Heh.

Now…What I find interesting is that seemingly a lot of people think that the right to say (think, believe) what you want actually *does* mean that you also have the right to be listened to…

I wonder why people think that?

When I’ve said to those people, ‘Does the government have to listen to Neo Nazi groups when working out employment legislation then?’ They say, ‘Well, no, of course not.’ Immediately, they negate their viewpoint, but can’t see it. It’s almost like they think, ‘Everyone has the right to be listened to – except, of course, racists, bigots, dumb people – OK. Just me. *I* have the right to be listened to!!! And you’d better listen to me or else!’

I don’t get it.

Anyway, this old thread caught my eye, because its basic point is something I’ve long thought and occasionally said: the right to speak does not imply an obligation, on the part of anyone else, to listen. One of the other respondents mentions “the right to vote” as implying an obligation, on the part of the government, to listen to us.

The answer to this apparent conundrum is in the relationship between people and democratic governments. A government isn’t this “thing” that exists independently of the people of a nation. It’s there because we put it there, and when a person stands for election, he or she does so on the basis that they will (effectively) sign a contract with their electorate, (That’s electorate as in everyone , not just those who voted for that candidate.)

The elected candidates form a government, which pledges to obey a “social contract” with the country. This is evident in the language used e.g. every politician makes noises about being “a servant of the people” at some point.

If an elected government or representative breaks their contract, there are consequences, as we have seen and will see again. My point is that the voter-candidate-government relationship doesn’t need to be framed in terms of “rights”: these are real or implied contractual relationships that have clauses. Voting is not the expression of an absolute or inalienable right; rather it’s a contractual right, as laid down in the social contract, which also includes contractual obligations on those we elect to office.

To Alex: Yes, protein structures matter jack. However, if we better understood cell signaling such that we could ‘intercept’ the message “cell divide” and replace it with “cell die” then there is an obvious connection to cancer there (yes I’m using a colloquial terms). My current understanding is that (again this is a simplified explanation) in many cases, a common ‘chemical’ is used to signal such messages. Seemingly a pulse, for example, is therefore used to send a message with the pulse periodicity determining the message sent-this is poorly understood area atm. Furthermore, there is work being carried out on how messages are sent between cells with suggestion being that certain cells act as nodes.

But that’s not really the point of the project. On the whole, graduate biologists (and above) have a pretty poor understanding of how powerful mathematical modeling can be and graduate mathematicians (and above) usually have virtually no clue as to the world of biology. This in contrast to the relationships seen between physics and maths departments for example. It’s mainly (historically) statistics departments who collaborate with biologists and there is lot’s of work that goes on, but even here mathematicians rarely have any ‘hands on’ experience. Hence, a project has been set up where biologist will be spending time in lectures rooms learning how to write equations and mathematicians will spend time cultivating cells and fiddling with lasers and the like. I have to say, stepping from a maths office where there is so much chalk dust it looks like its been snowing into a biomed lab was stepping onto the starship enterprise. Math’s departments must be the cheapest going.

Reading the above, there is obviously a PR element involved as well as ‘wide eyed’ amazement on my part. It sounds so nice, mathematicians and biologists living as one happy family. Perhaps, but then perhaps something will come from it. I think in the long term, there may actually be interest in orientating towards ‘theoretical biology’ degrees. Especially now computer software is ‘catching up’ with medical imaging hardware for example.

Also from a purely selfish point-of-view I’ll be earning a pretty decent tax free salary; twice the income of my parental home which is the only marker I’ve got to go off really. I make no great claims, if there wasn’t any money in it I wouldn’t be doing it. My girlfriend and I want a house, family etc. (eventually). My girlfriend and I have £50,000 of debt between us, although personally I think the deal you get with the student loans company is more than generous so I’m not complaining. Our immediate debt is only £12,000 pounds, but even still we’d go under in about 3 months if we worked for free (but yes I know 12 grand is nothing compared to a mortgage, feeding a family etc.,) Working in a lab is vastly more interesting than 99% of jobs anyway and if I’m being honest, a hell of a lot more satisfying than being pushed around for 2-4 years until I’d a) qualify as a lawyer b) qualify as an accountant – my other career choices. (Oh and infinitely more gratifying than my previous part-time jobs). So from a purely fiscal perspective, I don’t see what I’m doing as a waste of my time. I’m certainly not looking more than 18 months down the line for now anyway. However equally, there is a certain kudos that comes with studying a maths PhD which may potentially lead to greater employability.

So to address your criticism, yes I am a naive grad student but then how experienced can you expect a graduate to be? I would imagine that if i was to come back and argue with my present self in twenty years time it would not be a level playing field. I just have to compare myself to when I was taking A-levels to see that. I think part of the fun of being human is watching how you evolve as an individual as you age, how much of ‘current me’ will remain in 20 years? On that ‘current me’ point, reading back my above posts I think I must have been drunk writing them. Certainly I let my emotions get the better of me, but then a couple of posts in particular by Gia were designed to spark my emotions. Evidently, not all animal testing is ‘evil’ or ‘wasteful’ but I think you have to compare what I said to Gia’s post on how she would willingly kill 100 dogs etc.; conversely I have to read what Gia said with relation to my own posts. (Yet I still think it was unfair for Gia wrote me off as a PhD ‘candidate’ who hadn’t taken the ‘how to think’ class yet.)

To Gia and Alex: So yeah reading my posts on here, it is easy to write me off as being all about ’student’ politics, I can see that. My main defense here would be that it’s all too easy to get ‘carried away’ on an internet forum. Although ‘Eduao’ could see some merit in the exchanges on here. I would say though that my beliefs, as they are, and my understanding of the world, as it is, do not come solely from my age. Comparatively, I could put down much of what is said on here as grumpy and middle aged. You would call me naive and I would say you were bitter and jealous of my youth. I wouldn’t though because, even though most reading my posts would probably consider me a prick, as you have both bothered to reply to my posts I do consider what you have said. Evidently, the view you have of me is one that is likely to be repeated.

If I acted how I sound on here that is. Please, please don’t imagine me as some triumphant student politician that marches (and/or mopes) down the street with a ‘meat is murder’ stretched across my pounding chest (and/or draped across my starving vegan bones-which ever you prefer). I’m one of the most reserved people you can meet. Not shy, just I dunno, clenched. I know where I stand in relation to people very well, which is that 90% of my acquaintances/humans piss me off; perhaps not surprising given that 75% of the people I regularly talk to are students. I’m convinced that nightclubs are a conspiracy (which everyone always bloody insists on going to), especially on student nights. Conversely, endless endless photographs of people on night outs on Facebook make me give up hope for the human race. Everything is a bloody competition when your my age. My being in 4 year long relationship (although small compare to a twenty year marriage) is met with, ‘I dunno know how you’ve done that. I wanna have fun, y’know what I mean? Before I settle down after uni and that.’ Yeah right, I’ve seen you trying to pull don’t forget. Then my graduate friends aren’t much better, either already gloating about the salaries they’re earning or the car they drive, or endlessly ranting on about how they want to ‘travel’ / females posting pictures of themselves in bikinis at umpteen different beaches-well done you have breasts like every other woman, what an achievement. Then there are my white friends who call each other nigger and my black friends who go to all black parties (especially wannabe black lawyers for some reason).

Ack, it’s no bloody surprise that student’s have a poor reputation. I for one agree with most of what is said. However, worryingly, as my friends and I get older, I still don’t see maturity kicking in (which I guess some people must think about me). Also, now that I’m beginning to slowly look like a twenty something such that ‘adults’ directly engage me in conversation, I still see that many of the same character floors reappearing amongst the young population. The youth are written off, but I don’t the miracle transformation into ‘thoughtful human’ occurring with 90% of the population.

*breathes*

Secondly even if I gave you the structure of every protein in the cell it really wouldn’t get you much closer to understanding what needs to be done to arrest cell division.

Oh well, PR is everything these days…and P.I. will make up shit to get naive grad students to work in their lab for free…AND get government funding (from those decision makers who know less than nothing about biology).

Good luck to you James…and remember what I told you when you wake up one day and realize you have wasted years of your life…and people’s money.

You’re not seriously asking that question, are you?! Oh. I see by how you followed it up that you are. *sigh* OK. I guess I have to spell things out:
1,000 kittens, puppies, pigs, cows – 10,000, 100,000, 1,000,000 – matter far, far less to me that the health and happiness of human beings. If it takes the deaths of a million animals to find a cure for a disease which effects hundreds, thousands, millions of people then I support that research.

Do you support stem cell research? There are huge numbers of people – and the American government- who are against stem cell research because of God or Jesus or something. Why is that any different from not supporting animal testing?

Of course, the fact that I’m writing this from my *’fall-of-western-civilisation-proof’ South American home does say a lot about where I fit in to all that, but I’d quite like to read about it on the internet.

*’big gay’ prefix opportunity for Gia.

A physics professor friend of mine said to me the other day, ‘You know when you’re a student and you have all these idealistic politics and you think if everyone just believed what you believed that you could all change the world? And then you get a bit older and realise that everyone older than 30 who still believes all of that is more than likely an idiot. If they are over 40 and still believe that, they probably work for the local council.’ So true.

And, I’ll let you know that Alex has a PhD in bio-physics (is that right, Alex?), two *other* science Masters degrees (what are they?) and a law degree. He’s a little bit more advanced than someone who’s starting their PhD in September. Just so you know.

So, no, I’m not writing you off for being a student… it’s just that I’m bored.