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## Inbox
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> [!NOTE]
> The goal of this note is to discuss a difference between the way I do my research and the way other researchers do. See [[How my approach is different]] for more differences.
## Researchers in academia could do a better job at explaining things to the public
> [!QUOTE]
> _"If you can't explain something to a six-year-old, you really don't understand it yourself."_
I don't come from the academic world. The ways that they communicate are not second-nature for me. I come from the world of open-source software, blogs and meetups. Even in that world, I find that I have my own style that's different from others.
When I look at the way that other researchers show their results, most of the time I'm disappointed. I love to explain science to people, simplifying it to make it easier for them to relate. I love to make people excited. _Some_ researchers do a great job of this. The [Hide and Seek video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kopoLzvh5jY) is my favorite example. The [AlphaGo documentary](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXuK6gekU1Y) by DeepMind is very accessible to laypeoply, and it reached an audience of 30M people. I also like the fact that many research papers by these labs are accompanied with a blog post that's easier to read than a paper. ([Example for Hide and Seek](https://openai.com/blog/emergent-tool-use/).)
Research papers can be difficult to read. I've gone through a few dozen research paper as of March 2022, and I still find them difficult. Some research papers are written in a more accessible language than others. [Some of them](https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.06857) include links to videos of experiments on YouTube, which is great.
These examples are the exceptions to the norm. Many research papers are so difficult to read and visualize. A few days ago I read a paper that I was really interested in. I wanted to see the video of one of the experiments that the authors were writing about, but there was no such video. There was a link to the code, which isn't taken for granted, but it's often difficult to install all the dependencies needed to run research code, and even then it's hard to know how to run the experiment in the way that the authors were discussing.
I'm guessing that there are good reasons for that. I'm guessing that researchers don't want to sacrifice rigorosity for popularity.
## I want to explain things better
I'm good at explaining things. I want to do a better job.
When I do have results for my research, I will write a research paper. But I'll also go to great lengths to make it accessible for as many people as possible. This means videos. This means blog posts that are written for laypeople.
I hope I can balance my desire to make research accessible with the rigorosity expected of me.
I do want to be able to send my research to my friends and family, and I want them to understand what I'm doing. Not just in an abstract way. I think that laypeople can understand the deeper details, if they are explained right. I really hope I could make that happen.