[cliglot]

I’ve been in a bit of creative/intellectual rut the last few years, but before that there were a handful of things that intrigued me in the last 5-10 years.

Most recently, I became interested in the field of photonics/optics, particularly in the field of novel optical communications research.

I’ve had mild interests in things like Biology and History since I was a child. The latter particularly hooked me a few years back.

Neuroscience is a pretty cool one as well. The human brain is of course one of the most fascinating pieces of hardware in existence and understanding it (to whatever level we currently can) is incredibly interesting to me.

At one point I thought about going into security research, but now that everyone and their mother is headed that direction, it’s become less feasible.

Unfortunately I don’t even have a bachelors degree, and most of the fields are research heavy and not very accessible to hobbyists, so my actual interaction with these things remains relegated to reading papers/pop sci articles/etc.

[dieselgate]

Don't forget the study of neuroscience is much larger than just the human brain. Many other target organisms are studied e.g. fruit fly and are much more thoroughly understood on a fundamental level. Respectfully, when people want to understand the human brain they usually intend to study sociology or psychology rather than neuroscience. Although, of course, neuroscience is applicable to human brains as well.

[asdff]

Every neuron in the fly brain has been mapped recently. It is an amazing model system to work with. A couple weeks generation time (imagine implications for crossing and growing up mutants). Not just in neuro either. Better than working on mice too. IRB doesn't care about how you decapitate your flies.