"To selflessly further the total sum of knowledge?" Yes. I think you are saying this sarcastically but I'm not sure... This is why you should get involved in r

"To selflessly further the total sum of knowledge?" Yes. I think you are saying this sarcastically but I'm not sure... This is why you should get involved in research at the frontier. "What field? Who’s leaving?" Mathematics, and I'd extend it to other academic disciplines. Do you care more about the results and the knowledge or about who gets credit? The drive for "glory" has many negative effects in academia that do not get enough recognition. Just look at the replication crisis in psychology for an example. The fact p-hacking was rampant among psychology "researchers" was well known even in the 90s. I remember my professors in grad school for physics joking about it way before it became a mainstream-ish story. So why did this happen? Because there was no one with institutional power in psychology who both understood the problem and cared. No one who was interested in the furthering the "total sum of knowledge" rather they were interested in your "glory."