Eric Gilliam

Eric Gilliam is a Fellow at Good Science Project. He has a degree in political science from Stanford, and previously worked with economist Steve Levitt at the University of Chicago.

His primary focus is producing research that those funding and running “new science organizations” incorporate into their operational decision-making. His “administrative histories” focus on the management and operational aspects of exceptional research organizations from history. His most well-known pieces include:

• An in-depth analysis of Warren Weaver’s Rockefeller Foundation grant-making and the birth of molecular biology as a field
• A breakdown of how Bell Lab’s chose its research problems
• A progress studies history of early MIT
• A call for an alternative approach to deep tech VC inspired by the playbooks of early MIT, Bell Labs, and the GE Research Laboratory
• He is currently producing an extended series on the factors contributing to the success and failure of DARPA projects throughout history.

He can be reached at egillia3@alumni.stanford.edu.