Ask YC: How to survive grad school? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask YC: How to survive grad school?

#51

Post by 13ren » Fri, Oct 31, 2008, 4:03 PM UTC

mechanical_fish wrote: post #12

Some... play along, trying to get their own stuff done on the side. Others... are happy to have a good place where they can surf the net the whole day, while pretending to be scientists. Some of my collegues are completely clueless... but being generally friendly goes a long way. Congratulations! Your training is nearly complete! Welcome to the ranks of the enlightened! ;) Your essay is pretty comprehensive and one c…

[overwhelming majority spend most of their time on] publishing over-complicated solutions to easy problems, or non-solutions to difficult problems, or incomprehensible solutions to niche problems.

[PhD, year 8] I also get this impression from reading papers; and the incentive system rewards it. But I feel I'm too cynical - anyone got evidence?

A contrary view is that a PhD is a Doctor of Philosophy... and philosophy isn't about results, but reasoning. That's the game being played. It could be accurately described as angels-on-a-pinhead "academic" - but useful for practicing those reasoning skills.

Re: Ask YC: How to survive grad school?

#52

Post by msg » Fri, Oct 31, 2008, 4:20 PM UTC

I was on a pretty tight schedule for my MSCS, get in, write thesis, get out. I changed advisors once, but I probably should have done so again and worked on the robot instead of the image steganography.

I regarded my thesis as an interesting failure. I took a new approach that didn't quite make it up to par with existing methods. I made it just far enough in those 16 months to figure out how far behind I was.

It wasn't a waste of time. I learned some academic tools, I got my feet wet, and it was marginally related to my emphasis. But I was glad to cut my losses and move on.

There are a lot of ways to cut your losses. If you have something to show for your work (publication record, recommendations from your supervisors and coworkers, new skills and thinking modes), so much the better. If you can find another project, that sounds like a good way to go. You obviously care about doing good research. Don't give up.

I am on the fence about going back for a PhD, but only because of time constraints, not because I think I wouldn't enjoy it...

Re: Ask YC: How to survive grad school?

#53

Post by jlouis » Sun, Nov 02, 2008, 1:01 PM UTC

albertcardona wrote: post #18

dhbradshaw wrote: post #4

This post is important and I think that your feelings echo those of many thousands of graduate students. Let me talk a little bit as a rare case: I've worked now under 7 advisors on 7 different projects and now I'm finally almost done. Most of the projects have been as you describe: "after almost a year, it is fair to say that I have good view of the project and it is almost surely a giant failure." That's how most p…

I know of one exception. He explained his system: he does the research, then he gets grants for his research. This gives him time to do new research and he writes new grants based on that. He delivers because he only proposes to do what he has already more or less done! You have just described my thesis advisor: he was offset -2 years on the 3-year grant periods. The publication system is so slow that his whole appro…

The alternative is Simon Peyton Jones style: Work on some 10-15 papers at the same time. Whenever some new knowledge is gained, try to apply it to all the papers. At some point one of your papers is publishable. It is basically running research as one big investment bank and spreading your portfolio out.

Re: Ask YC: How to survive grad school?

#54

Post by buridan » Mon, Nov 03, 2008, 12:16 PM UTC

What you are experiencing is called 'science'. Normal science has around a 95% failure rate, great science is 1 in a million or billion. Most science is 'the grind', collecting, considering, developing minor things, most of which end up to be wrong. It is hard work, it is challenging work, and 5 years from now, you will either be part of something, or you won't.

If you think science is or could be otherwise, I think you are basically just fooling yourself by being completely unaware of history. Science isn't 'hacking' something together and making it work, it is finding the answer, not just 'an answer', but 'the answer' and even then 'the answer' is likely to be shown to be wrong by someone else. Knowing and learning what is wrong is as important as finding what is or could be right.

It sounds to me from what you say above that you want to be some sort of freelance creative computer consultant more than a researcher.

btw, no one needs another google, not because google is the best or anything, but because the model of centralization and massification has reached its potential and fails for too many people.

Re: Ask YC: How to survive grad school?

#55

Post by denshe » Wed, Nov 05, 2008, 2:04 PM UTC

Typically a first-year grad.student has other projects around in his/her lab and can actually switch to one of them if required. I think it might be an option for you. At least, I never recommend to continue working on something that you simply don't care ... Also, especially if you are doing CS-research: do an internship and ideally right now (I mean - find a good one, apply for, and get it; well, I know, there are not that many internships in winter time but some are certainly available). Assuming you do the internship it allows you to see the "real life" and just compare it with your academy life and other stuff.