industry. You can have a 100 US patents and yet be a dead weight to the industry.
Sheesh... don't be so serious, anonymous dude. I was just kidding. Still, some scientists are notorious for being absolutely systematic about their work, yet absolutely forgetful when it comes to other things. I'm *almost* one of those people. Meaning I'm almost a scientist.
AND once again I would go by PS ....
Anonymous,
I'm sure there are times you've been sooo involved with work that you forgot your sleep, hunger, friends.... Scientists are in this state-of-mind for prolonged periods of time. When a person so totally consumed by work that his heart-soul-n-mind in invested in the problem-at-hand; then he naturally becomes absent-minded about "other" stuff. So the stereotypical "Einstein Look" is not at all abnormal for a scientist... So what maybe termed "absent-minded" may actually reflect a state-of-mind that is too deeply involved in a particular line of problem-solving/invention/discovery... Archimedes, Newton, Edison, Darwin, Fermi, Planck, Pavlov, ...all fit into R.K Laxman's perception of a stereotypical scientist ... so I wont term it as misguided perception at all...
There is always a streak of madness in a genius,ingenious n a scientist ...
*Intern
To continue...
and Anon,
you seem to undermine the importance of "pure academic enviornment"; which encourages research/inventions/discoveries/innovations; with maybe no immediate practical applicability to mankind or humanity. Though researchers are encouraged to patent their fruits of labour; there are people who work without having money as their ultimate objective. Jonas Salk refused to apply for patent (polio vaccine) and maintained that he was more interested in people's access to the vaccine than the money he would make. Thomas Edison spent hours-n-hours in lab. just to see the incandescent bulb light up! Gregor Mendels works later formed basis for Laws of Heredity n modern genetics, Darwins' Theory of Evolution still raises controversies.... Albert Einstein was working towards a Unified Field Theory .....
Many scientists are not into the practical-application or transfer-of-technology part of their work. This does not mean that pure academic research is of any less importance. Many times the benefits of practical application maybe reaped by future generations....
Keep up the scientific spirit...
*Intern
Intern or whatever ur name maybe,
I don't think u have scientists around u to make that comment. Scientists TODAY need to follow the standard procedures and guidelines, rules and regulations and a systematic way of life. They cannot be sitting under the apple tree to let "gravity" dawn in their cerebrum.
The scientists of the yore had the luxury to do research in whatever way they pleased. All those tomes of hypothesis are seen in action today because of many more unsung heroes of technology who applied those theories to real life.
In fact simply because OUR academic pursuits compel us to see the theoreticians as heroes we tend to undermine the import of the technologists.
Hey, call me SP not PS!!
Well I've been in research long enough to know that there is always industry-driven research as well as "pure" academic research, and the intersection is definitely not null.
And, like I said, many scientists have their priorities fixed and pay no importance to things like tying ties and taking care of their hair. I, for one, will always have my hair sticking up near the back of my head (ssshhhh dont tell anybody else) and I still don't know how to tie a tie.
Hey SP do u use a bath soap for shaving? Apparently Albert Einstein did that I heard.
to continue..
PS, did you know that Einstein's brain lacked a particular small wrinkle (the parietal operculum) that most people have. So I was wondering if you..
All the world is a stage and you are the tungsten filament which throws light on the actors.
PS: Its fun to drop comments anonymously.
Oh for heavens sake... I have a dozen nicknames: SP, Zombie, Pacha, Prashu, so on and so forth. And you choose instead to invent a new one and call me PS. *sigh* why, why me...
Prashu ?? it sounds familiar..Bruno chu chu..bite her..chu chu...
PS, can i have your autograph?
Anonymous
... or whatever ur name maybe ...
Lemme begin with yr. comment ...
"I don't think u have scientists around u to make that comment" - Anon
I am somehow intrigued by this "I-know-all" and "what-do-you-know" attitude of some people ... and whatever your assumptions are to conclude that I dont know any scientists ....
... using the very same logic...
may I question if you know Newton personally to comment on his sitting under the apple tree??? (Sounds silly as much as yr. logic... )
Now coming to yr comment...
"The scientists of the yore had the luxury to do research in whatever way they pleased"
....
First the term "luxury" is an individual perspective;... spending 14-16 hours a day at lab. maybe called "luxury" by some and "sacrifice" by others....
... and in this age of private funded researchs, Miss/Mr. Know-All-Anonymous; are you suggesting that the breed of dedicated researchers /scientists who put in hours-n-hours of time-n-effort just cause they are intrigued by the problem at hand; is lost (with Newton)????
I just dont buy that argument ...
I beg to differ ...
Just as in the age of yellow journalism n sensationalization; we still have the breed of "investigative journalists"; who risk their lives by going to bomb-infested areas of Iraq, just for the thrill of their job ...
... similarly even TODAY when scientists "follow the standard procedures and guidelines, rules and regulations" ..... the breed of Newton-like scientists are still alive.... thats whats a pure "Scientific Spirit"
what-do-I-know ...
*Intern
*** By the way just yesterday I visited the FERMI lab. with a scientist who chooses to remain a bachelor just cause he loves spending hours-n-hours in his lab.... So i do know real scientists
Goodness gracious me!
Intern,
U have probably misunderstood my line of reasoning and have resorted to nitpicking or rather should I call it splitting hairs!
I do not deem it necessary to tell you about my associations with scientists all my life.
What I am trying to say is:
# the scope for pure science in today's world is limited besides being totally commercially unviable and industrially redundant. If u have a ready to use application of ur theory u are gr8! Thumbs up!
# Traits like absentmindedness and shabbiness in apparel are not really traits of scientists of Today. If u say innovation, creative reasoning, out-of-box thinking then yes u r spot on. Its like saying every guy who wears a khadi kurta and a sling bag is a journalist or still worse a journalist must wear a khadi kurta: now how stereotyped is that! Fallacious reasoning to me!
# At the end of the day, if u have not made ur research reachout to or be worthwhile to a part of humanity/living world however wee it may be, I think u have wasted ur resources.
nawwwww @ anon
...I was juss enjoying...
anyways I dont have much time now....
Prashant
WELCOME TO THE US of A
I'm off to Canada for some days....
see laters...
byeeeee
*Intern
OMG... the two of you, cool it... no nastiness on my blog!
*Phew* Intern, thanks for calling me by my given name, even if you misspelt it :D
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