What should I research?
Dark Arts Course
University of Edinburgh
Disclosure
Multiscale labs
- predict the biological consequences of molecular change
Proposal 1: This is a big call
- Unless you’re very wealthy indeed, your time is your most valuable resource
- Don’t invest it at random: make explicit choices
- Punch your card
“If you get a punch card with 20 punches on it, and that is all the investment decisions you get to make in your whole life, you would get very rich, because you would think very hard about each one.”
Warren Buffet
Proposal 2: Impact is your first criterion
Components
Aptitude
Money
Need
Aptitude
- Doesn’t really need thinking about
- Enthusiasm is inevitable
Money
- Sure, it’s essential but it follows impact
Need
- It’s all about the impact
Do the research that advances the care of your patients the most, and all the grants and papers and prizes will follow from that.
Steve Webb
Proposal 3
Where do big advances come from?
New ideas
New techniques
Proposal 3: Choose new ideas over old every time
Where do big advances come from?
New ideas
New techniques
Proposal 3: Choose new ideas over old every time
Where do big advances come from?
New ideas
- requires you to be smarter/luckier than those who came before you.
New techniques
- requires access to the techniques
Proposal 4: Think big
Survey the frontier, looking for gaps, weaknesses, opportunities.
- vision to see it
- ability to deliver it
- outcome that matters
What does he do next?
… impossibly beautiful vision
Proposal 4: Think big
You should absolutely be trying to be Messi.
Proposal 5: You are building a personal brand
If you’re explaining, you’re losing
Alistair Campbell
- Your brand needs to be simple
- Not entirely within your control
- Change direction. Judicious opportunism is essential.
Proposal 6
Focus is overrated
Proposal 7: Money is a distraction
The lure of the grant
- < 10% success rates = lottery
- not a valid decision making process
Never apply for a grant if you don’t want to get it
Proposal 8
If you are in danger of being scooped, you aren’t really making a contribution.
Pitfalls
- The blind alley
- The sunk cost
- Foundations made of sand (reliable vs unreliable evidence)
Never believe your own propaganda
Summary
Focus on the fundamentals
- Why would I succeed where everyone else in human history has failed?
Ask big questions
- Is this what I want to spend my life on?
- Why should anyone help me do this?