​Welcome to Binge Thinking. We invite professors and experts to give lectures in bars!

In a world of AI slop, doomscrolling and brainrot, Binge Thinking brings real experts into real places for nights of learning, conversation, and community.

Think Responsibly.

​TOPIC:
A Toast to Uncertainty: Why Science's Greatest Strength Is Admitting What We Don't Know

SPEAKER:
Dr. Stuart Firestein, Columbia University

​Somewhere along the way, "trust the science" turned into a slogan instead of a way of thinking, and a whole lot of people stopped trusting it at all. So how do you actually tell real science from something dressed up to look like it?

​In this talk, Dr. Stuart Firestein makes the case that science was never supposed to be a religion of certainty; its real power comes from admitting what we don't know yet. He'll walk through how to spot pseudoscience, when to lean on expertise (and when to question it), and why uncertainty isn't a weakness in science, it's the whole engine.

​Topics include:

​Why "follow the science" misunderstands what science actually is

How to tell real science from pseudoscience dressed up to look credible

When expertise deserves your trust, and when it's worth pushing back

Why uncertainty is science's greatest strength, not its weak spot

A kind of optimism baked into scientific culture that isn't a mood or a faith, but a philosophical stance

​About the Speaker

​Dr. Stuart Firestein is a professor of Biological Sciences at Columbia University and former chair of the department, where his lab has spent decades studying the vertebrate olfactory system, essentially, how the brain makes sense of smell. He's the author of Ignorance: How It Drives Science and Failure: Why Science Is So Successful, both built on the idea that not-knowing is what actually moves science forward. He earned his B.S. in Biology from San Francisco State University and his Ph.D. from UC Berkeley.

​Agenda

7:00 PM — Doors Open (Grab a seat and drinks!)
7:30 PM — Lecture Begins
8:10 PM — Audience Q&A
8:30 PM — Drinks & Conversation
9:00 PM — Event Ends