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>To me the litmus test is now this: do you need a particle accelerator (or equivalents) to conduct research in your field? If not, don't do a PhD. As someone t
by EthanHeilman 11y ago
>To me the litmus test is now this: do you need a particle accelerator (or equivalents) to conduct research in your field? If not, don't do a PhD.
As someone that did research outside of academia my litmus test was:
Do I need a mentor to train me to be a great researcher? After doing research on my own for a while I discovered that yes I needed such a mentor. I optimized my search around finding the best mentor possible.
- alexvoda 11y agoWhat did you find were the reasons you needed a mentor?
- EthanHeilman 11y ago1. Better communication in terms of writing and presentation (for my first talk I did three practice talks a day for a month with constant feedback and notes). 2. Understanding which problems to work on (Prior to grad school I spent over a year on a problem, when I published a solution I discovered that there was very little interest. I want to build things people use.). 3. Developing better research methods (How to approach and understand a problem. How to think about solutions and measure them.). 4. Honest, critical, and in-depth feedback on all of the above.