Scientist in “I am not omniscient” claim shock

Posted on February 5, 2009 by Cath@VWXYNot?

(Why, yes, I do get most of my news headlines from the BBC website. Why do you ask?)
Returning to my building just now with my healthy balanced lunch1 in hand, I was stopped in the street by a younger woman who I assume was a student. I really need to stop wearing my work ID badge while out of my department2, because apparently to some people the tell-tale purple lanyard represents The Source Of All Knowledge.
Student: “Excuse me, do you know where the seminar is?”
Me: “No. I mean, which seminar?”
Student: “It got moved forward half an hour and I can’t find it.”
Me: “Who’s speaking?” (thinking that this might narrow down the possible venues according to their size).
Student: “I don’t know, it’s about genetics… epi, epigenetics… something like that.”
Me: “Sorry, no idea. There are like twenty seminar rooms in these two buildings.”
Student: “……..oh.” (Walks off looking peeved with my failure to help).
I could say something about the perception of scientists by my parents my friends the general public. Or about the expectation that I will be able to converse at length about Uncle Joe’s diabetes, or whether I think Pluto should be a planet.
But I think I’ll just enjoy my cookie instead.
fn1.teeny salad, cranberry juice, crisps and a cookie
fn2.other reasons being patients in the clinical building thinking I am the other kind of Doctor, and bus drivers confusing me by saying “good morning, Catherine” as I validate my ticket. On the other hand it does get me a 5% discount at a local beer and wine store.
(I don’t know why one footnote tag is working, but not the other. Oh well, you know what I mean).

About Cath@VWXYNot?

"one of the sillier science bloggers [...] I thought I should give a warning to the more staid members of the community." - Bob O'Hara, December 2010
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17 Responses to Scientist in “I am not omniscient” claim shock

  1. Eva Amsen says:
    February 5, 2009 at 8:18 pm

    I have a giant invisible (to me) information sign over my head, and people ask me everything, with or without badge. But the badge did make it worse. I had a hospital badge, so obviously if I was in the actual hospital building people would ask me where certain wards were (and get really confused when I said I didn’t work in the building). I also once wore the badge outside on the street during SARS. I waited to cross the street, and a double-decker tour bus drove by. The tour guide was a bit of a joker, and from the top of the bus he yelled through his mic: “THAT LADY OVER THERE HAS TO WEAR A TAG BECAUSE SHE HAS SARS!!” Everyone on the bus turned to look at me, and other pedestrians waiting at the light pointed and laughed. I didn’t have SARS! They took my temperature every morning and one nurse even declared me undead because my body temperature was the lowest he’d ever seen. I don’t have SARS, I’m just undead!

  2. steffi suhr says:
    February 5, 2009 at 8:23 pm

    It’s the eye contact. Don’t ever make eye contact.

  3. Craig Rowell says:
    February 5, 2009 at 8:44 pm

    Never wear your scrubs or lab coat when trying to cut through the hospital to get to another research center either. As for seminars it is best to just shrug and keep going. How was the cookie? What kind was it?

  4. Cath Ennis says:
    February 5, 2009 at 8:48 pm

    Eva, that’s hilarious! I didn’t know you were such a prominent Toronto tourist attraction.
    Steffi, good advice. I shall wear my sunglasses and my iPod (or at least the earbuds) at all times from now on.
    Craig, it was an officially certified trauma cookie, which by law must contain chocolate chips at the very minimum, preferably chocolate chunks.

  5. Scott Keir says:
    February 6, 2009 at 8:03 am

    Oh, I think I need a trauma cookie stockpile. You know, just in case.
    _ (I don’t know why one footnote tag is working, but not the other. Oh well, you know what I mean). _
    I suspect the phrase fn2. needs a space after it.

  6. Mike Fowler says:
    February 6, 2009 at 8:32 am

    But strangely, no spaces required before and _ after _ italic underscores.
    It sounds very much like the trauma cookie store should be replaced by the more honest Yorkie bar (biscuit & raisin variety). Mostly chocolate, with crunchy and chewy extras. Better than the fruit and nut variety offered by competitors.
    Unfortunately, it’s manufactured by Nestle, well known confectioners to the devil. And they have an appallingly mysoginist ad campaign. Shame on you, purveyors of sweet, delicious claptrap.

    Sometimes chocolate just sickens me

  7. Cath Ennis says:
    February 6, 2009 at 6:33 pm

    Scott, I tried both footnotes with and without the space, then one with and the other without, then vice versa, and after the 4th unsuccessful preview I thought “sod it” and just published. It’s very confusing.
    Mike, there used to be a 3D Yorkie bar sign by the railway track coming into York from the South that said “Welcome to York – where the men are hunky and the chocolate’s chunky”. So their targeted demographic has obviously changed since I lived there.
    Personally I prefer Galaxy (sacrilege for someone who grew up within the smell of the Rowntrees (oh, sorry, Nestle) factory), although I’ve been told that that’s “girly chocolate”. So there you go.

  8. Richard Wintle says:
    February 7, 2009 at 2:59 pm

    The hospital where I work, for some recent anniversary or other, came up with wide, multicoloured lanyards that you can spot a mile away. Which is great for the patients and their baffled parents – they can easily find staff to help them out. However, for research-types like me, who don’t work in the hospital building, whenever we’re in the hospital proper, we tend to be accosted with requests for directions.
    Which, in my case, isn’t so bad, since I worked in that building for seven years or so in an earlier incarnation. But pity the poor parent who asks a fresh-out-of-undergrad MSc student who just happens to be passing through on their way to a seminar or something.
    Sorry, I guess this has been worrying me for a while, or something.

  9. Richard Wintle says:
    February 7, 2009 at 3:02 pm

    Oh, and Eva – I once got an ID badge for a hospital where I wasn’t even an employee, simply to make going in and out during the SARS crisis easier. Nobody bellowed at me from any tour buses, though.

  10. Eva Amsen says:
    February 7, 2009 at 3:52 pm

    “wide, multicoloured lanyards that you can spot a mile away”
    No! Don’t use the Care Bear pastel rainbow lanyards! I always wore mine on a black one I got at a film festival once. (Having obviously been at the same hospital)

  11. Unbalanced Reaction says:
    February 7, 2009 at 7:07 pm

    Haha! Frequent conversation on planes:
    Passenger: Oh, so you are a scientist! Tell me about {popsci subject on which I have no expertise]
    Me: Erm…

  12. Richard Wintle says:
    February 7, 2009 at 9:03 pm

    @Eva – oh yeah, we worked in the same place. I’d forgotten (even though you told me not more than a week or two ago). 😛

  13. Eva Amsen says:
    February 7, 2009 at 10:50 pm

    Uhuh, and right now I work in an office next to which hangs a photo of your university graduating class. Crrrrreeeeeeeepppy.

  14. Richard Wintle says:
    February 8, 2009 at 3:22 pm

    Oh, ye gods. Just thinking of my hairstyle then (and I use the term “style” loosely) is making me shudder.

  15. Cath Ennis says:
    February 9, 2009 at 10:23 pm

    “wide, multicoloured lanyards”
    “Care Bear pastel rainbow lanyards”
    Lanyard pride! Awesome.
    Richard, it is a little worrying that the hospital gave you the ID – especially during SARS!
    Eva, I think I speak for us all when I ask you to find a way to scan the photo and post it on NN.
    UR, that happens to me all the time too!

  16. Eva Amsen says:
    February 9, 2009 at 10:45 pm

    I don’t think I can scan something that’s on a wall without looking suspicious (even though/especially since I know everyone in the surrounding offices), but I can probably bring my camera one of these days.

  17. Richard Wintle says:
    February 10, 2009 at 2:10 am

    Cath – yes, they are a bit prideful looking. Despite Eva’s disparaging remarks, I rather like mine
    *files idea away – must take photo
    Also, I was working in an office at that particular hospital, although not on its payroll. Things were complicated that way, although I suppose that there must be an awful lot of meds students doing rotations that would have been in a similar situation.
    Eva – we need to have a chat. You bring your camera, I’ll bring my sledgehammer, ok?

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