Insanity is Important

While wandering around the plant science building today wondering where my mentor and the autoclave lady went I took some time to consider the importance of insanity in science. I don't mean psychology or psychiatry, though obviously they are important and the people there would be out of a job if insanity is Not Important. I meant the symptoms of mental illnesses, applied more generally to every aspect of science, and how it is that we must often behave as if we are suffering from a serious case of neurosis in the name of Practicing Good Science.

For instance:

Paranoia - Clare has instructed my labmates and I that the generally accepted way of going about doing bacterial inoculation is to assume that "everything got contaminated and we're all going to die". The adrenaline spike that would result, when someone gets THAT thought firmly logged in his / her brain, may help with being extra careful with all the cultures and equipment. Or it may not. In any case it is considered Good Practice.

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder - see twitchy lab interns with glazed expressions. There are really requirements for getting every single detail straight, with accuracies going to a thousandth of a gram or half a milliliter or three nucleotides. Also, there is no other way to explain the the accurate labeling of hundreds of samples, all lined up by date which is, again, Good Practice.

Schizophrenia - when before suggesting an experimental, grant, or research proposal, it's Good Practice to always take a few minutes to pretend that you are a professor -- getting in the mind set is very important especially if you haven't done all the research that you should have -- and look over the proposal. Anything that doesn't make it past your Inner Professor isn't worth mentioning. When applicable, pretending that you're the grant committee might also help, though being in the mindset of that many people at once is reserved only for those with a more serious case of schizophrenia.

Depression - any of the cases where the modeling program, culture, or tests failed. Or also when the resulting data makes you wonder whether or not there are mischievous elves hidden in the lab somewhere, ready to prance around and bang on things once the light's are out and everyone's gone home.

And then I had to leave to go to class.