Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I'm quitting my PhD

blog.derhagen.eu

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 382 posts

Re: I'm quitting my PhD

#51

Post by fn-mote »

IMO good advising is critical. You must have someone you believe in and work with. Screening a prospective research group or advisor AHEAD OF TIME is the due diligence of the academic world. Don't work with someone you don't think will support you when you are stuck and advertise your accomplishments when you make them.

I totally agree with the comments who say "performance" is an essential part of research. Somebody (your advisor, then later you) needs to be telling people how important your work is, where it can lead, what it will be good for, etc.

If you're not at this stage yet, my advice is cast a wide net and interview several prospective advisors about their work, etc. A bad fit will waste years of your life.

Re: I'm quitting my PhD

#52

Post by soheil »

red_trumpet wrote: post #15
chrisseaton wrote: post #4

> I started my PhD in Quantum Computing. Even though I basically didn’t have any previous knowledge about it How does this happen?

It sounds a bit like his supervisor(s) didn't know to much about Quantum Computing as well. Really seems like a strange situation...

QM is not something you can pick up in a couple of sessions from your research supervisor. It's probably the hardest concept to grasp in Physics and some argue Physics is the hardest field to study.

Re: I'm quitting my PhD

#54

Post by mordae »

sdfhdhjdw3 wrote: post #20

I'm someone who finished a PhD, here's my perspective. You don't believe your supervisor or your research group and so you quit, great. It's great that you have the critical thinking abilities and confidence in yourself to make such a decision. However, I think it's extremely unprofessional to write a blog post saying that your supervisor is superficial or your research group is performative art. I don't say this bec…

> extremely unprofessional

I disagree. It is extremely unprofessional to act like doing research while pocketing mostly public funds like that.

I am 100% behind the author.

They have apparently tried to resolve the issue internally and this serves as good warning for people considering science career in today's world.

Re: I'm quitting my PhD

#55

Post by im3w1l »

chrisseaton wrote: post #31
AnotherGoodName wrote: post #16

I would love PhDs to be thought of as something you dive into when you have something to pursue, perhaps many years later in life rather than a follow on immediately after study. As a comparison imagine if VC funding only went to the highest scoring new grads and the business proposal was asked for after the invitation to take on VC funding. That's pretty much what's been happening with PhDs. You get the marks, you g…

PhD is an apprenticeship to do research. If we left it until later in life, we wouldn't have anyone trained to do research.

There are way more PhD's then there are research positions, so we are very far from the deficit you fear.

Re: I'm quitting my PhD

#56

Post by anjc »

sdfhdhjdw3 wrote: post #20

I'm someone who finished a PhD, here's my perspective. You don't believe your supervisor or your research group and so you quit, great. It's great that you have the critical thinking abilities and confidence in yourself to make such a decision. However, I think it's extremely unprofessional to write a blog post saying that your supervisor is superficial or your research group is performative art. I don't say this bec…

It's also likely that, as a new student, the writer simply doesn't understand these "performative" aspects yet. The research group isn't succeeding by accident, put it that way.

Re: I'm quitting my PhD

#57

Post by austinl »

> I felt less and less comfortable in a setting that apparently expected me to pick some low-hanging – let’s call it fruits – and call it a day.

I think the author's reasons for quitting are valid. But I would also say that "low-hanging fruit" is exactly what many PhDs are going for by design. Science can move forward in giant leaps (like Newton, Einstein). But mostly, science progresses by the accumulation of thousands of narrowly focused projects. Perhaps the author's work could have eventually been used by another to make progress. The scope of what any single person can accomplish against the accumulated body of all scientific knowledge is often quite small.

Re: I'm quitting my PhD

#58

Post by Invictus0 »

sdfhdhjdw3 wrote: post #20

I'm someone who finished a PhD, here's my perspective. You don't believe your supervisor or your research group and so you quit, great. It's great that you have the critical thinking abilities and confidence in yourself to make such a decision. However, I think it's extremely unprofessional to write a blog post saying that your supervisor is superficial or your research group is performative art. I don't say this bec…

This post isn't about the advisors. No one reading this knows who the advisors are, they won't show up in Google. "Saying that your supervisor is superficial or your research group is performative art" is also hardly an accusation, it's an opinion. No names are named: how can there be an accusation without an accused?

Re: I'm quitting my PhD

#59

Post by time_to_smile »

sdfhdhjdw3 wrote: post #20

I'm someone who finished a PhD, here's my perspective. You don't believe your supervisor or your research group and so you quit, great. It's great that you have the critical thinking abilities and confidence in yourself to make such a decision. However, I think it's extremely unprofessional to write a blog post saying that your supervisor is superficial or your research group is performative art. I don't say this bec…

I interact very heavily with academics (though am thankfully no longer one myself) and one thing I can't stand is that all of them will complain endlessly about the horribly abusive and broken system that academia has become, then without hesitation turn around and flog the next person in line when it's their turn to continue the process from the abusing side.

As someone who once held the title of assistant professor, I have little patience for people who recognize that the system is in many ways repulsive, and yet refuse to even consider to stop playing the game because it's all that they know.

The amount of bullshit being produced and regurgitated in academia needs to be called out. Your definition of "unprofessional" is just "this makes us look bad"

Academics who defend a broken system are a major factor in why that system continues to decline.

I'm glad the OP wrote this article and find it expectedly discouraging that someone creeps out from the woodwork to try to shush it.

Re: I'm quitting my PhD

#60

Post by mcovalt »

Congrats on making a decision sooner rather than later. I also dropped out of graduate school and remembered having some similar thoughts as you.

I remembered feeling a bit lonely, too. There's no one to talk to about your work since no one understands it. It's a bit obvious in hindsight. Research topics are at the fuzzy fringe of human knowledge. They exist just outside of others' research topics. Your job is to find something that makes the field even more complex. Or, even better, connect the dots that show it may not be so complex after all. In either case, no one knows what the hell you're doing. If they're in your little tiny field, they may have some vague idea about how it may relate to their own little universe of research. But most likely, when you come home and a loved one asks what you did today, you won't be able to have an answer and that can be frustrating. To compound the issue, everyone is familiar with what a PhD is, but few know how academia works. And there's some not-great aspects of it.

I've continued my research on my own time because it interests me. I no longer have looming deadlines and I don't have to check my bank account in the Wendy's drive-through line to see if my stipend will cover a chicken sandwich. I still value academia, though, and I know that my hobby-research will come nowhere close to matching the quality of research done with the resources provided by academic institutions.

Post reply on HN