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by WhompingWindows 2911 days ago
The brain is able to change well into adulthood ("neuroplasticity"), and that includes mathematical/scientific/abstraction centers. There are plenty of folks who didn't get a great start in STEM, but through hard work and dedication, they pushed through the inherent frustration in learning STEM.

While some people might be born with a proclivity for these activities, I wouldn't say any individual could not get into science. For the truly uninitiated, check out Planet Earth, Blue Planet, or Cosmos. For the novices, check out your local astronomy club, ask scientists you know to explain their work to you, and don't be afraid to ask follow-up questions. Get into reading science articles in the popular press, and use those to find links to the real research articles, which will be VERY hard to read for beginners. Feel free to skim those, look at graphs/charts/evidence, and read the abstract/conclusions rather than the intro/methods and the whole thing. Finally, check out some MOOCs or local community classes/continuing education.
1 comments
code_coyote 2911 days ago
Good uplifting answer. But it is for what can lead to a hobby, rather than a career. Even certificates from MOOCs won't lead to a job in science, researcher or not.
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mindcrime 2911 days ago
Even certificates from MOOCs won't lead to a job in science, researcher or not.

That depends on how tightly you define "science". If you mean "science in traditional academia, working for/at a major research university or research consortium" then you are almost certainly correct. But if you expand the definition to include the corporate world, and roles that maybe aren't pure research, then I would argue that you can get a job doing science with less "paper credentials" than one might expect.

Whether or not that would/could apply to anything related to QC, I'm not sure, as I don't work in (or even really near) the QC domain. But to pick one example: in terms of machine learning / AI, I've definitely seen it. But maybe AI/ML is an exception to everything else just because it is (at the present) such an empirical / observation / experiment based domain.

Outside of all of that is the notion of "create your own job". If you want to be a researcher in Field X, start a company related to Field X and hire yourself. And, no, I don't intend that to be a glib answer, and I certainly acknowledge that it A. isn't easy, and B. is probably harder / easier in some domains than in others.

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