Science Quote by Thomas R. Cech

Cech’s line reads like lab pragmatism, but it’s really a window into how scientific “importance” gets policed. On the surface he’s giving blunt career advice: don’t sink years into a creature so obscure you can’t defend it to a thesis committee, a grant panel, or a skeptical department chair. The phrasing “good justification” tips you off that the audience isn’t nature; it’s institutions. In modern biology, curiosity is rarely the only admissible motive. You’re expected to translate wonder into deliverables.

The subtext is a quiet tension between two visions of science. One is the broad, naturalist tradition: the world is full of weirdness worth mapping, and today’s obscure insect could be tomorrow’s key to a conserved pathway. The other is the postwar, funding-driven model: pick “model organisms,” focus on tractable systems, maximize generalizable insight per dollar. Calling insects “strange organisms” is telling; it frames biodiversity as a quirky sideshow unless it can be made legible to mainstream molecular questions.

Context matters: Cech is a Nobel-winning biochemist associated with big, foundational discoveries. His world is one where “gene organisation” is a gateway to general principles, and where the prestige economy rewards universality over particularity. The line works because it’s honest about the hidden curriculum in science: your object of study is also an argument about relevance. It’s less a jab at insects than a warning that, in research, novelty isn’t enough. You have to sell why anyone should care, and “because it’s there” often won’t survive peer review.