One of the best keynote talks I've heard, ever

So incredibly grateful to host Ubadah Sabbagh and to hear him give one of the most transformative talks (and workshops) at SBN Tweets!

I gave the DEI keynote at this year‘s SBN Tweets, emphasizing the importance of being values-driven scientists. We have a role to play in lab and in society. In the final slide I prompted my colleagues to reflect on this in light of what’s happening in the world.

Sorry but don’t get to blame perverse incentives while not even considering for a moment taking some kind of risky action as an individual. We have agency. Poor incentive structures are real, yes, but they’re not an excuse to not even try.

boston was stunning this morning

I’m at my first economics conference (a field that basically did preprints before preprints were a thing) and I have to say I love the way they present working papers and give realtime feedback as the project is developing. We need more of that in life sciences.

What a sweet start to the day. For no reason at all, showed up to lab finding a post-it note on my screen with clue to a scavenger hunt. 9 clues later and an arm wrestling match (with an audience) later, look at my prize. These students made my day 🥹

at the airport rn. guy next to me just sneezed, told his buddy “bless me foo”. his buddy blessed him, then he replied “thanks man”.

Happy Friday! I want to elaborate on a thought provoking discussion from last night’s Kendall Square panel AI in drug discovery featuring Derek Lowe, Jen Nwankwo, Alex Snyder, and me (thx Rhie Lim/CIC for organizing!) It should interest techbio/biotech VCs and founders-to-be: 🧵

I like to say “btw let’s start thinking about closing remarks because we’re getting there soon”

I had so much fun speaking with Angie Voyles Askham of The Transmitter about writing science-themed kids books, especially since the final installation of The Magnificent Makers (#9: Rolling throughly the Rock Cycle) hit stores today. What a journey 💜📚🔬thetransmitter.org/craft-and-care…

appreciate DM's pragmatism here: "Also remember that all of this career-metric stuff is in a way meaningless. Arbitrary. Laughable even. It should never be internalized as some sort of objective evaluation of the merit of your scientific record...Don’t actually believe the hype."

𝗘𝘅𝗰𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗼𝗽𝗽𝗼𝗿𝘁𝘂𝗻𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗔𝗿𝗮𝗯 𝗴𝗿𝗮𝗱 𝘀𝘁𝘂𝗱𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀 & 𝗽𝗼𝘀𝘁𝗱𝗼𝗰𝘀 I’m co-organizing the SAF Life Sciences Conference on Nov 1-2, 2024, and we’re inviting abstract submissions for 10-minute flash talks. Deadline is Sep 15. Details below!

Exciting news from Oslo! Nancy Kanwisher @[email protected] has received the The Kavli Prize in Neuroscience at a royal ceremony in Norway with her fellow laureates Doris Tsao + Winrich Freiwald. Family and friends were present for the festivities - cheers to all! 🥂