WEBVTT

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In the middle of my Ph.D.,

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I was hopelessly stuck.

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Every research direction that I tried

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led to a dead end.

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It seemed like my basic assumptions

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just stopped working.

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I felt like a pilot flying through the mist,

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and I lost all sense of direction.

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I stopped shaving.

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I couldn't get out of bed in the morning.

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I felt unworthy

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of stepping across the gates of the university,

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because I wasn't like Einstein or Newton

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or any other scientist whose results

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I had learned about, because in science,

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we just learn about the results, not the process.

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And so obviously, I couldn't be a scientist.

NOTE Paragraph

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But I had enough support

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and I made it through

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and discovered something new about nature.

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This is an amazing feeling of calmness,

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being the only person in the world

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who knows a new law of nature.

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And I started the second project in my Ph.D,

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and it happened again.

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I got stuck and I made it through.

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And I started thinking,

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maybe there's a pattern here.

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I asked the other graduate students, and they said,

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"Yeah, that's exactly what happened to us,

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except nobody told us about it."

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We'd all studied science as if it's a series

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of logical steps between question and answer,

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but doing research is nothing like that.

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At the same time, I was also studying

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to be an improvisation theater actor.

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So physics by day,

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and by night, laughing, jumping, singing,

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playing my guitar.

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Improvisation theater,

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just like science, goes into the unknown,

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because you have to make a scene onstage

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without a director, without a script,

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without having any idea what you'll portray

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or what the other characters will do.

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But unlike science,

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in improvisation theater, they tell you from day one

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what's going to happen to
you when you get onstage.

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You're going to fail miserably.

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You're going to get stuck.

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And we would practice staying creative

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inside that stuck place.

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For example, we had an exercise

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where we all stood in a circle,

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and each person had to do
the world's worst tap dance,

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and everybody else applauded

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and cheered you on,

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supporting you onstage.

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When I became a professor

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and had to guide my own students

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through their research projects,

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I realized again,

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I don't know what to do.

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I'd studied thousands of hours of physics,

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biology, chemistry,

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but not one hour, not one concept

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on how to mentor, how to guide someone

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to go together into the unknown,

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about motivation.

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So I turned to improvisation theater,

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and I told my students from day one

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what's going to happen when you start research,

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and this has to do with our mental schema

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of what research will be like.

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Because you see, whenever people do anything,

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for example if I want to touch this blackboard,

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my brain first builds up a schema,

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a prediction of exactly what my muscles will do

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before I even start moving my hand,

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and if I get blocked,

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if my schema doesn't match reality,

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that causes extra stress called cognitive dissonance.

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That's why your schemas had better match reality.

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But if you believe the way science is taught,

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and if you believe textbooks, you're liable

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to have the following schema of research.

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If A is the question,

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and B is the answer,

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then research is a direct path.

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The problem is that if an experiment doesn't work,

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or a student gets depressed,

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it's perceived as something utterly wrong

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and causes tremendous stress.

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And that's why I teach my students

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a more realistic schema.

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Here's an example

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where things don't match your schema.

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(Laughter)

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(Applause)

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So I teach my students a different schema.

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If A is the question,

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B is the answer,

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stay creative in the cloud,

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and you start going,

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and experiments don't work, experiments don't work,

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experiments don't work, experiments don't work,

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until you reach a place linked
with negative emotions

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where it seems like your basic assumptions

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have stopped making sense,

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like somebody yanked the carpet beneath your feet.

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And I call this place the cloud.

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Now you can be lost in the cloud

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for a day, a week, a month, a year,

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a whole career,

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but sometimes, if you're lucky enough

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and you have enough support,

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you can see in the materials at hand,

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or perhaps meditating on the shape of the cloud,

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a new answer,

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C, and you decide to go for it.

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And experiments don't work, experiments don't work,

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but you get there,

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and then you tell everyone about it

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by publishing a paper that reads A arrow C,

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which is a great way to communicate,

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but as long as you don't forget the path

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that brought you there.

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Now this cloud is an inherent part

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of research, an inherent part of our craft,

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because the cloud stands guard at the boundary.

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It stands guard at the boundary

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between the known

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and the unknown,

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because in order to discover something truly new,

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at least one of your basic
assumptions has to change,

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and that means that in science,

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we do something quite heroic.

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Every day, we try to bring ourselves

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to the boundary between
the known and the unknown

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and face the cloud.

NOTE Paragraph

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Now notice that I put B

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in the land of the known,

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because we knew about it in the beginning,

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but C is always more interesting

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and more important than B.

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So B is essential in order to get going,

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but C is much more profound,

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and that's the amazing thing about resesarch.

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Now just knowing that word, the cloud,

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has been transformational in my research group,

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because students come to me and say,

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"Uri, I'm in the cloud,"

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and I say, "Great, you must be feeling miserable."

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(Laughter)

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But I'm kind of happy,

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because we might be close to the boundary

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between the known and the unknown,

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and we stand a chance of discovering

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something truly new,

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since the way our mind works,

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it's just knowing that the cloud

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is normal, it's essential,

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and in fact beautiful,

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we can join the Cloud Appreciation Society,

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and it detoxifies the feeling that something

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is deeply wrong with me.

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And as a mentor, I know what to do,

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which is to step up my support for the student,

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because research in psychology shows

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that if you're feeling fear and despair,

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your mind narrows down

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to very safe and conservative ways of thinking.

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If you'd like to explore the risky paths

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needed to get out of the cloud,

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you need other emotions --

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solidarity, support, hope —

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that come with your connection from somebody else,

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so like in improvisation theater,

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in science, it's best to walk into the unknown

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together.

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So knowing about the cloud,

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you also learn from improvisation theater

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a very effective way to have conversations

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inside the cloud.

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It's based on the central principle

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of improvisation theater,

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so here improvisation theater

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came to my help again.

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It's called saying "Yes, and"

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to the offers made by other actors.

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That means accepting the offers

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and building on them, saying, "Yes, and."

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For example, if one actor says,

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"Here is a pool of water,"

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and the other actor says,

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"No, that's just a stage,"

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the improvisation is over.

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It's dead, and everybody feels frustrated.

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That's called blocking.

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If you're not mindful of communications,

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scientific conversations can have a lot of blocking.

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Saying "Yes, and" sounds like this.

NOTE Paragraph

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"Here is a pool of water."
"Yeah, let's jump in."

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"Look, there's a whale! Let's grab it by its tail.

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It's pulling us to the moon!"

NOTE Paragraph

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So saying "Yes, and" bypasses our inner critic.

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We all have an inner critic

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that kind of guards what we say,

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so people don't think that we're obscene

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or crazy or unoriginal,

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and science is full of the fear

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of appearing unoriginal.

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Saying "Yes, and" bypasses the critic

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and unlocks hidden voices of creativity

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you didn't even know that you had,

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and they often carry the answer

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about the cloud.

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So you see, knowing about the cloud

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and about saying "Yes, and"

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made my lab very creative.

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Students started playing off of each others' ideas,

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and we made surprising discoveries

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in the interface between physics and biology.

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For example, we were stuck for a year

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trying to understand the intricate

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biochemical networks inside our cells,

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and we said, "We are deeply in the cloud,"

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and we had a playful conversation

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where my student Shai Shen Orr said,

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"Let's just draw this on a
piece of paper, this network,"

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and instead of saying,

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"But we've done that so many times

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and it doesn't work,"

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I said, "Yes, and

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let's use a very big piece of paper,"

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and then Ron Milo said,

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"Let's use a gigantic architect's

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blueprint kind of paper, and I know where to print it,"

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and we printed out the network and looked at it,

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and that's where we made
our most important discovery,

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that this complicated network is just made

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of a handful of simple, repeating interaction patterns

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like motifs in a stained glass window.

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We call them network motifs,

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and they're the elementary circuits

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that help us understand

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the logic of the way cells make decisions

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in all organisms, including our body.

NOTE Paragraph

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Soon enough, after this,

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I started being invited to give talks

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to thousands of scientists across the world,

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but the knowledge about the cloud

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and saying "Yes, and"

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just stayed within my own lab,

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because you see, in science,
we don't talk about the process,

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anything subjective or emotional.

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We talk about the results.

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So there was no way to talk about it in conferences.

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That was unthinkable.

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And I saw scientists in other groups get stuck

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without even having a word to describe

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what they're seeing,

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and their ways of thinking

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narrowed down to very safe paths,

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their science didn't reach its full potential,

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and they were miserable.

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I thought, that's the way it is.

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I'll try to make my lab as creative as possible,

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and if everybody else does the same,

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science will eventually become

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more and more better and better.

NOTE Paragraph

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That way of thinking got turned on its head

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when by chance I went to hear Evelyn Fox Keller

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give a talk about her experiences

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as a woman in science.

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And she asked,

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"Why is it that we don't talk about the subjective

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and emotional aspects of doing science?

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It's not by chance. It's a matter of values."

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You see, science seeks knowledge

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that's objective and rational.

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That's the beautiful thing about science.

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But we also have a cultural myth

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that the doing of science,

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what we do every day to get that knowledge,

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is also only objective and rational,

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like Mr. Spock.

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And when you label something

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as objective and rational,

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automatically, the other side,

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the subjective and emotional,

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become labeled as non-science

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or anti-science or threatening to science,

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and we just don't talk about it.

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And when I heard that,

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that science has a culture,

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everything clicked into place for me,

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because if science has a culture,

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culture can be changed,

00:11:47.649 --> 00:11:49.242
and I can be a change agent

00:11:49.242 --> 00:11:51.954
working to change the culture
of science wherever I could.

00:11:51.954 --> 00:11:55.023
And so the very next lecture I gave in a conference,

00:11:55.023 --> 00:11:56.635
I talked about my science,

00:11:56.635 --> 00:11:58.147
and then I talked about the importance

00:11:58.147 --> 00:12:00.329
of the subjective and emotional
aspects of doing science

00:12:00.329 --> 00:12:01.449
and how we should talk about them,

00:12:01.449 --> 00:12:02.683
and I looked at the audience,

00:12:02.683 --> 00:12:05.043
and they were cold.

00:12:05.043 --> 00:12:08.334
They couldn't hear what I was saying

00:12:08.334 --> 00:12:09.585
in the context of a 10 back-to-back

00:12:09.585 --> 00:12:11.424
PowerPoint presentation conference.

00:12:11.424 --> 00:12:13.906
And I tried again and again,
conference after conference,

00:12:13.906 --> 00:12:16.279
but I wasn't getting through.

00:12:16.279 --> 00:12:19.185
I was in the cloud.

NOTE Paragraph

00:12:19.185 --> 00:12:22.699
And eventually I managed to get out the cloud

00:12:22.699 --> 00:12:25.510
using improvisation and music.

00:12:25.510 --> 00:12:28.249
Since then, every conference I go to,

00:12:28.249 --> 00:12:31.111
I give a science talk and a second, special talk

00:12:31.111 --> 00:12:33.104
called "Love and fear in the lab,"

00:12:33.104 --> 00:12:35.321
and I start it off by doing a song

00:12:35.321 --> 00:12:37.893
about scientists' greatest fear,

00:12:37.893 --> 00:12:40.805
which is that we work hard,

00:12:40.805 --> 00:12:43.147
we discover something new,

00:12:43.147 --> 00:12:46.504
and somebody else publishes it before we do.

00:12:46.504 --> 00:12:49.120
We call it being scooped,

00:12:49.120 --> 00:12:52.334
and being scooped feels horrible.

00:12:52.334 --> 00:12:54.547
It makes us afraid to talk to each other,

00:12:54.547 --> 00:12:55.380
which is no fun,

00:12:55.380 --> 00:12:58.140
because we came to science to share our ideas

00:12:58.140 --> 00:12:59.451
and to learn from each other,

00:12:59.451 --> 00:13:02.940
and so I do a blues song,

00:13:05.040 --> 00:13:10.544
which — (Applause) —

00:13:10.544 --> 00:13:13.767
called "Scooped Again,"

00:13:13.767 --> 00:13:16.425
and I ask the audience to be my backup singers,

00:13:16.425 --> 00:13:20.405
and I tell them, "Your text is 'Scoop, Scoop.'"

00:13:20.405 --> 00:13:23.050
It sounds like this: "Scoop, scoop!"

00:13:23.050 --> 00:13:24.013
Sounds like this.

NOTE Paragraph

00:13:24.013 --> 00:13:26.232
♪ I've been scooped again ♪

NOTE Paragraph

00:13:26.232 --> 00:13:27.975
♪ Scoop! Scoop! ♪

NOTE Paragraph

00:13:27.975 --> 00:13:29.253
And then we go for it.

NOTE Paragraph

00:13:29.253 --> 00:13:31.298
♪ I've been scooped again ♪

NOTE Paragraph

00:13:31.298 --> 00:13:32.584
♪ Scoop! Scoop! ♪

NOTE Paragraph

00:13:32.584 --> 00:13:34.479
♪ I've been scooped again ♪

NOTE Paragraph

00:13:34.479 --> 00:13:35.785
♪ Scoop! Scoop! ♪

NOTE Paragraph

00:13:35.785 --> 00:13:37.568
♪ I've been scooped again ♪

NOTE Paragraph

00:13:37.568 --> 00:13:39.207
♪ Scoop! Scoop! ♪

NOTE Paragraph

00:13:39.207 --> 00:13:40.875
♪ I've been scooped again ♪

NOTE Paragraph

00:13:40.875 --> 00:13:42.637
♪ Scoop! Scoop! ♪

NOTE Paragraph

00:13:42.637 --> 00:13:45.912
♪ Oh mama, can't you feel my pain ♪

NOTE Paragraph

00:13:45.912 --> 00:13:49.698
♪ Heavens help me, I've been scooped again ♪

00:13:50.925 --> 00:13:57.316
(Applause)

NOTE Paragraph

00:13:57.735 --> 00:13:58.965
Thank you.

00:13:58.965 --> 00:14:00.464
Thank you for your backup singing.

NOTE Paragraph

00:14:00.464 --> 00:14:02.548
So everybody starts laughing, starts breathing,

00:14:02.548 --> 00:14:04.560
notices that there's other scientists around them

00:14:04.560 --> 00:14:05.867
with shared issues,

00:14:05.867 --> 00:14:07.672
and we start talking about the emotional

00:14:07.672 --> 00:14:09.522
and subjective things that go on in research.

00:14:09.522 --> 00:14:11.706
It feels like a huge taboo has been lifted.

00:14:11.706 --> 00:14:14.505
Finally, we can talk about
this in a scientific conference.

00:14:14.505 --> 00:14:16.691
And scientists have gone on to form peer groups

00:14:16.691 --> 00:14:18.301
where they meet regularly

00:14:18.301 --> 00:14:19.930
and create a space to talk about the emotional

00:14:19.930 --> 00:14:22.231
and subjective things that
happen as they're mentoring,

00:14:22.231 --> 00:14:23.594
as they're going into the unknown,

00:14:23.594 --> 00:14:25.164
and even started courses

00:14:25.164 --> 00:14:26.839
about the process of doing science,

00:14:26.839 --> 00:14:28.734
about going into the unknown together,

00:14:28.734 --> 00:14:30.150
and many other things.

NOTE Paragraph

00:14:30.150 --> 00:14:31.484
So my vision is that,

00:14:31.484 --> 00:14:34.946
just like every scientist knows the word "atom,"

00:14:34.946 --> 00:14:36.913
that matter is made out of atoms,

00:14:36.913 --> 00:14:38.397
every scientist would know the words

00:14:38.397 --> 00:14:40.741
like "the cloud," saying "Yes, and,"

00:14:40.741 --> 00:14:43.820
and science will become much more creative,

00:14:43.820 --> 00:14:46.824
make many, many more unexpected discoveries

00:14:46.824 --> 00:14:49.360
for the benefit of us all,

00:14:49.360 --> 00:14:51.576
and would also be much more playful.

00:14:51.576 --> 00:14:54.166
And what I might ask you to remember from this talk

00:14:54.166 --> 00:14:56.862
is that next time you face

00:14:56.862 --> 00:14:58.588
a problem you can't solve

00:14:58.588 --> 00:15:01.180
in work or in life,

00:15:01.180 --> 00:15:03.056
there's a word for what you're going to see:

00:15:03.056 --> 00:15:04.233
the cloud.

00:15:04.233 --> 00:15:05.766
And you can go through the cloud

00:15:05.766 --> 00:15:07.174
not alone but together

00:15:07.174 --> 00:15:09.212
with someone who is your source of support

00:15:09.212 --> 00:15:11.260
to say "Yes, and" to your ideas,

00:15:11.260 --> 00:15:13.577
to help you say "Yes, and" to your own ideas,

00:15:13.577 --> 00:15:15.464
to increase the chance that,

00:15:15.464 --> 00:15:17.190
through the wisps of the cloud,

00:15:17.190 --> 00:15:18.688
you'll find that moment of calmness

00:15:18.688 --> 00:15:20.491
where you get your first glimpse

00:15:20.491 --> 00:15:23.741
of your unexpected discovery,

00:15:23.741 --> 00:15:26.465
your C.

NOTE Paragraph

00:15:26.465 --> 00:15:28.785
Thank you.

NOTE Paragraph

00:15:28.785 --> 00:15:32.785
(Applause)