You did all see this part of that post, right?Moonbear said:
They were right! It does cause blindness!Moonbear said:
Moonbear said:
Fixed...heman said:
It is a fun party. At this year's conference, they had put together a documentary on DVD where they interviewed the founding members of the society (at least the ones still alive). I knew a lot of the history already, because my post-doc mentor has been a member since the inaugural meeting as well, but it was really nice to hear it told in that way and for all the trainee members to see. They commented a few times about the social/dance and the N.A.K.E.D. party, and that someone once proposed they stop sponsoring the dance, and it met with an uproar of protest that it's one of the most important functions of our meeting!TheStatutoryApe said:
The reason is that this society was started by a group of young professors and post-docs back in the late 1960s because they weren't satisfied with the ability to present their science at the meetings they had available, so broke off from another society and formed a new society. Because they were young at the time, they made it a primary mission of the society to get trainee involvement at all levels, and they still do that to this day. It's the sort of meeting where people bring their entire lab because they know it's going to be a good experience for their students and post-docs. But the social is the place where students get to see that the professors are all human and fun and approachable (if they don't figure that out by the symposium talks given by professors wearing jeans). I had a dinner the first night and was chatting with some of the new trainees, and was sharing with them stories of my first meetings and how seeing these old, gray-haired professors whose articles I had read and held in high esteem as gurus in the field were getting up and dancing on tables at the N.A.K.E.D. party! (I'm sure that's against some rules of manners.) 
