If we knew what we were doing, it wouldn't be called research

July 27 2016

Hello there,

I have never been good making long introductions so I will be straight to the point.

I am a PhD Student working on metal-air batteries: they store energy thanks to oxygen. Amazing no? But it’s what I want to tell you today.

For two years now, I dedicate a lot of my spare time to an association trying to connect better researchers, entrepreneurs and general public (just type BeyondLab in your favorite search engine).

I don’t know how it works in your country, but here, in France, academic research in mainly funded by the State. And so many results are just sleeping in the labs.

It’s a shame because these results are funded with public money, they are supposed to belong to everyone but society cannot enjoy it, for many reasons…

Whether you are a scientist or not, I will be really interested to read your opinion on this topic.

What is your opinion of research?

Do we need more or less? How do the topics studied should be chosen? Do you think research is useful for your everyday life?

I think that it’s really fundamental to maintain an open and multidisciplinary research to continue understanding and discovering great things.

Just check out the TED Talk by Steven Johnson “Where good ideas come from”: the story of GPS is a nice example of that philosophy.

To finish:

-I was last weekend to a wonderful wedding. It was of course the celebration of love. But a nice tribute to friendship too. Friendship as an opportunity to build a second family with the chance of the meetings. Just take your phone/your pen/your oven and send a text/a letter/a brownie to an old friend you didn’t saw for a long time.

-If you want to make the revolution (in science/politics or whatsoever stuff), drop me an email, we need to talk!

-The most powerful sentence I’ve heard these years: “Happiness is a state of mind”. It seems very simple, but I think it’s a part of the answer. When I am deeply sad, I tell myself that “my machine to see things in a positive way” is broken.

-The second most powerful sentence comes from the Listserve: “Try just one day not to give yourself excuses”. Do or don’t do things, but with a good reason!

-An huge shout out to Lily and Floriane, two oustanding girls who turn my everyday life in a fantastic adventure.


Cheers,

Jérémy
[email protected]
Lille/Nantes, France

PS : I would like to thanks Einstein for my email object :D


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