Julia Frugoli (JFRUGOLI at BIO.TAMU.EDU) wrote:
:: >I asked them if there was anything they would consider doing even
: >if they didn't get paid for doing it. The only two answers were
: >gardening and music but they wouldn't even consider doing
: >science for nothing.
: >Would anyone here do science for nothing? I probably would and have.
: >Dr. Cynthia M. Galloway
: I bristle at the suggestion, intended or not, that commitment means being
: willing to work for free. It's just not an option for many people.
: Julia Frugoli.
I think there's also a significant difference between science
and other creative endeavors: you have to get paid to do
science, because it has to be done full time. You can garden
after work, or play an instrument, or sing in the choir, or
act in local plays, paint, write short stories, or even,
if you're ambitious, find funding to make a short film in
your spare time. You can be a community activist, work on
environmental causes, work for international human writes.
You can volunteer for political campaigns, or run for
city council. In all of these fields you _can_ make a
contribution in the time you have left over from a job
that puts bread on the table.
But in order to produce good experimental science, you
have to spend most of your waking hours doing it, and
you have to have the infrastructure of a major research
institution, and that means you have to get paid for it.
--
Bharathi Jagadeesh/bjag at ln.nimh.nih.gov
Lab of Neuropsychology, NIMH
Building 49, Room 1b80
Bethesda, Maryland 20892
(312) 496-5625 x270
