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As a kid, I loved those science fiction films where the space patrol guys had those whacked out control panels with dials and toggles and gauges and stuff. Even when we were kids we used to make fun of "the future" in those movies because it was totally ridiculous compared to the space-age technology of 1975. So it surprised the hell out of me when the professor led me into the monitoring room. I expected to find a row of computers and video monitors, some high-end imaging stuff, anything, you know? I mean, it's not like the university couldn't afford state-of-the-art. They had just built that big-ass biology lab at the other end of campus, right? Yeah, so, I'm literally speechless when he sits me down in this wooden desk chair and puts me face to face with the control gear and two rows of analog meters. He tells me my shift will be every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon, just before his class, shuts the door, and leaves me there to stare at eight meters and three dials, with just some scribbled notes from the guy who had the previous shift about not adjusting the gain more than 1 dB without recording a minute's worth of data so they could see the adjustment on the paper output.
In retrospect, I really appreciate that experience, because it taught me that science wasn't about the gadgets, it was about the ideas. We've gotten spoiled in the years since then. The laptops my undergrads bring to class now are more powerful than what passed for our entire processing core in that lab. And sure, there's no denying that we can analyze everything so much faster and crunch so much more data, but the tools don't make the research better if we don't understand what the tools are for. By the end of that semester I felt like I was Albert Fucking Einstein because I could tell what was going on just from the hum some of those old devices made. My write-ups were full of the little ideas that I thought of all afternoon as I sat in that closet. The professor never laughed at any of them, at least not in front of me, and one time he almost choked on his tea as he read my notes and realized I'd seen a solution to a problem they'd been struggling with for a year. His recommendation letter got me into my doctoral program later on. I read in the Chronicle of High Ed that he retired a year or so ago and I sent him an e-mail thanking him for starting me off in my career. He wrote me back a letter with a fountain pen and ink. I laughed.
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