Flor 
@flor@scholar.social
- Pronouns
- She/her/hers
- Languages
- English/Spanish
- Country
- USA
Life sciences postdoc, mostly genetics and cell biology recently. Week is approximately 3 computer days, 2 lab days. Lots of data analysis work.
Joined Dec 2018
PIs who use undergrads as free labor
I despise PIs that tell other PIs, "hey did you know you can get undergraduates to work in your lab for free and they can just wash dishes all day?!" No. No no no. Occasional dishwashing help? Sure, of course, because some amount of lab maintenance is everyone's job and it's useful to be in the lab and get to know people. But a full semester or more of only dishwashing? Nooooo. That student better be getting work-study funding at least.
Flor
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Good article about the suppressed contributions of women in science. While I would optimistically like to think that most people know about Rosalind Franklin's contribution to the discovery of the structure of DNA now, the problem goes much deeper.
Flor
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New programmers! What are your biggest questions about learning how to code?
I will answer as many as possible in a Q&A blog post early next week!
Flor
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sexism in science
"The History of Women in Science Is Hidden in Plain Sight: By searching through footnotes, researchers found female programmers who made important but unrecognized contributions to genetics."
science history + current sexism
If I visit again, I'm going to go prepared with uncensored books on the history of DNA that actually mention Rosalind Franklin. Just reverse-shoplift them into the Cold Spring Harbor Lab's libraries. Really piss James Watson off!
science history + current sexism
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory has no references to Rosalind Franklin and her extremely important role in the discovery of the structure of DNA (it was her research data). It's such a bizarre experience to visit, see DNA history everywhere, and find her so deliberately absent. I assume it's because James Watson still lives there and doesn't like her. Kind of made me wish I carried Sharpies around. I'm not usually a vandal, but come on that place was begging for it.
Flor
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'Academia is full Marxism'
Me, staring at the extremely hierarchical system based off of free labor and normalizing unhealthy behavior behind the Edgy Professor image <<lol what>>
Flor
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Smoky the 🐻 put a lot of pressure on me early on. Out of all the people in the world, he said *I* was the only one who could prevent forest fires.
Damn, 🐻, a kid can only do so much.
Python course promo code
FYI I found a promo code for a free Udemy python course for the pandas package (for spreadsheet processing). "APRILMAGIC" for:
https://www.udemy.com/data-analysis-with-pandas/
I just tried it and it worked for me, so I'm sharing it.
Flor
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I've had this box since Xmas and would really like to throw it out but I can't because it's siegfried's den
Flor
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It's 2019. Stop top-posting in email please. Reply to the bits that you mean to and keep it short.
AKA stop letting Google tell you how to communicate.
What kind of #ergonomics do people use for work/study? I am transitioning from all bench work to almost all computational work in my lab. I need to improve my computer ergonomics. Any recommendations? I bought gel rest pads for my wrists recently, but they feel kind of awkward. Not used to them.
Flor
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Kill the concept of "RT does not equal endorsement."
Don't share content if you don't endorse it.
Don't spread it. Let it die.
Do not give it a platform.
Flor
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I use Ubuntu and a Google-free LineageOS phone, Firefox, Ublock Origin, Pi-Hole... I was gonna set up DNS-over-HTTPS, but now I find out that T-Mobile is selling my location data anyway. At some point it feels like privacy is just impossible https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/nepxbz/i-gave-a-bounty-hunter-300-dollars-located-phone-microbilt-zumigo-tmobile
Flor
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FINALLY I know enough about coding to get all snooty about certain practices. Living the dream
Flor
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We've only got 19 years left to patch all those 32-bit devices before the Unix End Of Time.
I helped fix a lot of Y2K stuff. This time round, there's no way we're gonna catch everything. No way.
I need to make sure I'm dead before then or well enough to not go anywhere NEAR any kind of medical facility.
One doctor I went to is still using Windows XP and wanted to know why I thought they didn't need my social security number.
Those $300,000 MRI and X-Ray machines aren't getting patched, but are online..
Flor
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On leaving the politics out of hacking
So I guess that sufficient time has passed that I'll tell the story.
At a company I once worked at one of the managers sent out an email. Could anyone volunteer to give some programming classes at one of the local schools? It sounded ok: a bit of outreach and a chance to educate the next generation. Until I looked up what school it was. Turned out it was one of the elite private schools for rich kids only.
One of my co-workers replied, saying that they had also looked up the school and that they were affluent enough that they could just hire a hacker for a few evenings. There are plenty of hackers around who could use a bit of extra income. They also said that volunteering for this would merely help to perpetuate special privileged access to skills or knowledge by the rich, and I agreed. I said it's not a feedback loop that we should be helping to reinforce. If it were a state school it would be a different proposition.
It later turned out that the school in question was where the manager was sending their own children, and this pulled the rug out from their previous often repeated statements about "believing in meritocracy". It made them look like a hypocrite - claiming that anyone could rise while trying to give an already over-privileged class yet more advantages.
In a later meeting when the hypocrisy was pointed out the manager went on a rant about "there will be no more politics at this company". Everyone just looked at them as if they had just said something really unintelligent. Which of course they had.
There is always politics in hacking. Many of the hackers of my generation didn't come from elite schools. They were not "toffs" with special tutors. Most attended state schools and were self-taught on home computers. The "apolitical hacker" is just someone who thinks that their own politics should be hegemonic.
At a company I once worked at one of the managers sent out an email. Could anyone volunteer to give some programming classes at one of the local schools? It sounded ok: a bit of outreach and a chance to educate the next generation. Until I looked up what school it was. Turned out it was one of the elite private schools for rich kids only.
One of my co-workers replied, saying that they had also looked up the school and that they were affluent enough that they could just hire a hacker for a few evenings. There are plenty of hackers around who could use a bit of extra income. They also said that volunteering for this would merely help to perpetuate special privileged access to skills or knowledge by the rich, and I agreed. I said it's not a feedback loop that we should be helping to reinforce. If it were a state school it would be a different proposition.
It later turned out that the school in question was where the manager was sending their own children, and this pulled the rug out from their previous often repeated statements about "believing in meritocracy". It made them look like a hypocrite - claiming that anyone could rise while trying to give an already over-privileged class yet more advantages.
In a later meeting when the hypocrisy was pointed out the manager went on a rant about "there will be no more politics at this company". Everyone just looked at them as if they had just said something really unintelligent. Which of course they had.
There is always politics in hacking. Many of the hackers of my generation didn't come from elite schools. They were not "toffs" with special tutors. Most attended state schools and were self-taught on home computers. The "apolitical hacker" is just someone who thinks that their own politics should be hegemonic.
And the thing is, I *was* interested in continuing education, but at college-entering time, I didn't think it was actually attainable for me. Everyone talks about law school and med school loans. I come from a poor family and my parents have no retirement plan except me and my siblings, so loans of that size were scary and out of the question. The risk for financial ruin was too much. I'm grateful my university told me about grad school stipends (not loan based). Made #gradschool feel possible.
Sometimes I still think about how I might not have a PhD if not for freshman-me defiantly lying and checking the "PhD" box when my university asked, "What is the highest degree you hope to attain?" It was an intro survey of the incoming student body. The university put me on mailing lists about pre-grad school info. I learned about research opportunities and programs like McNair. I originally just expected to get my B.S. and get a job. Good job, freshman-me! #underrepresented #socioeconomic
Flor
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Why do academics feel such a strong need to tell others how to spend their time, especially around this time of year? http://neurodojo.blogspot.com/2015/12/time-policing.html
- Pronouns
- She/her/hers
- Languages
- English/Spanish
- Country
- USA
Life sciences postdoc, mostly genetics and cell biology recently. Week is approximately 3 computer days, 2 lab days. Lots of data analysis work.
Joined Dec 2018
