Science can become fashionable. Stanislav Straupe, Head of Quantum Computing Sector at the Lomonosov Moscow State University Center for Quantum Technologies, is confident of this.
According to the speaker, scientists need to show the general public by their own example that science is done by interesting and adequate people. "To make science fashionable, we must create role models for future scientists. If we want to attract young people to science, we must show them what they will be like if they successfully complete this path," Straupe explained.
Also, in an interview with WWW1.ru on the sidelines of the Forum of Future Technologies, the candidate of physical and mathematical sciences explained the key difference between the professions of a scientist and an engineer. Scientists try to disassemble the events taking place in the world into "screws" in order to understand their structure. An engineer faces a different task – to assemble and create something. An engineer transforms, converts and modifies reality.
It seems to me that I am gradually evolving from a scientist towards an engineer. In a good sense of the word. That is, I am reorienting myself towards some applied solutions. This does not mean that the scientist in me is dying. It's just that our science is slowly becoming a technology. This means that it has kind of “matured” and now produces something that can really be useful to people, and not just represents some fundamental interest. As a true physicist, I am in superposition. In my mindset, I am a scientist and I am motivated, of course, by scientific interest. On the other hand, colleagues motivate us to create technologies and products, to commercialize them. This is such a driver that makes you look at the world a little through the eyes of an engineer. Not a very familiar look for me. I'm learning little by little. Then, I'll probably have to look at the world through the eyes of a businessman. These are all very interesting ways to look at the world.
