Hi, I'm Dr. Dante Shepherd, chemical engineering professor and creator of the webcomic "Surviving the World", a.k.a. the guy in the labcoat by the chalkboard. AMA!

If I have twenty apples, and Johnny has thirty five apples, what is the probability that raptors will spawn out of the ancient city of Pompeii and reveal to us the secrets of life itself.

Please be as descriptive as possible.

You and Johnny simultaneously drop your apples just right onto the weakest ridges aroudn Pompeii. The lost city cracks open to reveal a horde of feathered raptors, who were somehow perfectly preserved throughout time. Before you get a moment to take in the wonder of these dinosaurs before you, you and Johnny are devoured. In your last moments of thought, you think you can piece together what the secret of life may be, but it is obscured by the more deafening thought of AHHHHHHHHHH MY BONES

Fugacities.

Why? Fucking whyyyy?

I don't know either! I'd probably have been better at teaching Thermo II if I did!

I'm convinced that there are only 5-10 people in the entire world that actually understand fugacity.

I would buy and wear a Fuga City State Penitentiary jumpsuit if any ChemE started making them.

I'm convinced that anyone who says they understand fugacity makes up words until everyone else just goes away.

My roommate always acted like I was a stupid person for not understanding fugacity. Fuck you Frank.

What the hell, Frank.

How fast do I need to throw a grilled cheese sandwich in order for it to cook itself before it lands? I must know.

Kid, I'm just a chemical engineer. I'll tell you what type of chemicals NOT to cook it in (here's a hint: hydrofluoric acid is nasty nasty stuff!), but you may want to ask a physicist for a faster answer. I don't have my textbooks one me.

Hi Dante! I love STW. Your quirky and intelligent sense of humor makes me not weep for the fate of the world. A couple of questions:

1) Do you usually do several STWs at once, and just release them over the week? How do you maintain such a high rate of content generation?

2) One of my best friends just got hired at his first job as a high school physics teacher. What sorts of suggestions do you have for someone just starting out as a teacher in the STEM field? Any good/funny stories to share from your days starting out as an instructor?

Thanks for everything you share!

Thanks for the kind words!

1) The past three years I've more frequently made one each day, but back at the beginning (and for the past month, too) I've made a bunch all at once, just because I had limited access to the bigger chalkboards. It partly depends how many ideas I've taken time to prepare ahead of time.

Content generation isn't that difficult if you're paying attention to the world around you! People you interact with, articles you read, discoveries you make, off-topic thoughts that bounce around your brain - they're all good material to build from and to be inspired by!

2) If you're starting out in the STEM field, try to keep a grasp on current science research - what I've found more than anything else is that students need examples and applications of the science theory before they can establish any personal understanding of the material. The stronger their grasp on the subject matter, the more interested they become in science. So always try to have a few good examples or applications ready in relation to the topic at hand in the classroom.

What did you write your dissertation on? Is that work still relevant to the research you do now?

My dissertation was on developing thin film two-tiered polymer networks to be used as lubricant films on micro- and nano-scale devices. I was able to produce some of the lowest friction coefficients ever recorded for dry films, and at one point was in talks to use it with a pharmaceutical company that makes syringes. I don't do any of that anymore, unfortunately - but I love teaching and get to do that for several classes each semester, so I don't mind.

That is freaking awesome. As someone who uses syringes several times daily, I am both impressed and relieved that people think about this stuff.

Did you know that syringes need lubricant, and the standard industry practice is to just rub them in silicone oil? SERIOUSLY. It then can get injected into you or interact with the medicine in the syringe . . .

Lubricant on nano-scale devices you say? Surely you had people making the obvious joke here!

You have no idea.

Did you think your comic would get so big?

I made STW for the first year with basically no readership - which was fine, because I started it for more of a creative outlet than for readership. Then the readership just jumped in size all on one day, and I'm shocked and humbled that as many people read it as they do. I don't think I realized how well it was known until my ChemE students claimed to have recognized me within five minutes of my first day of teaching last fall.

I'm still bewildered that so many people read STW, but if they enjoy it, I'll keep doing it.

Do you ever hang out with Randall Munroe?

*edit: typo

I have never met Randall. I've only heard positive things about him. I have a feeling I would feel so outclassed in terms of everything that I wouldn't make very good conversation.

Do you clean your own chalkboards between lessons, or do you have a staff that does this? As someone who hates writing residue, I appreciate it.

I clean my own chalkboard - I've used a squeegee before when I had access to a really nice slate board, and that worked great. More recently I use a combination of eraser and my labcoat to clean it - mainly because the current board I have isn't anywhere near real or imitation slate, and water only serves to ruin it. The zen of chalkboard erasing is a kind of meditating if you can do it right.

Over the years in your comic, you have created lots of interesting pseudo-formulas. Have you ever had a reader calculate any of these values in a particular situation? I am particularly fond of the EoS (Enjoyment of Shower) quantity.

Yes, some people have! The problem with the Enjoyment of Shower equation in particular was that it had no upper bound on the shower temperature, if I remember right. So you could have a shower at 500000000000000 degrees and it would be the greatest showed ever, never mind that you would have died just by stepping in past the shower curtain.

I also have a second question for the T.A.

What is the answer to the question: Woof woof, bark, woof.

Awoooooooooooooooooooooo

Werewolves of London!

Awooooooooooooo!

love your work! this comic is my homepage and i make it a ritual to check it every day.

how true is The Shepard Principle in regards to STW?

ANYTHING is creepy if you do it long enough. STW is five years old, but it was plenty creepy to start off.

I can't find a link describing the Shepard Principle - could you help out?

http://www.survivingtheworld.net/Lesson957.html

Do you sometimes like to sit back and watch videos to relive the good ol' days?

How dare you. You are a monster.

What do you think we can do to encourage more young women to enter the sciences?

I think in some cases it just requires better / more interesting science earlier on. Some studies have shown that people will lose interest in science starting in the fourth grade - which is right when they start getting introduced to scientific concepts, so there must be some kind of disconnect for a lot of these students. For women in particular, I've taught classes where well over half the ChemE students were women - and the opposite as well, unfortunately. I don't think there's an easy direct answer, but I do think we can improve the experiments so that young scientists can relate to the material better, and help prevent them from developing distaste for the subject.

My name is Chad, and you have made my life exceedingly difficult.

What did I do to deserve this?

You could have changed your name, you know. I'm just out there preaching the good word and making sure people know to be wary of you.

so how freudian is your slip?

Oh, I look DAMN GOOD in that slip.

I may or may not have told everyone in the room that I wanted to sleep with them, when dressed up in that costume.

I... I... Didn't know you were in chemical engineering! High five for being in the same field! Woooo!

Woo! Internet quantum high five!

Your comic about chemistry career paths actually helped me re-think my non-pre-med chemistry major and go with engineering, which I was already considering. I'm a senior now, and although it's been tough, I can say I actually enjoy my engineering course material, now.

Also, GO SOX!

That was actually one sent in by a ChemE and a chemist. I think it's interesting how little chemistry that chemical engineers actually do. It's a little sad, too - most ChemEs don't realize how little there is until it's too late to drop out or change majors.

How much time do you spend in a week thinking of ideas for the comic?

Sometimes I can spend upwards of six hours trying to hammer out an individual idea for a comic. Sometimes it comes to me in three seconds. There's no rhyme or reason to how it works.

that's what i keep telling my girlfriend

HEY-OHHHHH

How do you feel about classes like "How Things Work" and cable television "science simplified" TV shows? Do you think simplifying science is a helpful way to draw in the science-phobic or a damaging dumbing-down of students?

I think you should always be able to simplify what you can do with science. Every scientist should be able to explain their research in 25 words or less to any audience, be they colleagues or kindergartners. Every scientist should be an educator, not an 'ambassador for science', whatever the hell that overly passive phrase means. So anything that gets science out there is helpful if it gets more people to understand what scientists are trying to accomplish.

Hi. I just want to thank you for not spoiling the Red Wedding scene of Game of Thrones. I saw your facebook post a few moments before the episode (europe time difference) and I knew sth was up, but still. Thank you for not spoiling. That means the world to us TV-only dumbasses.

I don't get why there needs to be animosity between the two sides. I think book-first readers wouldn't be jerks if there weren't people purposely being snide in outright rejecting the books. There's plenty of room for enjoyment all around.

You should do tutorials on how to make the faces you make on your pictures.

You stretch your face enough and keep your eyes as wide open as possible. BAM. You can make any face I make.

Does your fascination with velociraptors stem from a childhood velociraptor related trauma?

My fascination with raptors stems from one guy my freshmen year of college doing raptor impressions all year. He then transferred out, so I started doing them. My fascination definitely stems from accidentally getting a guy suffering from Lyme Disease paranoia to raptor with me and watching him tackle some poor innocent guy who just happened to be walking along.

Dante, I've been reading since my friend introduced me, (about comic 15 or so) and while I'm sorry that I haven't been keeping up with the homework I have to ask;

Where does your inspiration come from and who actually takes the pictures?

I've taken almost every picture on a self-timer. That's part of why I tried playing with taking blurry images early on.

Inspiration comes from everywhere! You've just got to realize you're living in the world and keep your eyes open.

You're like a clever version of the 4-panel cringe pics.

Thank you?

Would you ever consider growing a beard?

There's only one reason I'll grow a beard. I did it about a year ago. Who knows, maybe I'll do it again in the future.

Great comic - always a treat Dr. Shepherd. My 11-year-old son excels at science (he recently received a perfect score in the science portion of Virginia's standard test) but he is damned by being born to parents who have not fared well in the STEM disciplines (but we've got the arts and humanities covered in spades).

Anyways, couple of questions: How would you recommend young children approach long term projects such as one for a science fair? Teachers seem extremely inflexible with what makes an appropriate project. Also, what resources would you recommend for curious, analytically minded children?

Hey, good for your son!

I think young children, if they come into proposing a project with enough idea of what they want to do and the science behind it, then many teachers will go along with it. I did a centrifugal force project by measuring the time and velocity it took Hot Wheels cars to go around a loop, and my teacher didn't want to let me do it because 'centrifugal force' wasn't a thing. But I presented enough and it changed her mind.

So get your son to read about what current research is doing and discovering, and that might help inspire him to what he personally wants to do, AND give him the support to get his teachers to support him, too. Plus, it might rub off on you in terms of what you know!

Would you have the success you do if you didn't wear a Red Sox hat?

Maybe? I think it adds to the general image, though. And it was part of my daily uniform as a grad student.

How many lab coats do you own?

(long-time fan here, so glad that you're doing an AMA!)

I don't even own one, technically. The lab coat I wear is one I stole from a grad student colleague in my research group when I was at Cornell. It wasn't until later I discovered he had been using it with HF, which now terrifies me.

HF is terrifying for sure

HF?

Hydrofluoric acid. You get it on you, it doesn't stop eating away at you until it reaches the calcium in your bones. Even drops of it are hazardous. Run like the dickens if you hear someone is using it.

1. How do you keep coming up with new material on a daily basis?

2. Is StW something that's well known at Cornell? Do your students/colleagues read it?

3. Why Velociraptors? Why not T-Rex's or Pterodactyls?

4. Can you acknowledge my existence?

2) STW was not well known at Cornell at all. It might be now, for all I know. I'd gladly go back and give a STW talk if I was invited. 3) Because I'm not tall enough to be a T-Rex and I can't fly like a pterodactyl. Not even like a chaos pterodactyl. 4) Hi!

Do you wear your ballcap when lecturing? I really hope you do....

A colleague mistook me for an undergrad at the end of last fall, and I wasn't even wearing my hat then. So I DEFINITELY don't wear it now in the classroom.

How do you Photoshop your beard on so nicely?

PRACTICE PRACTICE PRACTICE

Hey Professor! Several questions for you. Answer them (or not) in whatever order you wish:

1) What has been the general response to Science the World? Have there been more educators or researchers that have wanted to work with you? 2) What was your expectation for your page-a-day calendar kickstarter, and have you been pleased or dismayed by the difference between that and the actual response (if any)? 3) Do any of your professional colleagues know about your work on the comic? If so, what is their opinion? 4) Related to (3), have any of your professional colleagues seen any of your velociraptor impressions, and if so what did they think?

Keep up the awesome!

1) Response to Science The World has been very positive! My group will be trying to work with teachers/educators all across the U.S. and in other countries, too. It will certainly be a continuous work in progress, but I'm hopeful it makes a decent contribution to the STEM field. 2) I've been pretty amazed by how well the calendar has done so far, partly because I know most of my readers are college students and are probably too busy sleeping during the summer to actually read what the internet is telling them. 3) My professional colleagues never discovered STW while I was at Cornell, and never discovered it while I did my postdoc. But because my students knew about it, everyone now knows about it - thankfully, it's all been positive! I get the weird feeling that if my colleagues had known about it, I wouldn't have gotten my position, but now that they do, it might help me keep it. 4) I'm sure they will see a raptor impression at some point.

WHAT'S THE FIRST STEP WHEN YOU DO A MATERIAL BALANCE

SET A BASIS!

Hello Dante, and thanks for the AMA. Any tips to become better in Organic Chemistry?

Just keep suffering, just keep suffering, just keeping suffering . . . Everybody sing!

Hi Dante, I love the photocomic - been a fan for years, thanks for the laughs, and the ones that make us go "hmm".

I've got a couple of questions. Or maybe, question-sections?

• How did you get started? What made you think it would be a good idea to make funny faces in a labcoat while speaking to an audience like a 1920s silent film?

• Do you ever think about the future of the photocomic, or are you taking it day to day? Can you see yourself ending it one day, or getting bored? Or taking it to a new level?

• Finally, do you have any funny stories about your co-workers and/or students, in relation to the photocomic? Have they discovered you independently and come to ask you what the hell you were doing? Has anybody ever walked in on you posing like a dinosaur in front of a chalkboard and thought you were mental?

Thanks again, and thanks for doing the AMA!

1) I had written a one-act script that I really liked (although it's too closely based off of some people for me to share it now) and it wasn't going anywhere, so I kept trying to figure out ways to rework it. Eventually, after discovering comics online like QC, and reading something Brian K Vaughan wrote about making photocomics when he couldn't find an artist, I settled on photocomic format and put myself into one of the roles from the script. The first 100 or so comics have a lot that was cannibalized from that script. 2) I might end it someday, but I don't know when that would be. If I was told I had to stop it to keep my position, I would stop it that day. But I probably wouldn't get bored with it, just feel like it was time to end. 3) A janitor once walked in while I was writing the words 'sex tape' on the board. That was hard to explain.

Holy crap, I thought you were just some guy who made funny graphs on chalkboards. Had no idea you are a professor.

I know! It surprises me, too.

How long until 3d printing will be able to print organic material?

As soon as someone realizes they'll be able to scream IT'S ALIVE after they finish a print job.

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1) Cats would make for a great resource I mean solar energy is the real answer. We just need to figure it out and make it more viable. 2) Almost any animal. Raptors are extinct. Even an orange could beat a raptor these days.

You knew this was coming :

Would you rather fight 100 duck sized horses or 1 horse sized duck?

Bonus points for the science!

Why do I have to fight them? That's what I've never understood about this question? Why can't we just befriend them and then have the most amazing carriage rides or flights over the city? Why do we have to be enemies with everything we come across? WHY DO YOU PERSIST IN MAKING HUMANKIND OUT TO BE MONSTERS, REDDIT?

Think you want to come back to AggieCon next year?

I'd certainly be interested! It was a fun time.

The proof is correct. I am, indeed, questioning your PhD.

That being said, thanks for STW. (: I've seen them, I've enjoyed, and I never really paid attention to who made/did them. Now I know. :D

Thanks for the kind words!

No problem-o. (:

Thanks for assisting in my procrastination while at work.

By procrastinating, you're potentially improving your drive when you are working, so really, I'm assisting your work output. Tell your boss to cut me in on a slice of the profits.

How much of your time does your comic take up in your life?

Is it like a second job with all required obligations?

Does it feel burdensome at times, or is it just something you love to do?

Thanks for all the great posts, I share them widely!

STW felt like it was entirely necessary up until I became a professor - I knew I wasn't doing the job I wanted to do (yet), so I needed STW just to feel more complete with what I was doing.

Now I don't feel like I HAVE to do it anymore, but I still get a kick out of trying to get people to laugh and think about things, so it's a nice diversion.

It can take up a lot of time, but who needs sleep? And people seem to enjoy them, so I'll keep making them.

Hi Dante! I love STW and I'm so glad you brought back recitations. What was the the weirdest question you've ever received and what was the best (that you didn't publicly answer)?

I think someone once asked me how to remove a curse from a duck.

[deleted]

The Maxwell Equations!

Are useless.

Hey Dante,

I'm a chemical engineer about to finish my senior year and hopefully get into industry. Any advice from one chem.e to another?

You want to get into industry? Play off as many connections as you can. My networking is what got me my postdoc and my current position. It's stupid how necessary it is, but it will certainly help.

Don't worry about getting into a field you have some concern about - like petrochemical, for example. Even if you are an environmentalist, you could still approach that job with those concerns guiding you. Which could make you even better at your job!

Try to apply to positions that are related to fields you're interested in and in an area you're interested in living. Location is sometimes overlooked, but that foot in the real world will help keep you grounded.

I wish you the best of luck!

Do your students recognize you? What about the other faculty in your department? What do they think of this?

My first class last fall all recognized me within five minutes. I realized that later on - but then they were incredibly touching at Halloween when everyone wore a hat and labcoat to class. Those were some great kids.

The other faculty for the most part know about STW, and seem to enjoy it? No one has told me to stop, but I think they enjoy that I do something like the comic.

Hey Dante, Big fan of yours. Based on your photocomic, I started one of my own. Is there any advice/tips you would give someone who's started one?

Find your own voice - find your own style. Don't just copy or imitate what every is out there. That's more important than anything else.

If you do good work, readers will come. Do it for yourself as much as doing it for them.

Did you OR DID YOU NOT contribute a vocal to the "You Can Escape Your Fate" crowd-created song AND did it make it into the song?

BONUS: If it did make it in please locate the min/sec mark at which it appears.

https://soundcloud.com/hallelujahthehills/you-can-escape-your-fate-but

I did not contribute a vocal. I wanted to leave it to the readers and didn't want to pressure HtH to use my vocals over others. I loved how it came out, though - it's a very strange mix of everything. A lot like TMBG's "Fingertips".

You, sir, are a gentleman and a scholar. You do the city of Boston proud. Keep on keeping on.

If you could have any superpower, which would you choose, and why?

Also, is there any science-fiction you particularly enjoy reading or watching?

If you have superspeed, you technically have EVERY superpower, if you apply the science right. So I want superspeed. Now. Someone make this happen, please?

Do comic books count as science-fiction? They should.

Do you ever wash and iron your lab coat?

Occasionally washed. Not often as I've needed to, I'm sure. Never ironed.

How long/terrible is getting a PHD really? Is it worth it?

BWAH HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA maybe.

What was the moment in the lab where you most feared your own godlike powers?

Also, huge fan of the comic from the early days! Thanks for making great entertainment every day of the week for so long!

I almost set the fume hood in my government lab on fire one day. That was bad.

I just wanted to thank you for coming to our chemEcar regionals this year. Your inspiration for our glove based gas retention system on the car was amazing and hilarious all at the same time.

Guys, this dude/professor is amazing.

I'm glad we made sure that the middle finger wasn't the only finger that inflated! Stupid DQ based on obscure rules.

What do you think is the most important thing for getting the younger generation of Americans (K-12) more interested in STEM fields? I am in a STEM field because I got introduced to it early on by my father who is a computer network engineer but what about the bright kids coming from a family that has no interest in anything STEM related or kids that may come from a "bad neighborhood" or any other situation that would hinder their interest in science or engineering?

I really think better experiments would help - particularly if we can blend in more of an inquiry-focus. Inquiry, meaning that the students get to design a lot of the experiment themselves set within the guidelines that we provide! You can do these experiments, too, for schools in different neighborhoods - one of the teachers I'm going to be working with has specified that the students cannot use anything that could potentially be used as a weapon - so you get the idea how challenging that could make things, but there's always a solution if we try enough different options.

Favorite Boston bar. GO!

Cask and Flagon.

I really haven't been to too many bars in Boston, my students are all too young to invite me . . .

My question has been asked already so I'll just say I'm a huge fan, thanks for doing what you do :)

Edit: thought of another question. What do your colleagues/fellow professors think of the comic? Do they know? Are you leading a SECRET DOUBLE LIFE

Thanks for reading!

I'm currently a junior studying chemical engineering. What are your opinions of graduate degrees in the field for those hoping to enter industry rather than academia?

A master's degree can help, if your goal is to enter industry. A PhD can help, too, but you have to make sure you're studying research that can be directly related to some area of interest in industry.

Who would you invite for a guest comic on STW?

If you had to be invited for a guest comic, which one would you choose?

I would love to get Jon Allison to do one if he ever had the time.

Anyone who asks me, if I know of their work, I'd probably say yes. Does National Geographic have a webcomic?

[deleted]

Can I make them small enough that I could hold them in my hand, and then domesticate them so I could have one as a pet? Let's focus on what I want out of the raptor before we focus on the weaknesses.

Oh man. I love your comic and I've been reading since about Lesson 300. Yours is one of only three comics in my news feed that makes me chuckle or laugh at least 9 out of 10 times (the others being Dinosaur Comics and Bug).

So here's a first question: How, when you're so busy teaching, researching, [ostensibly] writing, and everything else, do you find time for Surviving The World? Do the ideas just flow to you, do you have a formula for extracting humor from your busy life, or do you sit down and brainstorm the comics?

Also congratulations on cannonball (late, I know). I think your new-father jokes were some of your best material.

I don't sleep as much as I should. That's my answer to a lot of things, unfortunately.

Thanks for the kind words!

I've been reading Surviving the World since it started and I was wondering what made you decide to start it?

My brain was about to explode at the time. Too many creative ideas that were not able to be channeled into my science. It was a matter of self-preservation at the beginning.

STW helped me through some dark places. So thank you for your humor and your ability to write on a chalkboard.

My question is this, who is your favorite Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle and why?

I'm an engineer. Obviously, it's Donatello.

What is two times four?

Half of sixteen.

No questions, I just want to say thank you for what you're doing on the comic, in the classroom, and for the raptors. Your raptor pope impression at Aggie Con was awesome!

Thank you!

First off, my husband and I love your comic.

So, how do you feel about t-rexes in comparison to velicoraptors? Also, how are your wife and daughter doing?

My daughter and wife are fine, thanks for asking! Although Cannonball is teething again, so none of us are sleeping.

T-Rexes are nice, but they're way too tall.

Thanks for the kind words!

Oh that guy, you're quite cool.

What's in the pipeline?

STW Calendars!

What are your thoughts on DEATH.

I think she was a fascinating character that Gaiman developed in his Sandman series.