Merry Christmas to me!

Yes, I am a geek for life...and life is bliss!  Today was a great day as two books I ordered arrived!  The first is by Paula Stephan and is called How Economics Shapes Science.  I've followed her work for years and I'm really excited to read her book (I'll post a review on my blog as soon as I'm done reading it). As she's studied the role of postdocs in science, I'm very interested to see how she considers them specifically and the scientific workforce in general. 

The next book titled Science: Bought and Sold actually came out in 2002. It is edited by Philip Mirowski and Esther-Mirjam Sent.  This is quite a tome and will take quite a bit of effort to get through, but I am really looking forward to reading about "The Organization of Cognitive Labor", "Scientists as Agents", and "The Instability of Authorship".  Wish me luck!

On a side note, my next post will be about a NAS meeting that I attended on Monday and Tuesday. COSEPUP is again examining the postdoc experience. After attending the open sessions and chatting with some of the committee members I feel that the resulting report has the potential to be a meaningful one.  I'll write up my notes and impressions ASAP!