An Introduction

The fun thing about a first post is that no one will read when it goes up.  So this is more a reference for the future, if anyone gets curious beyond the sound bites to the right.

I am a physicist postdoc, which means that I have a PhD but universities and research institutes are not yet willing to offer me permanent positions.  Instead, my current and next jobs are explicitly temporary, where I will hopefully prove that I can do useful, interesting independent work so that I can get a more senior position next time around.  I work on particle physics phenomenology, which in lay terms means I am most interested in the results of the Large Hadron Collider at CERN; but I'm a theorist, not a member of any of the experimental collaborations.  I have other interests too, such as Dark Matter, but the LHC is my main focus.




I describe myself as taking a tour of the English speaking world because I did my undergraduate degree in the UK, my doctorate in the USA, I currently work in Canada and my next job will be in Australia.  I do hope to return to North America after that, though.

I am an atheist, essentially because I consider science to leave any god unnecessary.  In any case, I am a scientist and skeptic first, and an atheist mostly as a result of that; but if the evidence changed. I would change my mind.