Readings

Here you will find papers and other resources mentioned in the class. They will be added as the course progresses.

Slides (Password protected)

General Resources

  • The Physics of Behavior — Uri Alon: This is Uri Alon’s quite wonderful course which he calls “The Physics of Behavior.” Alon is a deep and original thinker and this course (as well as his courses on systems medicine and his course on Systems Biology of Aging and Longevity) will surely show you new and unusual ways to think about the living.

In-Class Readings

Day 1 (September 1st)

  • Sean Carroll Serengeti Rules

  • Videos: vignettes in physical biology Organized lecture list; Youtube channel link: Rob uses the space afforded to video lectures to explore in (rich, personally-inflected) detail some key stories of physics and biology.

  • Videos link: This short video describes the history of Newton’s waste book that he used as he was a studious 22 year old trying to learn about what his predecessors in mathematics had done and began playing with his own calculations.

  • Irving Wallace Self-Control Techniques of Famous Novelists

    On pg. 2 of this interesting article on the habits of writers entitled “Self-Control Techniques of Famous Novelists” by Irving Wallace, he shows us some of the “appliances” used by writers such as Trollope, Balzac, Hemingway, Victor Hugo and others. Note the systematic tables and graphs used by Wallace himself during the writing of some of his famous novels.

  • Howard E. Gruber and Valmai Gruber The Eye of Reason: Darwin’s Development during the Beagle Voyage, The University of Chicago Press and The History of Science Society (2011).

    It is wonderful and amazing to imagine the 22 year old Darwin off to explore the world. While on his 249 week voyage, he took copious notes and this article tells the story of Darwin’s many notebooks. Our hope is that over your roughly 250 weeks at Caltech that you too will practice the fine art of private notebook keeping, trusting your instincts for interesting questions and strategies to answer them.

  • Official caltech phd thesis latex template link

Day 3 and 4

Day 6

  • A PhD is an apprenticeship in research – we can’t let AI take that away, Toby Murray, The University of Melbourne link