Hello ebc–

Did we really finish five full years of a PhD? That's half a decade in graduate school. Pause for dramatic effect. It’s surreal to think about—we can hardly believe it ourselves. So, naturally, we had to document our reflections on this milestone in a season 5 finale; a journal entry within the ebc lab notebook.

Moral of the story: Avery and Yassine rose to the occasion, marching fearlessly forward through the challenges of the fifth year—from preparing manuscripts and finalizing aims and analyses to pushing projects to their limits and writing THE dissertation.

Beyond the mountain of deliverables, Avery and Yassine reflect on the wisdom they gained during their fifth year. The lessons and experiences have been priceless. Avery shares what it means to do hard things and get over yourself, while Yassine explores the patience required for personal transformation and the power of simply showing up.

We hope you enjoy and are inspired! As always, stay educated and seek confusion!

-A&Y

Get connected with us:

Contact us for educated thoughts or general confusions at educatedbutconfused@gmail.com & follow us on instagram @ebcpod :)

Hello ebc–

We are entering a brave new world. Have you seen that movie? If not, it’s a wonderful spectacle (and book). That being said, what are we going to do with the wild, wild, west that is artificial intelligence (AI), especially in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields.

In today’s episode, we discuss our perspectives and experiences with AI including our current understanding, how we use it within our research workflows, and important caveats to consider. More specifically, we firstly break down how AI models are derived from supervised and unsupervised machine learning, the importance of understanding how these models are built from datasets, and this concept of “crap data in, crap data out.” We then explore the utility of using AI, across individuals, ranging from programmers all the way to lay users, removing previous barriers of entry in asking questions and speeding up the discovery process that would otherwise require a technical background.

We also discuss how we use AI in our scientific workflows to help with writing code, writing, and making plots and figures. Finally, we discuss all the caveats of AI including problem-solving, critical thinking, ground truth, the energy and ecological impact, regulation and democratization of AI.

This all begs the question… When will we reach a symbiosis with AI, and what will that world look like? Stay tuned for Part 2!

Next episode topic: Wrapping up the 5th year in our Neuroscience PhDs

As always, stay educated and seek confusion!

-A&Y

Get connected with us:

Contact us for educated thoughts or general confusions at educatedbutconfused@gmail.com & follow us on instagram @ebcpod :)

Hello ebc–

Publishing certainly dictates success in your career, from competing for scarce tenured-track positions to receiving government grants, the sheer volume of primary research articles and their impact factor is at the forefront of climbing the scientific ladder. This is embedded into the culture of academia and is not going away any time soon, but how will we manage in an ever-evolving publication model?

In today’s episode, Avery and Yassine break down publishing in academia, including the process of submitting a manuscript for peer review, the meaning and economies of “open-access,” and the current ways for which article submissions are funded. We also discuss the issues with the current publishing model, highlighting the proposed government changes to bankrolling publications, the shortage of finding scientists to conduct peer-review, and the ramifications of closed-access. Finally, we offer our ideas to create an ideal publishing model for across stakeholders including journals, academics, and the tax-payer. Will they be integrated? The world only hopes so. We hope you enjoy the listen!

Next episode topic and homework for this week: The collective consciousness

As always, stay educated and seek confusion!

-A&Y

Get connected with us:

Contact us for educated thoughts or general confusions at educatedbutconfused@gmail.com & follow us on instagram @ebcpod :)

Resources:

Article on elife’s new publication policy and its ramifications for its Clarivate-assigned Impact Factor

Article discussing the outrage with the proposed changes to funding from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB)

See this article released by Society for Neuroscience (SFN) discussing the importance of the commenting campaign and more information on what OMB is proposing:

The deadline for submitting a comment to OMB to advocate against the changes has passed. But… we will keep you guys posted for the next phase of action and responses if you want to show your support!