Feynman: I am burned out and I'll never accomplish anything (1985) • Hacker News Board

Re: Feynman: I am burned out and I'll never accomplish anything (1985)

#131

Post by phone8675309 » Thu, Jan 11, 2024, 10:16 PM UTC

mbm wrote: post #93

oldandboring wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the closest comment I could find to how I experience my burnout. Nothing makes me more anxious than realizing that I fall further behind every day I'm not spending (unbillable) time becoming an expert in all the dev/ops tooling that somehow became indispensable the past 5-10 years. It's funny because I used to LOVE computers as a teenager because I loved setting up and configuring Unix systems. Now, as a deve…

The complexity has increased exponentially, but the user experience has not.

If anything, it's regressed.

All of this complex tooling gives devops the ability to say "sorry, no capacity, see you in two quarters".

Re: Feynman: I am burned out and I'll never accomplish anything (1985)

#132

Post by godelski » Thu, Jan 11, 2024, 10:22 PM UTC

borroka wrote: post #106

godelski wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds like you're describing a system that is a failure but that the solution is not to fix the system but to give up and do something else. Can we not fix academia? Is the signal of so many people, especially in CS, abandoning academia for industry not as clear of a sign as you can get? I feel crazy because it feels like everyone either does not want to admit the system is broken or will admit it but not want…

First, a postdoc on the way out of academia is not going to fix academia. Second, how is the system broken? There are mismanaged resources, some nepotism (in the U.S., a lot of nepotism if we look at countries other than the U.S. or the like), some research questions that are (wrongly) favored, but it doesn't change the fact that many more PhDs with academic career ambitions are being produced than there are (and wil…

> Second, how is the system broken?

I want to d my best to respond, but can you help me determine my audience? That way I can be clear? Are you coming from inside or outside academia? If inside, what field? If outside, have you gone through a graduate program? Which decade? No need to give highly specific answers, I'm just trying to get some additional context to best respond. There are problems more visible to those inside and often nuanced and problems that are invisible to outside.

Re: Feynman: I am burned out and I'll never accomplish anything (1985)

#133

Post by godelski » Thu, Jan 11, 2024, 10:29 PM UTC

tnecniv wrote: post #108

godelski wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds like you're describing a system that is a failure but that the solution is not to fix the system but to give up and do something else. Can we not fix academia? Is the signal of so many people, especially in CS, abandoning academia for industry not as clear of a sign as you can get? I feel crazy because it feels like everyone either does not want to admit the system is broken or will admit it but not want…

When I was still a PhD student, my advisor lamented that he couldn’t find postdocs to hire because big tech was paying them more for the same role with minimal constraints. If that kept going for a while, I imagine it’d put pressure on at least some parts of academia (CS and engineering don’t expect you to do a series of postdocs like biology does, and pure math has their own system of seniority I only know a little…

I literally went through this recently with someone in my department. They wanted to know what professors did similar research to me at R1 universities of comparable rank. I told them no one and they didn't believe me. I sent them an annotated version of a bibliography to a survey paper I had recently written, writing down where each person worked. I just don't think they understand that right now, as an intern for a big tech company I am making more money than some of our junior professors. When I can get a full time position my cash in hand compensation goes up, plus equity and more benefits (like 401k). Who the hell would go into academia? You have lower pay, fewer resources, and more bureaucratic BS. There's lots of bureaucracy in industry too, don't get me wrong, but it's easier to deal with when you're getting paid more.

A post doc position wants me to move across the country, into a major city, and pay me $50k/yr for a position with low growth opportunities and where I will have to move again in another few years? No thanks.

Re: Feynman: I am burned out and I'll never accomplish anything (1985)

#134

Post by htss2013 » Thu, Jan 11, 2024, 10:33 PM UTC

gen220 wrote: post #121

godelski wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I know completely clueless and incompetent researchers that made an effortless transition to faculty positions at top 10 universities, whereas some great postdocs were stuck forever, burnt out, and left. Ironically, some of said postdocs did the work the others took credit for in order to be promoted. I've seen this, and it's happened to me. I'm at a much lower ranking uni and we partner with higher ranking unis an…

In bureaucracies like this, the fish inenvitably rots from the head. The people who offer the faculty positions are incompetent or indifferent. And the people who hired those people are incompetent or indifferent. As such, it's a mess that literally can't be solved from within, it needs to be solved by the administration, and the boards who appoint them. The tenure system means it'll take generations to resolve. Acad…

What do you mean by eugenics? That academics studied eugenics? Or that eugenics was widely popular among academics?

I guess the pendulum always swings to the extreme other direction. Today, the more disadvantaged your intersectional identity, the better your prospects in academia.

Re: Feynman: I am burned out and I'll never accomplish anything (1985)

#135

Post by godelski » Thu, Jan 11, 2024, 10:33 PM UTC

gen220 wrote: post #121

godelski wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I know completely clueless and incompetent researchers that made an effortless transition to faculty positions at top 10 universities, whereas some great postdocs were stuck forever, burnt out, and left. Ironically, some of said postdocs did the work the others took credit for in order to be promoted. I've seen this, and it's happened to me. I'm at a much lower ranking uni and we partner with higher ranking unis an…

In bureaucracies like this, the fish inenvitably rots from the head. The people who offer the faculty positions are incompetent or indifferent. And the people who hired those people are incompetent or indifferent. As such, it's a mess that literally can't be solved from within, it needs to be solved by the administration, and the boards who appoint them. The tenure system means it'll take generations to resolve. Acad…

I agree, and I think that is the essence of the meritocracy-metric paradox. Those that hacked the metric become those in charge. I think that only reinforces the idea of metric hacking. I really think this concept is playing out at large and not just academia.

Re: Feynman: I am burned out and I'll never accomplish anything (1985)

#136

Post by chankstein38 » Thu, Jan 11, 2024, 10:34 PM UTC

This is me with writing code. I do it professionally and have for almost 15 years. I'm so burnt out on the day to day, forced work. But show me something interesting or hackable, a game I like that I can mod, a cool script, a cool concept that might make a neat image or sound. Whatever it might be, suddenly I'm playing again and having fun, burnout or not.

Just wish I could find a way to make that my paycheck...

Re: Feynman: I am burned out and I'll never accomplish anything (1985)

#137

Post by olyjohn » Thu, Jan 11, 2024, 10:36 PM UTC

ericmcer wrote: post #59

vasco wrote: post #10

I'm not a mental health connoisseur or anything, but removing your own pressure to perform seems like good advice regardless of your circumstances. If you're tired or stressed or whatever, labeling yourself as "a burned out person" seems to me like the only good thing it does is add more pressure. Because how can you do well if you're "damaged" in some way? It's important to not just do old style sweep it under the r…

Makes sense, we are taught that being “mindful” of our mental state is key to mental health, but it also means everyone walks around with a handful of self diagnosed mental deficits.

Being mindful of what you are doing, what you are thinking, how you are feeling, and how you are reacting to things is not diagnosing. You should probably leave the diagnosing part to a professional if you feel that you really need help with your mental health.

Re: Feynman: I am burned out and I'll never accomplish anything (1985)

#138

Post by wnolens » Thu, Jan 11, 2024, 10:50 PM UTC

dexwiz wrote: post #64

tnecniv wrote: post #13

As a researcher, I’ve felt largely the same way lately. It’s been hard for me to even wrap up a project I was so excited about when I started it that I missed sleep because I was that engaged. Unfortunately, I don’t have a cozy tenure position at a major research institution to ride out the burnout until I feel inspired again. I’m just a lowly postdoc. I’ve thought about leaving the research life for a regular job, b…

I think there is a kind of grief associated with growing up that people don’t talk about. When you are young and inspired it seems like life is long and you can do anything, branching paths with unlimited doors. Once you're an adult, your past choices narrow down your future paths, and your sense of age starts to set in. In some way you mourn the paths not taken. This is called mortality, and can be a nasty combo wit…

I need a support group for this idea. Can't seem to accept it and walk through some doors, abandoning the other paths. It's sparked a major depression in me.

Re: Feynman: I am burned out and I'll never accomplish anything (1985)

#139

Post by marssaxman » Thu, Jan 11, 2024, 11:05 PM UTC

dexwiz wrote: post #64

tnecniv wrote: post #13

As a researcher, I’ve felt largely the same way lately. It’s been hard for me to even wrap up a project I was so excited about when I started it that I missed sleep because I was that engaged. Unfortunately, I don’t have a cozy tenure position at a major research institution to ride out the burnout until I feel inspired again. I’m just a lowly postdoc. I’ve thought about leaving the research life for a regular job, b…

I think there is a kind of grief associated with growing up that people don’t talk about. When you are young and inspired it seems like life is long and you can do anything, branching paths with unlimited doors. Once you're an adult, your past choices narrow down your future paths, and your sense of age starts to set in. In some way you mourn the paths not taken. This is called mortality, and can be a nasty combo wit…

As I have grown older I have come to see a similar effect not just in my own life but in the shape of the world around us; humanity has closed the doors to certain kinds of futures I once hoped and worked for, and "mourning" is a good term for those feelings. There are many open doors remaining in humanity's future, to be sure, but the scope of change seems narrower than it once did, since the bright new possibilities of the future always seem to get swallowed up by the ugly messes left over from the past.

Re: Feynman: I am burned out and I'll never accomplish anything (1985)

#140

Post by 0x3444ac53 » Thu, Jan 11, 2024, 11:08 PM UTC

tnecniv wrote: post #13

As a researcher, I’ve felt largely the same way lately. It’s been hard for me to even wrap up a project I was so excited about when I started it that I missed sleep because I was that engaged. Unfortunately, I don’t have a cozy tenure position at a major research institution to ride out the burnout until I feel inspired again. I’m just a lowly postdoc. I’ve thought about leaving the research life for a regular job, b…

Personally, I never made it very far in academia. Never even finished out undergrad. That said, I'm now at a point in my life where I'm mostly surrounded by Businesses Majors and I do truly miss my time as a philosophy student, despite being very burnt out when I left.

Academia is a weird field, that, in my experience, is wonderful to have connections to, but for the most part is exhausting. Frankly I think things can be more exhausting when you love them enough to be consumed by them.

Even now, I have projects that I work on in my free time that I'm so engaged and miss sleep for, and while I'm proud of whatever is produced, it does often lead me feeling frustrated and burnt out. It helped me quite a bit to start setting boundaries for myself, as in: I'm going to work on this project until this time, and then I'm taking time to disconnect from it. Even though it can be frustrating to interrupt a flow state, it's still important to take care of ones own needs.