The final Experimental Error: the end of an error

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A Ph.D. thesis often ends up being completed piecemeal: Edit chapter 6, but don’t forget that you left that whole section open in chapter 3 while you finished an experiment, and when you’re done, refresh your lit review in chapter 1, and then keep trying to convince Microsoft Word not to break table 18 in four places. Yes, you make progress, but the sheer number of remaining tasks makes it clear that you can never finish.

Until you do.

Almost 2 decades later, I still remember the strange lightness I felt when I realized my thesis was done. My wife and I were visiting her grandfather in Brooklyn, and I had excused myself to hunker in a side room with my laptop to write, and write, and write. I finally polished off a chapter, looked for the next task—and realized there weren’t any.

I had been experimenting for 6 years, then writing for 6 months. And now I was done. Just like that.

Scientists are no strangers to endings. Someday, you’ll leave your lab and move on to your next job. Your grant will run out. You’ll write on the final page of your lab notebook. You’ll tell a departing colleague to come back and visit, but you’ll never see them again. You’ll leave a list of instructions for the next scientist to continue your research, and they may or may not read it. You’ll do something you love for the final time.

This is it, folks. After 16 years and 184 columns (I like data), I’m done.

This column started after I published my book, Surviving Your Stupid, Stupid Decision to Go to Grad School. An editor at Science Careers named Jim Austin emailed to ask whether I might want to try writing monthly science humor pieces. This was a dream offer. I still remember hearing other kids laughing and playing basketball outside my bunk at summer camp while I laid in bed, rereading Dave Barry Turns Forty. And now I’d kind of sort of maybe get to be the Dave Barry of scientists?

A few months later, I almost got fired. Comedy means writing the things we’re all thinking but generally aren’t bold enough to call out, and I thought, “You know who no one is bold enough to insult in the pages of Science? The advertisers in Science.” That’s when I learned the term “kill fee,” which is when a publication pays you to not publish your writing. It also means Jim, a little angry, emails you and asks whether you can behave in the future, or whether we should just “end this little experiment.”

Clearly I chose to (mostly) behave, and we went on to publish columns that I hope have helped bring scientists together. I wrote about impostor syndrome, grade grubbing, predatory conferences, and AI hallucinations. I reviewed board games and video games, talked about bad advisers and bad advisees, and created what I anticipate will become the definitive guide to the hierarchy of free food. I watched helplessly while British schoolchildren voted me off the island. I stream-of-consciousnessed a seminar. For some reason, I wrote poetry.

I’ve never taken for granted that Science Careers would continue to host my column. I’ve always known someday they’d move on—grad school concerns evolve, publishing strategies shift, you know. And here we are, my last column.

For a scientist, one of the most painful parts of letting something end is knowing you weren’t finished. And a scientist’s job is never finished, because “finished” means we’ve worked out the answers to every question and solved every problem.

So no, I’m not finished. I’m just closing this chapter. I’m publishing this experiment and starting a new one. Or, maybe more accurately, I’m publishing this experiment and seeing where I can apply for funding to start a new one.

Until then, my most heartfelt thanks go to Jim, as well as his successor, Rachel Bernstein, and when Rachel is out of town, Katie Langin. They taught me that a good editor is someone to whom you can send 80% of a column that kind of meanders, and they can give you three good ideas for how to pull it together.

I’d like to thank my wife and kids. I published columns about the birth of my daughter and the birth of my middle son, but not the birth of my youngest son. Oops. Sorry, Elliot.

I’d like to thank everyone who works at a school, company, or conference and invited me to come speak at their event—34 states and six countries so far! Nothing is more fun than being the token entertainment for an audience that has spent the day hearing highly technical, highly boring seminars and is finally allowed to listen to science jokes and drink wine. I’m still giving those talks! Email me!

I’d like to thank every single one of my loyal fans—yes, both of them. Thanks, mom and dad.

Seriously, I really do want to thank all of you. By reading this column, you’ve helped push back on the idea that scientists are stodgy, robotic, and insular. We’re people who were once taught the reasons behind the stars and wanted to learn more. That doesn’t make us outsiders. It makes us amazing.

If there’s one lesson I want to give scientists on my way out, it’s this: Outreach is part of your career. When scientists work in isolation, when we use big words to sound smart, when we chuckle at questions we think are simple, when we thrive on the pride we take in doing something complex but don’t bother to communicate why we love it, the world forgets we’re human. We become archetypes, brainiacs, and, frankly, fools.

Get out there. Find people who have never met a scientist and meet them. Show them science isn’t some secret club—it’s methodical, objective, democratic, beautiful, devastating, and crucial. And, if you keep your mind open to the possibility, it can be a hell of a lot of fun.

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