Building organizations to build technology to solve pressing problems. Reluctant Twitter user. Active fetch-player (haven't taught the dog to throw yet.)
Today,
@AdamMarblestone
and I are launching
@Convergent_FROs
to incubate a series of FROs in the coming years. Focused Research Organizations will fill a structural gap in the R&D ecosystem. We have the opportunity to target especially impactful technical challenges.
Recently read Thomas Kuhn's "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions"...
With my interest in metascience, research and progress - what other books have I been sleeping on?
Some people go on silent retreats.
Some people go on ski weeks.
Some people retreat to a tropical island.
I just realized I want to go to a training camp with ~4-5 hours of intense exercise, massage, walking, sauna and healthy food.
Where do I find this?
My brother learned about Effective Altruism in his undergrad philosophy class โ cool
He had lots of good questions about longtermism/ex-risk โ good
He had never heard of Give Directly, GiveWell or J-PAL โ bad
I am looking for examples of OKRs at research orgs.
A FRO team member told me that the classic engineering or customer success examples aren't useful. Looking for something from scientific research - capturing/allowing for the uncertainty in research projects.
Convergent Research is launching a series of FROs targeted at high impact problems in science and technology.
We need a Director of Development to make it happen.
Not just a fundraiser - someone who truly understands the science, mission and impact.
Pre-2019, I wasn't agentic. I was interested in all the same things, had the same education, the core of the same skills - but didn't know agency was a thing.
Cate is right - it is super learnable.
Agency is a learnable skill. It's an all-purpose life intensifier, allowing you to make the world more like what you want. I wrote a post about it, link in bio.
I want to write a blog post about how to form science nonprofits (from an ops, nitty gritty POV) but I don't like writing and don't have a blog. Would anyone want to co-write it with me?
We're working on a new institutional and incentive model for science - also doing mind-blowingly cool science.
Most of these roles work directly with me - it will be a blast.
Excited to be growing the core CR team!
We aim to launch 10-20+ moonshot science projects over the coming yrs, and will need exceptional people with the right mix of โcrazyโ and โgroundedโ to accelerate our core org + FROs across ops, talent search, etc.
5 roles open now ๐
Every call.
@MWCvitkovic
: I know nothing about this subject and I'm sure I'm not helpful.
Field leading expert: Thank you for your very insightful questions. They have really helped crystalize my thinking on this.
@michael_nielsen
I used to rate my risk tolerance against more or less dangerous than driving. (i.e. is spending an hour doing this less dangerous than driving? great, don't even think it through, just do it.)
But driving has gotten safer, so I'm considering updating to something new.
I'm super excited to see the two newest FROs
@ParallelSqTech
and
@EvEBiotech
announced!
PTI is taking multiplexing and mass specs to the next level to rapidly advance single sell proteomics.
EvE is creating and open sourcing what could be the most impactful drug dataset.
I'm really glad that Greg's wife was diagnosed.
But I've known about my EDS for over a decade. And, as far as I can tell, there isn't much I can do about it.
1) The cause of the disease is extremely poorly understood
2) We have basically no delivery mechanisms that could target
A reason we need beneficial AGI:
After five years of pain across many systems in her body (a broken foot from stepping off a curb, debilitating migraines, fatigue, joint pain and instability, etc), my wife was recently diagnosed with a genetic disorder called Hypermobile
Plane with internet - Extremely productive and focused
Plane without internet - Extremely restful, nap, journal, think
Plane with bad internet - Chaotically open lots of tabs, feel stressed, get no work done.
@devonzuegel
80% of them are sterile :( But there are many that are stunning.
The number one reason I'm likely to drop into a random hotel? Hotel lobbies almost always have public bathrooms.
This builds on some amazing work by
@AdamMarblestone
,
@MWCvitkovic
and
@AGamick
and others.
The concept is these take on projects:
โ too big for a single academic lab
โ too complex for multi-lab collab
โ and not profitable enough for a vc-backed startup or industrial R&D
I think of
@Ben_Reinhardt
as turning science fiction into reality. I am so so excited that he announced
@Spec__Tech
so everyone else can watch this important experiment in scientific org design!
Check out the Forbes piece on him that stole my line!
1/ For the past year, weโve been building a new research organization:
Speculative Technologies (
@spec__tech
) exists to create an abundant, wonder-filled future by unlocking powerful materials and manufacturing technologies that donโt have a home in other institutions.
We're hosting a summer party in Boston w/
@Convergent_FROs
and
@newscienceorg
, June 10th at 7pm. Scientists, science funders and biotech folks are welcome! Add your details here if you'd like to come:
I actually really enjoy the surge of new people at the gym in January ๐๏ธโโ๏ธ
My thoughts are basically: โYeah - get it girlโ โhope I see you tomorrowโ and "good god, use less weight."
Wanted to share some thoughts for anyone new to an exercise habit.
There are few humans I respect more than
@ilangur
. He has deep technical knowledge, a strong vision for improving human existence and scientific incentives - and is also a wonderfully kind and thoughtful leader and mentor. I'm so excited that he'll be leading
@ARIA_research
๐ฃToday we are announcing
@ilangur
as the first CEO of
@ARIA_research
alongside the first Chairman
@matthewclifford
.
Their expert leadership will enable transformational science and technology to be identified and funded at speed ๐ก๐ฌ
#ScienceSuperpower
Iโm speaking at the Founder-Led Biotech Summit by
@pillar_vc
&
@petribio
!
Join me for the free, virtual summit convening biotech founders, PhDs, scientists, investors & leaders building the next breed of biotech companies: the founder-led biotechs.
I'm sitting behind a dad on a plane who is scrolling through photos on his phone and zooming in on his adult daughter's face over and over again. It's extremely endearing.
@LauraDeming
You may have to eat more! If I exercise heavily, I end up needing significantly more calories. If I exercise and don't increase my calorie intake, I feel similarly (not focused, lethargic, not creative.)
I'm looking for a visual science communicator/ artist/ illustrator who is interested in a wide range of topics (biology, neuroscience, space, robotics etc.) Can anyone intro me?
@AstroRob
@holljmck
@GeorgeZisiadis
@SparrowSoup
you might know someone.
I've done ~20 (informational) interviews over the last couple of months about a single role.
I am fascinated at the radically contradictory advice we've received...
It's Tom Kalil (
@tkalil2050
)'s birthday, and so I wanted to give a shoutout regarding his "Magic Laptop" thought experiment:
If you write a press release on it, it becomes real. You just specify who agrees to do what (org A takes action B)
What headline would you write?
Through FROs we can differentially develop technologies that help reduce existential risk for humans, mitigate global emergencies like catastrophic climate change and pioneer technologies that drastically improve human wellbeing.
Michael running for DCCC in San Francisco gives me hope as I had scarcely ever allowed myself to hope before.
Please check out his campaign and share where you can.
i felt really emotional seeing my chinese name in print today.
i was born ่ตๅคฉๅฎธ in china, and immigrated to the us at 2.5.
when i started elementary school, the office lady said she couldn't pronounce my name so "you need an american name."
1/3
Planning to live up to this high praise in 2024.
Throwing a monthly dinner at my place, planning some group trips, hopefully at least one workshop.
What are your favorite community building activities?
I've discovered the way in which I want to use Twitter. Have cool friends. Get really excited when my cool friends work on cool projects. Retweet them.
I'm thinking of getting a short, blunt fringe.
Maybe more, small visible tattoos?
I am no longer young, hip and cool.
Does anyone have a beanie I could borrow?
I left my docs at home :(
Oh, by the way, I'm in Austin today if anyone wants to meet up.
๐ฅAre you an ML scientist interested in connectomics? Become part of our amazing team of scientists and engineers and join our efforts in creating the next generation of brain mapping technology!๐ฅ (1/3)
Continually proud of and impressed by
@ForestNeurotech
I've been able to spend some time in their labs lately - it's amazing to see the progress that they've made in a small amount of time.
@pomarius85
joined
@Convergent_FROs
today as Chief of Staff.
I am more productive already and I've been laughing for a solid 3 hours. Tremendous first day.
It's amazing how much not wearing my glasses affects my ability to have social interactions.
Just passed someone in the hallway while mostly blind.
Them: Hi Anastasia
Me: I'm well, how are you?
Today I splashed Dandan Noodles on my nice dress before a meeting.
I had a stain removing wipe in my bag and was able to fix it. This is the most competent thing I (potentially anyone) has ever done. I won't be taking any questions.
Iโm excited to share that Iโm joining
@ARIA_research
, a new ๐ฌ๐ง government funding agency, as a Programme Director.
Iโm developing the structure to fund a concerted R&D effort towards accelerating mathematical modelling of real-world phenomena using AI, at a scale of O(10โท) ยฃ/a.
Catch me at
#FTC2022
today talking all things founders and Focused Research Organizations.
Going to be an important event to help drive the
#publicgoods
and
#opensource
community forward.
@
I bought a one pound box of chocolate for a friend.
That friend went out of town.
Am I allowed to give 3/4 lb of chocolate to a stranger? If I don't have an answer by this evening it will be 1/2 lb of chocolate.
@nickcammarata
I currently have no public takes on "we need AGI."
But I think that there is a lot of non-AGI work that can be done here.
1) Update science funding
2) Build more tools for science
3) Change clinical trials/FDA approvals
4) Improve information flows in the US healthcare system
Through happenstance, I know 4 people who work at Anthropic.
They all seem to fall into the "incredibly nice" and "incredibly smart" categories.
Anthropic seems like a great place for excellent engineers.
@elidourado
What if instead of doing injecting right away, we instead catalogued many types of particles, how well they reflect sunlight and if they have negative side effects?
I can imagine some sort of multidisciplinary, thoughtful, scientific project that would do this...
Iโm grateful for the visionary founders of
@CultivariumFRO
and
@E11BIO
who are building a team of leading scientists and top notch engineers to create transformative platform technologies. Theyโre tackling non-model organisms and large scale brain mapping.
I'm super happy that people are starting to know our non-profit: N/A.
But actually, I really am hiring for a controller! Send me your favorite finance people.
A reminder to the scientific community at large that we are always seeking short abstracts towards FRO proposals at
This can be in any field, as long as there is a major bottleneck in R&D that a FRO-shaped team can unlock. See:
@robertwiblin
Point source capture wonโt get us to carbon negative. While different CDR technologies may be not efficient now, the R&D and market building needs to start now so they can be useable in the future.
I posted a "Head of People" role this week. I've already had more than 400 people apply - this was a big surprise to me. Is it always like this in People Ops?