The Nocturnists
The Nocturnists
Uncertainty in Medicine: Precision in Motion with Chris Aiken
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Uncertainty in Medicine: Precision in Motion with Chris Aiken

Improvisational artist Chris Aiken shares what dance can teach us about risk, attention, and poetic instinct.

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Chris Aiken

Dear friends,

This week on The Nocturnists: Uncertainty in Medicine, we’re thrilled to share a conversation that might surprise you. It’s not with a doctor or a patient, but with an improvisational dance artist.

Meet Chris Aiken, a renowned dancer and teacher at Smith College whose life’s work is all about moving through the unknown—literally. Chris creates entire performances without choreography, inviting dancers to respond to the moment and each other in real time, like birds in a murmuration, or schools of fish.

We were curious: what could this kind of embodied risk-taking teach us about how we move through medical uncertainty?

In this episode, we follow Chris into the studio, where we observe his rehearsals and hear how he trains dancers to prepare for chaos, and respond with what he calls poetic instinct. Along the way, Chris shares insights about decision-making, attention, failure, and the kind of quiet discipline that makes improvisation possible.

This is a conversation about dance, but it’s also about the art of staying open when the path ahead isn’t clear. We hope it will leave you thinking (and feeling) in new ways.

Listen Now

With love,
Emily and The Nocturnists Team

PS- I recently did an interview with KALW’s Crosscurrents about our Uncertainty series. Take a listen here: The Benefits Of Embracing Uncertainty.

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Uncertainty in Medicine in Nautilus

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