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A mental health crisis in science

nature.com

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Re: A mental health crisis in science

#201

Post by MichaelZuo »

bumby wrote: post #200
MichaelZuo wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hiring boards at major universities know leadership ability is valuable, it's just that there are very few people with the skills, the credible track record, the leadership/teaching ability, and willing to apply, that they have to settle for less. And it so happens that this is where it's easiest to justify settling. A lot of folks talk about how hard it is to find a tenure track job but it's actually trivial for any…

> And it so happens that this is where it's easiest to justify settling. Why do you think this is so? Is it because technical skills are more easily measurable and thus more defensible than so-called “soft skills”? I think it goes without saying that most 99 percentilers can get the job of their choosing within that skillset. My question is more about the ranked priorities of the rest of the "middling" candidates. Wh…

Because leadership skills and teaching ability are much harder to objectively measure on a CV and in a few hours of face-to-face meetings.

Whereas everyone on a hiring committee can tell quite quickly if a prospective applicant is blowing smoke about their technical skills, competence at navigating academia, etc...

This is the same dynamic everywhere when multiple qualities are valued but only some of those qualities are easy to quantify or assess.

Re: A mental health crisis in science

#202

Post by winderxxx »

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Re: A mental health crisis in science

#203

Post by bumby »

MichaelZuo wrote: post #201
bumby wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And it so happens that this is where it's easiest to justify settling. Why do you think this is so? Is it because technical skills are more easily measurable and thus more defensible than so-called “soft skills”? I think it goes without saying that most 99 percentilers can get the job of their choosing within that skillset. My question is more about the ranked priorities of the rest of the "middling" candidates. Wh…

Because leadership skills and teaching ability are much harder to objectively measure on a CV and in a few hours of face-to-face meetings. Whereas everyone on a hiring committee can tell quite quickly if a prospective applicant is blowing smoke about their technical skills, competence at navigating academia, etc... This is the same dynamic everywhere when multiple qualities are valued but only some of those qualities…

I tend to agree. But I do think it’s a solvable problem by valuing, teaching, and prioritizing leadership skills. I think one of the problems in academia is that specialization requires people to forgo learning those traits, and they revert to what they’re comfortable evaluating (because it’s also what they specialize in)

Re: A mental health crisis in science

#204

Post by MichaelZuo »

bumby wrote: post #203
MichaelZuo wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because leadership skills and teaching ability are much harder to objectively measure on a CV and in a few hours of face-to-face meetings. Whereas everyone on a hiring committee can tell quite quickly if a prospective applicant is blowing smoke about their technical skills, competence at navigating academia, etc... This is the same dynamic everywhere when multiple qualities are valued but only some of those qualities…

I tend to agree. But I do think it’s a solvable problem by valuing, teaching, and prioritizing leadership skills. I think one of the problems in academia is that specialization requires people to forgo learning those traits, and they revert to what they’re comfortable evaluating (because it’s also what they specialize in)

What? Do you understand my previous comment?

Re: A mental health crisis in science

#205

Post by bumby »

MichaelZuo wrote: post #204
bumby wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tend to agree. But I do think it’s a solvable problem by valuing, teaching, and prioritizing leadership skills. I think one of the problems in academia is that specialization requires people to forgo learning those traits, and they revert to what they’re comfortable evaluating (because it’s also what they specialize in)

What? Do you understand my previous comment?

I think so. I’m drawing a distinction between the difference being due to an ability to measure and the difference being due to self-selection, predicated on the need to specialize.

If you’re interviewing with a group of mathematicians, there’s a greater likelihood they will consider math skills to be the Ine Important Thing, in part because they’ve had to focus on that so much it becomes disproportionately important in their worldview. It’s a bias due to being overly focused on a specialization.

Re: A mental health crisis in science

#206

Post by ke88y »

kevviiinn wrote: post #182
ke88y wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> in fact our program recently paid for students to attend a multiple day seminar about how to get jobs outside academia. Consider that preparing you for jobs outside of university should be the goal of your education , not relegated to a two-day seminar. And also consider how relatively fucked it is that such a seminar is actually quite necessary due to the fact that the vast majority of your faculty haven't spent m…

The goal of a PhD education is to learn how to do research, first and foremost. That is the entire point of a PhD If you want to do anything else just get a masters

> The goal of a PhD education is to learn how to do research, first and foremost.

This is vague to the point of meaninglessness. To wit, consider the following questions:

1. What is "Research"? (In PhD school the de facto answer is "whatever things get published in top conferences")

2. What does it mean to "learn how to do Research"? (I argue the most important skill is knowing which questions to ask, but that's not something that PhD students or even Professors every get to actually do -- your funding agency's friendly managers/directors will clearly articulate the set of questions you are permitted to ask during Proposer's Day workshops.)

All of that to say: learning how to do "Research" is the goal that students are told they're supposed to have. The actual goal of a PhD program is to generate income from overhead on grants. This has a nice side benefit of occasionally producing valuable licensing revenue streams. That anyone learns anything is a happy coincidence.

Re: A mental health crisis in science

#207

Post by Chris2048 »

pelasaco wrote: post #141
Chris2048 wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Einstein?

"When Hitler came to power in January 1933, Einstein was in California and was almost immediately deprived of his posts in Berlin and his membership of the Prussian Academy of Sciences. His property was seized and his books were burned in public. Einstein never returned to Germany, and signed a letter to President Roosevelt alerting him to the fact that Germany might be developing an atomic weapon. He recommended tha…

But Einstein's pursuit of Science wasn't what put him in danger? In fact it might have made it easier to flee?

Re: A mental health crisis in science

#208

Post by MichaelZuo »

bumby wrote: post #205
MichaelZuo wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What? Do you understand my previous comment?

I think so. I’m drawing a distinction between the difference being due to an ability to measure and the difference being due to self-selection, predicated on the need to specialize. If you’re interviewing with a group of mathematicians, there’s a greater likelihood they will consider math skills to be the Ine Important Thing, in part because they’ve had to focus on that so much it becomes disproportionately important…

> I tend to agree. But I do think it’s a solvable problem by valuing, teaching, and prioritizing leadership skills. I think one of the problems in academia is that specialization requires people to forgo learning those traits, and they revert to what they’re comfortable evaluating (because it’s also what they specialize in)

I don't see where you drew the distinction, can you point it out?

How does the possibility of mathematicians being narrow minded in your second paragraph relate to this distinction?

Re: A mental health crisis in science

#209

Post by bumby »

MichaelZuo wrote: post #208
bumby wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think so. I’m drawing a distinction between the difference being due to an ability to measure and the difference being due to self-selection, predicated on the need to specialize. If you’re interviewing with a group of mathematicians, there’s a greater likelihood they will consider math skills to be the Ine Important Thing, in part because they’ve had to focus on that so much it becomes disproportionately important…

> I tend to agree. But I do think it’s a solvable problem by valuing, teaching, and prioritizing leadership skills. I think one of the problems in academia is that specialization requires people to forgo learning those traits, and they revert to what they’re comfortable evaluating (because it’s also what they specialize in) I don't see where you drew the distinction, can you point it out? How does the possibility of…

>I don't see where you drew the distinction, can you point it out?

>"I think one of the problems in academia is that specialization requires people to forgo learning those traits, and they revert to what they’re comfortable evaluating (because it’s also what they specialize in)"

There's a distinction in avoiding a measure because it's not quantifiable and just plain not feeling as comfortable in that domain.

>How does the possibility of mathematicians being narrow minded in your second paragraph relate to this distinction?

When you're a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. Humans tend to be cognitively lazy, so they revert to what they know when faced with uncertainty. E.g., a mathematician feels more comfortable measuring math skills, even though a better measure may be a combination of math and leadership skills. So they tend to hire quants with poor management traits. It doesn't mean they couldn't evaluate the soft skills, it means they chose not to.

Using a different analogy, if you asked a sprinter to choose a decathlete, what skills do you think they would more heavily weight in their evaluation? I'm saying it's likely they would more heavily weight the sprinting events because they don't know how to evaluate the other events as well. They specialize in sprinting, after all, and that's what they know and feel comfortable with. The result probably isn't going to select the best overall decathlete, but it doesn't mean the other events couldn't be measured.

Re: A mental health crisis in science

#210

Post by CatWChainsaw »

syngrog66 wrote: post #151

My understanding is that there's been a big rise in mental illness, anxiety and stress in general, over the last 10 yeats or so. And its true across professions, ages, race, gender or sexuality. A lot of factors pushing for it: 1. the general madness and chaos of the Trump presidency ("When I wake up in the morning will I learn Trump has launched nukes at North Korea? Or vice versa?" etc etc, ad nauseum for 4 years)…

People who understand that collapse is inevitable are generally more depressed, yes.
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