​Welcome to Binge Thinking. We invite professors and experts to give lectures in bars around Boston, NYC, and DC!

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.

​Join us and grab a drink as we question what science really knows. What if the smartest thing it can say is “I don’t know”?

​Back by Popular Demand!! Dr. Firestein returns for Round 2!

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

SPEAKER:
Dr. Stuart Firestein, Columbia University

​Somewhere between the lab and your group chat, “trust the science” stopped being a way of thinking and turned into a bumper sticker. Some people treat it like scripture. Others tossed it out completely. Plot twist: both camps might be missing the point.

Science was never built to hand out final answers. Its real superpower is saying “we don’t know yet” out loud, then getting wildly curious about it. Not knowing isn’t the bug. It’s the whole feature.

​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” gets science totally wrong

​How to tell legit science from pseudoscience wearing a convincing costume

​When expertise earns your trust, and when it’s fair game to push back

​Why uncertainty is science’s biggest strength, not its weak spot

​The kind of optimism built into scientific culture: not a mood, not a faith, but a philosophy

​Bring your questions, your skepticism, and a drink. This is the one night where not having all the answers is exactly the point.

​About the Speaker

​Dr. Stuart Firestein is a professor of neuroscience in the Department of Biological Sciences at Columbia University and former chair of the department. His lab studies the vertebrate olfactory system, possibly the best chemical detector on the planet, and has received continuous funding from the NIH and private foundations for over 25 years. Fun fact: before science, he spent nearly 20 years working in theater, then went back to school at 30.

​He earned his B.S. in Biology from San Francisco State University and his Ph.D. in Neurobiology from UC Berkeley, followed by a postdoctoral fellowship at Yale University School of Medicine. He joined Columbia’s faculty in 1991 and became a full professor in 1998.

​A passionate advocate for making science accessible, Dr. Firestein advises the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation’s Public Understanding of Science program and is a member of the visiting Fractal Faculty at the Santa Fe Institute. At Columbia, he serves on the advisory boards of the Center for Science and Society, the Presidential Scholars in Society and Neuroscience, and the Columbia Institute for Ideas and Imagination at the Paris Global Center. He is a AAAS Fellow, a Guggenheim Fellow, and a recipient of the 2011 Lenfest Distinguished Columbia Faculty Award.

​He is the author of Ignorance: How It Drives Science (Oxford University Press, 2012) and Failure: Why Science Is So Successful (2015), both translated into 12 languages and still in print. His 2013 TED talk has racked up over 3 million views, and he speaks regularly to educators and students about the often overlooked value of ignorance, failure, and uncertainty in science.

​Agenda

6:30 PM - Doors Open (Grab a seat and drinks!)
7:00 PM - Lecture Begins
7:40 PM - Audience Q&A
8:00 PM - Drinks & Conversation
8:30 PM - Event Ends