75 Eve Marder and how Recipe Science ruins creativity

Professor Eve Marder is a pioneering neuroscientist at Brandeis University. Drawing on decades of work with a small neural circuit in lobsters, she describes how discovery often emerges from intuition, puzzlement , and the courage to follow unexpected observations. Eve highlights the central role of personal tolerance for ambiguity in shaping a scientist’s questions and methods. She discusses the fine line between idiosyncrasies and general principles , and how deep familiarity with the literature shaped her scientific intuition – something hard to replicate in today’s information-saturated world. We also discuss how reading is a prerequisite for clear writing, and how rigid publishing norms led to “recipe science” , suppressing creativity. ​​For more information on Night Science, visit .

You can listen to 75 Eve Marder and how Recipe Science ruins creativity online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

75 Eve Marder and how Recipe Science ruins creativity is an episode from Night Science by Itai Yanai & Martin Lercher.

This episode is 33:35 long.

This episode was published on May 26, 2025.

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