I woke up this morning with a headache. And I was out of coffee. I realized that I'd already missed a meeting that was indispensable, as it concerned where to put a table that has been sitting in the entranceway of the Department for four months, and I was already late for a meeting to discuss why we had had the first meeting so soon. And I can't find my other shoe. There's no way I'm going to get to work and not find out that we're all out of restriction enzymes, that the experiments aren't happening, and those that are are giving results that change before they can be written down. It's one of those days.
Which makes me ask the question that I ask every now and then (probably less than I should and probably more than I should to you, ever-patient reader): why do we do this? This science thing and all the baggage that goes with it.
I know all the conventional answers that we tell ourselves and the public. It's interesting and it can be fun, and the universe is just so unimaginably strange that we just have to know a little bit about it. Unless, of course, we think too much and realize that if all the information about an infinite universe is infinite, and any amount of something divided by infinity is zero,we not only cannot know anything, but we also cannot, in principle, exist. Which is exactly the sort of thing philosophers worry about and scientists don't. This explains why scientists get significantly better offices. Um,where was I?
Oh yes, we know the answers we give to why we do it. But these aren't the real answers. The real answer is much better, but it's a secret. It's sexy and engaging – if the public knew, we would never be allowed to do it again. We do science because we WANT TO RULE THE WORLD (maniacal laughter). No,sorry, I got carried away; that isn't why we do science. Okay, it isn't why most of us do science, although I'm worried about the guy in the office next to mine.
Here's the real reason, and it's still a good one. We do science because of our deep desire to fundamentally change the world as we know it. Or, as the pundits say, FCTWAWKI (they don't actually say fctwawki, because to do so sounds like something really disgusting being coughed up, but they do mouth it behind scientists' backs while giving each other knowing looks). We want to do something so astoundingly important that it changes everything: the way we think; the way we look at the world; the way we do things.
I admit it. I want to FCTWAWKI. So do you. We want to see our work in a high-impact journal (I've often thought that, to the public, a high-impact journal must sound a lot like a high-impact road disaster – why would anyone want to be in that?). But yes, we want it. And we want all the newspapers to pick up on it and explain to the public (who are still worrying about journals being hit by fast-moving vehicles) why our work is so very important and why it FCTWAWKI. And the small percentage of the population who read the newspapers will tell their friends, who will make sure to watch it when it's discussed on the news on television or, hopefully, as a news bulletin. And if we're really really going to FCTWAWKI, we'll finally see our work parodied on The Simpsons.
FCTWAWKI, if we think about it, is ultimately what science is for. No,really, it could happen. (If you, reading this as a graduate student, now would be a good time to go do something else. The rest of this essay isn't for you – you should be reading real papers anyway. Then do those fabulous experiments you're planning that will not only earn you that fabulous degree from your fabulous institution but also FCTWAWKI. Fabulous. Bye now.)
Just pretend for a moment. Suppose, just suppose, that you have worked in isolation, with inspiration and perspiration (and lots of other `ations') so that credit comes only to you and not `science in general', and discovered or invented (or both) something that we absolutely and with the certainty of hindsight (as an aside, despite conventional wisdom, hindsight is not 20-20;recent studies have shown that it is slightly nearsighted and has severe astigmatism in the left eye) know will completely and permanently change society. Once your discovery/invention is really understood and in everyone's home, life will never be the same again. Wow!
Okay, if that ever happened, really, you would become an immortal. You would achieve that goal that we cannot even admit to ourselves is our deepest goal. You'd have to be happy. And famous – Louis Pasteur, Thomas Edison,Albert Einstein, Philo Farnsworth...
Who?
Philo Farnsworth. One of those people who, in the past 100 years FCTWAWKI.
In 1921, Philo Farnsworth had an idea. He made it work successfully in 1927. He demonstrated it in 1934 and received the patent in 1935. A company stole it from him but then finally paid him some royalties. The patents ran out in 1947. In the 1950s the public started to become aware of it in a big way, and in the 1960s I personally let it dominate my life (I've since repented). By the time he died in 1971, he had lived to see his invention affecting the lives (for good or ill, but definitely affecting their lives) of hundreds of millions of people. Arguably, his invention ended a major war. Today, it is used for education, undersea and space exploration,communication, medicine and mindless entertainment (except for the halftime show of the Superbowl: `mindless' insults lifeforms without minds). Philo Farnsworth invented television.
Okay, lets see. One, two, three... okay, ten of you knew who Philo Farnsworth was. Okay, and you even want to argue that he didn't actually invent television, because there was this guy in Geeksburgh, Scotland who really invented it. But you're all missing the point. Or maybe yougot it but you just think its obvious.
Philo Farnsworth, in our society (which also includes yours),should be the most famous name from the last century. He did it. He FCTWAWKI. We can forget all of last year's Nobel Laureates (not me, of course – I think they're great, but it can happen); hey, this guy is the real thing. He did it: he changed everything. You don't have to think it's a good thing,television, but you do have to admit that it has changed things. He did it.
Philo Farnsworth suffered from severe depression most of his life, and he never got any real recognition at all. He wasn't famous – or happy. Maybe it was because of those awful sit-coms in the 1960s, but I don't think so.
Philo Farnsworth had an idea, and he actually made it work. It wasn't easy or trivial or done by lots of people at the same time – it was his baby. And it turned out that it FCTWAWKI, and he watched the world watching Laugh-In and the Vietnam War in their living rooms. Even if nobody else knew, he knew that he had done it.
Should that be enough? It's worth thinking about. Are you doing science to make a contribution, just for the sake of making a contribution or for some sort of recognition, fortune and glory? Do you think high-impact papers are going to make you famous (as my dear mother has often said to me, “If you're so famous, how come I've never heard of you?”) or happy?
Sure, there are lots of things we have to do as scientists that just aren't the least bit enjoyable. But hopefully the real answer is that for some of us poor twisted souls, science makes us happy all by itself. If not, if you don't like any of it and are hanging in there to FCTWAWKI, think about it. It might be a good thing to work this out for yourself, before you look back on your career and ask why you aren't as famous as Philo Farnsworth.
