At least someone is able to admire perfectionism
Raffi: One way in which I think we're different is that you aim for really thorough mastery of something.
Me: ...rather than being a jack of all trades?
Raffi: Yeah, one of the things I really like about med school is that it's forcing me to dig in deep and actually achieve mastery of something. So I can continue dabbling later.
:D
I do find myself drawn to this sort of mastery. One of the things I most enjoyed about Going Postal was the description of clacks operators as craftsmen -- as learning their skill so well that it becomes part of their anatomy, as having basically their own dialect, as learning to read clacks/semaphore messages solely by the sound of the shutters flapping, as children picking up the craft by osmosis, as remembering dead clacks operators by sending their names up and down the line continuously. I'd like to be a craftsman. Perhaps this is part of what drew me to chainmaille and conlanging.
So can biology / bioengineering be a craft? I hope so... but if there's craftsmanship to be found here, it probably isn't in the mechanics of techniques. The whole point of science is to perform reproducible experiments, which means eliminating the human variation. (I have been enjoying stuff like getting really good at pouring plates, but there's only so much mastery to be found there.) I suppose this is the sort of field where Real Mastery only comes when you're forty or so.
...Then again, Real Mastery in the sciences (and in sciency engineering fields) seems to require the kind of jackdom-of-all-trades that allows one to think across disciplines with ease. Or perhaps I just see a lot of that because I associate with professors who are (1) interdisciplinary by trade and (2) tenured enough to indulge their neophilia.)
I like the idea of the Wanderer, but I don't have to be one professionally. I can be a Journeyman instead.
Me: ...rather than being a jack of all trades?
Raffi: Yeah, one of the things I really like about med school is that it's forcing me to dig in deep and actually achieve mastery of something. So I can continue dabbling later.
:D
I do find myself drawn to this sort of mastery. One of the things I most enjoyed about Going Postal was the description of clacks operators as craftsmen -- as learning their skill so well that it becomes part of their anatomy, as having basically their own dialect, as learning to read clacks/semaphore messages solely by the sound of the shutters flapping, as children picking up the craft by osmosis, as remembering dead clacks operators by sending their names up and down the line continuously. I'd like to be a craftsman. Perhaps this is part of what drew me to chainmaille and conlanging.
So can biology / bioengineering be a craft? I hope so... but if there's craftsmanship to be found here, it probably isn't in the mechanics of techniques. The whole point of science is to perform reproducible experiments, which means eliminating the human variation. (I have been enjoying stuff like getting really good at pouring plates, but there's only so much mastery to be found there.) I suppose this is the sort of field where Real Mastery only comes when you're forty or so.
...Then again, Real Mastery in the sciences (and in sciency engineering fields) seems to require the kind of jackdom-of-all-trades that allows one to think across disciplines with ease. Or perhaps I just see a lot of that because I associate with professors who are (1) interdisciplinary by trade and (2) tenured enough to indulge their neophilia.)
I like the idea of the Wanderer, but I don't have to be one professionally. I can be a Journeyman instead.