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An Alternative Approach to Deep Tech VC
Marrying early YC's goals with systems from the mid-20th C. deep tech pipeline
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Eric Gilliam
4
How did places like Bell Labs know how to ask the right questions?
Alternative Title: Why all applied research organizations should hire a Bell-style systems engineer
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Eric Gilliam
3
A Report on Scientific Branch-Creation: How the Rockefeller Foundation helped bootstrap the field of molecular biology
This piece is noticeably longer (twice the length) than the others on this Substack. This is because 1) it is a practically-oriented historical…
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Eric Gilliam
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When do ideas get easier to find?
 • Eric Gilliam
4
A Progress Studies History of Early MIT — Part 1: Training the engineers who built the country
 • Eric Gilliam
What should new-age research organizations be optimizing for?
 • Eric Gilliam
3
How did places like Bell Labs know how to ask the right questions?
 • Eric Gilliam
3
A Report on Scientific Branch-Creation: How the Rockefeller Foundation helped bootstrap the field of molecular biology
 • Eric Gilliam
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Irving Langmuir, the General Electric Research Laboratory, and when applications lead to theory
To this point, I’ve written tens of thousands of words on this Substack covering the work of scientists from the early-to-mid-1900s — a golden era of…
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Eric Gilliam
A Progress Studies History of Early MIT — Part 1: Training the engineers who built the country
The MIT Series Patrick Collison and Tyler Cowen opened their 2019 Atlantic piece that helped jump-start the progress studies movement with the following…
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Eric Gilliam
When do ideas get easier to find?
And why progress studies may be much older than you think
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Eric Gilliam
4
John von Neumann: A Strange Kind of Bird
What his career can teach us about the nature of scientific creativity.
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Eric Gilliam
4
Bombs, Brains, and Science
Would you rather lose 10% of your researchers or 10% of your labs?
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Eric Gilliam
The Past and Present of Computer-Augmented Hypothesis Generation
Don Swanson’s career started on a path familiar to many who read this blog. A BA in Physics from CalTech in 1945. A Ph.D. in Theoretical Physics from UC…
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Eric Gilliam
 and 
Corin Wagen
1
How Recent Innovation in Jiu-jitsu Helps Us Think About OpenAI’s Future
Check out my guest post for the ChinaTalk Substack on recent innovation in the sport of jiu-jitsu and how it can help us think about OpenAI’s future. In…
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Eric Gilliam
FreakTakes
FreakTakes
Historical analyses for those building a new generation of research orgs
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