Anna Wexler: A crucial choice
The Story Collider
Story Collider, Inc.
4.4 • 824 Ratings
🗓️ 30 December 2013
⏱️ 15 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
There is one rule more important than any other in an fMRI experiment: no metal. But a stuck piercing makes aspiring neuroscientist Anna Wexler make a crucial choice -- end her career, or face possible serious injury? Anna Wexler is a documentary filmmaker and writer currently pursuing her PhD at MIT in the Science, Technology, and Society Program, where she is studying the social and ethical implications of neuroscience advancements. She graduated from MIT with two Bachelors of Science degrees, one in Brain and Cognitive Science and the other in Humanities and Science with a focus in Writing. She was selected as a 2007-2008 filmmaker-in-residence at WGBH to work on her debut feature documentary, UNORTHODOX, which follows three rebellious Orthodox Jewish high school teenagers through a transformative post-high school year in Israel. The film premiered in November 2013 at the Boston Jewish Film Festival and at DOC NYC. Anna's writing has been published in numerous outlets and anthologized in "Best Travel Writing, Vol. 9 (2012)" and "Best Women's Travel Writing 2011." Help keep us going! If you love the podcast, please donate here: www.patreon.com/thestorycollider
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | How about listening to the sounds of Istanbul? |
| 0:15.0 | Beautiful, isn't it? |
| 0:16.7 | But you can't discover the coolest city in the world just by listening. |
| 0:21.2 | Check Istanbul.orgatogch.com now and plan your Istanbul trip today. |
| 0:31.7 | A science story, huh? |
| 0:34.9 | Is NYU scientist the... |
| 0:36.7 | It felt a huge. And I just thought, well... It was that... Is NYU scientists the... I felt... |
| 0:37.5 | I was so... |
| 0:38.7 | And I just thought, well... |
| 0:39.7 | It was that golden moment. |
| 0:42.9 | Because science was on my side. |
| 1:01.9 | Hi, everyone. I'm Ben Lilley. and welcome to the Story Collider, where we bring you true stories of how science has affected people's lives. |
| 1:04.3 | This week's story is from Anna Wexler. |
| 1:09.2 | The story was recorded in December 2013 at Oberon in Cambridge, Massachusetts. |
| 1:11.1 | The theme of the evening was, |
| 1:11.9 | Ouch. |
| 1:20.9 | So I'm 17. |
| 1:23.2 | I get into MIT. |
| 1:29.7 | And the one thing I know is that I really want to study brain science. Now this is kind of funny because I grew up in an Orthodox Jewish home where science didn't exactly mesh with everything |
| 1:34.7 | that we were supposed to take on faith. But there was something about being surrounded by all the |
| 1:39.9 | religion that really got me interested in the brain because I was always wondering why people |
| 1:44.5 | believed what they believed. |
... |
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