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Well, I think one of the shifts that happened is that research changed from "I'm charting my own course in an undiscovered field and accept all liability" to "a

Well, I think one of the shifts that happened is that research changed from "I'm charting my own course in an undiscovered field and accept all liability" to "a university factory promises me a degree and experience". But here there is an incomplete jump -- in some programs it looks like a well-charted degree program, but has all the liability of research that may not work out. That's why I think (as pointed out above) some practical engineering fields do much better than purely theoretical fields in this regard. It has also become much more expensive to give it a try and be wrong. People who don't understand these factors and go in with the wrong expectations are highly likely to fall through the cracks, and not recognize when their program is going sideways or their advisor/topic relationship is not working out.

bonoboTP 6y ago
The illusion that we are supposed to uphold is that brilliance and serendipity can be planned for, can be scheduled and made into an academic program. Actually research and scientific discovery should never be the job of someone. It should be a side product of general activity in a field, something that is already useful even without the discovery (if you're poor). Or just lesure hobby activity that is fine if nothing comes out of it (if you're rich). It's also part of the whole inflation and treadmill thing going on in education and titles. Generations ago, going to high school was something significant. For the next generation, high school was the default and college became a special thing. Now the majority (in the US) goes to college. Within the family it feels like satisfying progress. Parents look on their kids and feel proud that they are making it further than they themselves did. But now a Master's degree can be a bit too generic. Having a PhD can be nice in industry nowadays (though of course not required). So what used to be a special thing for a limited circle of select few with the background and fallback that allowed failure, is now becoming a factory process. PhDs are produced by the thousands and thousands, and we pretend they all pushed science forward. There is a flood of papers accompanying this. Tiny steps forward or mixing and matching existing things, but selling a big story around it, flag planting, trying to claim a huge area when only a tiny aspect of it is actually demonstrated, drawing out huge conclusions etc. There are many reasons for this. The general societal inflation is just one thing. The other is the overall quantification, standardization and uniformization in our zeitgeist. There must be a standard process for everything. The politicians and bureaucrats demand to have a standard process for innovation. You must know in advance exactly "how many pieces of innovation" will you produce per year, what will be the impact of it etc. Then when you tell them about your plans, all they hear is the number of buzzwords mentioned from the latest fads and tune out otherwise. Ah and they look at your publication list of course. If you churned out many papers in the past, you will probably do that as well in this round of funding, and those papers can all be attached to the funding agency reports, so that will make the agency look good towards the ministry or whatever.

bonoboTP 6y ago

The illusion that we are supposed to uphold is that brilliance and serendipity can be planned for, can be scheduled and made into an academic program. Actually research and scientific discovery should never be the job of someone. It should be a side product of general activity in a field, something that is already useful even without the discovery (if you're poor). Or just lesure hobby activity that is fine if nothing comes out of it (if you're rich). It's also part of the whole inflation and treadmill thing going on in education and titles. Generations ago, going to high school was something significant. For the next generation, high school was the default and college became a special thing. Now the majority (in the US) goes to college. Within the family it feels like satisfying progress. Parents look on their kids and feel proud that they are making it further than they themselves did. But now a Master's degree can be a bit too generic. Having a PhD can be nice in industry nowadays (though of course not required). So what used to be a special thing for a limited circle of select few with the background and fallback that allowed failure, is now becoming a factory process. PhDs are produced by the thousands and thousands, and we pretend they all pushed science forward. There is a flood of papers accompanying this. Tiny steps forward or mixing and matching existing things, but selling a big story around it, flag planting, trying to claim a huge area when only a tiny aspect of it is actually demonstrated, drawing out huge conclusions etc. There are many reasons for this. The general societal inflation is just one thing. The other is the overall quantification, standardization and uniformization in our zeitgeist. There must be a standard process for everything. The politicians and bureaucrats demand to have a standard process for innovation. You must know in advance exactly "how many pieces of innovation" will you produce per year, what will be the impact of it etc. Then when you tell them about your plans, all they hear is the number of buzzwords mentioned from the latest fads and tune out otherwise. Ah and they look at your publication list of course. If you churned out many papers in the past, you will probably do that as well in this round of funding, and those papers can all be attached to the funding agency reports, so that will make the agency look good towards the ministry or whatever.