Monthly Archives: November 2019

How Silly Are You (or Pompous or Forthright)?

What’s wrong with being called gutsy? The new book by Hillary and Chelsea Clinton use it as a term of approbation, but it didn’t find favour with Emma Brockes in the Guardian. Why? ‘It’s partly that descriptors like “gutsy” seem … Continue reading

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In which I defend the birds-eye view

Lovely massive tree. But what about that small boy in the corner?Is science about obsessing over one tiny daub of paint? Or is it about standing back and appreciating the entire picture?

Posted in academia, Research, Scientific method, Scientific thinking | Comments Off on In which I defend the birds-eye view

Doing Your Bit

When you have vulnerable people being harassed, what can you do? And I mean you. I have written a lot recently on my blog about the importance of bystanders. To learn more, I attended a recent training session regarding Bystander … Continue reading

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Science and Government, Science in Government

Before pre-election purdah set in, two interesting reports got published, one with more fanfare than the other. The one with more publicity attached was the long-awaited report (Changes and Choices) on options for future international funding by Adrian Smith and … Continue reading

Posted in Adrian Smith, Areas of Research Interest, Jon Agar, Public Laboratories, Research, RSRE | Comments Off on Science and Government, Science in Government

Berlin Debate – Who owns science?

Yesterday I had the privilege of participating in the 14th Berlin Debate on Science and Science Policy, which is hosted by the Robert Bosch Foundation. This year the invited participants discussed “Who owns science? Reshaping the Scientific Value Chain in … Continue reading

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Bias in Publishing

You’ll have heard the story about women whingeing about how their proudly-submitted papers got rejected by a premier journal without being sent out to referees. Or that the comments they received from referees were unduly harsh, but a male colleague’s … Continue reading

Posted in editors, pipeline, Research, Royal Society of Chemistry, success rates, UKRI, Women in science | Comments Off on Bias in Publishing

Sounding Board 2

It’s been almost two years since I introduced you to our Alumni Sounding Board, who have been helping us to keep in mind the industry perspective since the very beginning of our curriculum revision. Now that we are deep in the … Continue reading

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