[MUSIC PLAYING]
JOAQUIN NUNEZ:
Evolutionary biology
is the science of change.
There is just something
that is fascinating
about biological
diversity that just
creates the sense of curiosity.
Where all this is coming from?
What's driving it?
That curiosity for understanding
when all the diversity of life
comes from sort of
overlaps with a sense
of urgency for conservation.
It's incredibly exciting.
DAVID RAND: This
department and this field
in general, spans a huge range
from ecological applications,
environmental applications,
evolutionary, even to
dinosaurs.
So it's a huge spectrum,
but this uniting theme
of how organisms function is
really what ties us together.
And that's what makes it
a special place to work.
ARMITA MANAFZADEH: Our
professors treat us
like colleagues and they
take our ideas really
seriously here.
To have conversations with
ecologists and population
geneticists and all these
people from across the span
of ecology and
evolutionary biology,
is really valuable because
you get perspectives
that you wouldn't
have even imagined.
STEPHEN PORDER: We have a
real breadth of interest.
But what we share is a
passion for training people
to think critically
about the questions
that they're most interested in.
And the motivation
for that could
be purely wanting to understand
on a theoretical basis
how evolution occurs.
Or it could be a
motivation to think
about how we could possibly
make it through the 21st century
without catastrophic
challenges to both humans
and all other organisms
on the planet.
JOAQUIN NUNEZ: Brown has
a very strong culture
of intellectual passion.
And that permeates every level
of its academic structure.
ARMITA MANAFZADEH: Being
around this level of science
is totally incomparable.
The things that I found
challenging three years ago
seem so trivial now, and I feel
I can take on so much more.
STEPHEN PORDER: It's really
this evolution of the student,
from the day they walk
in, to the day they leave.
And when they leave,
they are fully
fledged scientists who are
ready to go on and tackle
their own questions.
DAVID RAND: You can't do
this by a sense of duty,
you have to do this with a sense
of excitement and curiosity.
We have the freedom and the
opportunities in some respects,
the responsibility
to pursue new ideas.
Because if you don't,
no one else will.
JOAQUIN NUNEZ: The best
way to find answers
to these challenges
is to look outside
of the traditional
thinking on the field.
And so that is
actually something
that makes our department
so incredibly competitive.
That interaction of those
fields that would otherwise
look completely separated
but that are heavily, heavily
integrated under the umbrella
of ecology and evolution,
to make some incredible science.
