Question: whats the most interesting thing that youve found out by being a scientist?

Pete Etchells answered on 26 Apr 2012:

Hi katiejane, thanks very much for the question! I mentioned in another question like this about some of the interesting things that I found out during my PhD, but I think more generally, the most interesting thing I’ve found out by being a scientist is how little we actually know about everything! When I first came to that conclusion, I found it really scary – I mean, it’s worrying to think that we really don’t know much about how so many things work in our day-to-day lives; for example, we still really haven’t figured out what it is about our brains that makes us all individual and unique. But then I thought that it means that there are so many exciting things that we can find out, we’re going to be busy for a long time to come. My job is getting to find out about new things that no one else has ever figured out, and I think that’s brilliant.