• Question: do you inspire to be like einstein

    Asked by livjones to Alberto, Chris, Emmanuel, Jennie, Michelle on 20 Jun 2013.
    • Photo: Michelle Taylor

      Michelle Taylor answered on 20 Jun 2013:

      Mmmm, well Einstein did a lot of thinking and came up with all of his theories by ‘thought experiments’ that involved a lot of mathematical calculations. I am more of an experimental scientist – I like to collect the data and see if what we think is happening in nature is truly correct – this is what makes science so special as a way of thinking about the world – we never take anything for granted and always like to see the evidence for ourselves. So I guess I aspire to be more like Charles Darwin or Alfred Russell Wallace who both came up with the theory of natural selection by carefully observing the world around them and testing their ideas with experiments.

    • Photo: Emmanuel Amabebe

      Emmanuel Amabebe answered on 20 Jun 2013:

      yeah I aspire to even the more than Einstein.

    • Photo: Chris Whittle

      Chris Whittle answered on 20 Jun 2013:

      I must say I love Michelles’s answer there!

      I don’t want to be link Einstein either – the stuff I’m trying to do can’t be theorised about, or predicted. You have to really get stuck in the lab and see what your experiments are telling you.

    • Photo: Alberto Lapedriza

      Alberto Lapedriza answered on 20 Jun 2013:

      I agree 100% with Michelle’s answer. Biology is an experimental science based on observations, rather than theory. Therefore, I’m more inspired by Crick and Watson (discoverers of the DNA structure) than by Einstein.

      I’d also like to add that science has changed a lot from Einstein’s (and Darwin’s) time. Now science is much more collaborative, and new discoveries and advances are the result of the effort of hundreds or thousands of scientists working in the same problem. Take as an example the sequencing of the human genome 10 years ago. Getting the DNA sequence of all our genes was possible thanks to a huge international collaboration, rather than the effort of a single scientist. Therefore, I feel inspired by knowing that the collaboration between scientists leads to great achievements.

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