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I'm quitting my PhD

blog.derhagen.eu

381–382 of 382 posts

Re: I'm quitting my PhD

#381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How did your supervisor managed his subordinates so they wound not spend their time in leisure activities? They are not there to babysit, and many want self motivated people. If you spend your time doing leisure activities, you will either spend too much time getting the PhD, or simply not get it. Also, in large enough research groups, the advisor delegates almost everything to postdocs. I knew one guy who, every t…

This seems very much US and academic field specific. Here in Europe when I did my PhD in physics the supervisor is the boss designing the project and giving out orders on tasks to be accomplished. As somewhere in this thread one mentioned it is a true apprenticeship. It is though very much opposite of what new PhDs expects judging that from my own experience, conversations and confronting my supervisor who eventually…

> This seems very much US and academic field specific. Here in Europe when I did my PhD in physics the supervisor is the boss designing the project and giving out orders on tasks to be accomplished.

Many (most?) professors in the US are the same. The other kind, though, is not that rare.

Re: I'm quitting my PhD

#382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Obviously the 3rd option ("shut the fuck up if you don't want your overlords to hear") would be the best, but also perhaps the most boring Best for whom?

Best for the blog post author. Picking fights with people stronger than you, in a system you don't intend to leave, doesn't usually work out well for you. Nor in general. STFUing is a near-optimal strategy in a lot of situations, really.

Locally (as in, local maxima) I would agree. I can’t think of any whistle-blower who didn’t suffer major blowback, unless they remained anonymous.

However it also leads to a tragedy of commons, in this case in the form of institutional corruption.

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