Tuesday, March 09, 2010

Biologists vs. Engineers

Lambda-The-Ultimate referenced this fun paper: Can a Biologist Fix a Radio? — or, What I Learned while Studying Apoptosis and I found it a fun read. I certainly thought of my dad and brother, as the author described how a biologist might go about fixing a radio and had a chuckle.

It got mentioned on a programming forum because the paper calls for formal languages, and discusses their power. I can definitely appreciate that.

I also liked how the author talked about the cycles a scientific discovery goes through (from it being an esoteric discussion among a few, to a gold rush, to a state of frustration and confusion) and thought it matched up well to how tech trends tend to occur.

Give it a read - and ask yourself, how would your profession go about fixing a radio?

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