Scientists have an artistic vein. Or, at least, should be artists because the job demands it. We can take an entire working period making two to three plots. Do you wonder why? Edward Tufte said “Clarity and excellence in thinking is very much like clarity and...
The best thing it may happen while doing science is also the worst. It’s when we realize and say “I don’t understand.” However, not understanding can be of value. We just need to learn how to deal with it. When I read an article outside my...
“Why do we take so long to produce so little?” Have you ever asked yourself this question? I have. Numerous times. And I think this often occurs in scientific writing, especially in the results and discussion section which demands creative thinking. That...
What do you feel when you receive the comments from reviewers of an article you submitted, and they ask for major revisions? What if you feel their comments show a weak reading of your work? Most of us feel upset and demotivated. I understand and experience the same...
Some of us are knowledge workers, but all of us can be knowledge explorers. Why do we explore knowledge? What triggers our curiosity? The desire to know. Desire is what moves us, how we move and why. But is desire enough? I always loved books on science. They...
In a previous post about using word count as a method to improve the flow of your scientific writing, I suggested that looking at the right number of words in Abstracts, which is around 250, it’s almost like a blog post. Thus, if we think about Abstracts like blog...
There’s this awful sentence about our scientific careers, “publish or perish.” I have profound reservations about it because of the pressure induced in our scientific work and writing. With such pressure to publish we risk turning our research shallow and not...
People may see science as just facts and figures, equations and numbers, but there’s more than that. In the background, there’s always a “why” and the pursuit of truth through knowledge. For me, this means a philosophy of science may inspire every scientist, that love...
Recently, I read an article by Adrian Bejan on the “Evolution in Thermodynamics.” His work is fascinating because of the Constructal Theory he proposed which is one of my main research subjects. However, what caught my attention was a reference at the end...
Recently I spoke with an Italian friend about what could be a Job Description for a scientific research position. Here are the qualities that look like limitations: Be ignorant. Ability to deal with failure. Dare to be vulnerable. Yes. Contrary to the perception given...
