3 ms·

Also, academia (in the humanities) has much more of a downside. If your startup fails, you spend a year or two of your life learning a lot of useful skills, bu

Also, academia (in the humanities) has much more of a downside. If your startup fails, you spend a year or two of your life learning a lot of useful skills, but end up out of a job when the money runs out. It sucks, but you end the travail much better off than when you started, and probably better off than if you had toiled in a mediocre corporate job. In the humanities, if your academic career fails, you've spent a decade of your live to get a relatively useless degree, have weak job skills for someone your age, and probably damaged self-esteem. You're not better off than you were when you began; you're in your mid-30s with nothing to show but a publication no one cares about.

whacked_new 18y ago
A counter argument: if they are getting the PhD as evidence of mastery in a topic they love, it doesn't matter what comes after it, unless circumstances will force them to give up what they love until they die. If one can see just this far, they will be able to plan accordingly. Suppose they do, then there is no reason to change course. The point is to know what you want and why you want it; having figured this out, screw what other people think, unless your plans require that as a parameter.
- banned_man 18y ago
  A counter argument: if they are getting the PhD as evidence of mastery in a topic they love, it doesn't matter what comes after it, unless circumstances will force them to give up what they love until they die. The intrusion of bad "circumstances" is the norm in academia. Actually, it's the norm in life, but academia is set up in a way that makes it nearly impossible to recover. Also, the "love" people have for a subject or field is highly conditional (not that it should be any other way; that wouldn't make sense). This is mere attachment. Unconditional love for something so abstract probably cannot exist, and if it can, is not desirable in any case. It's legitimate to be intellectually fascinated by finite fields or 19th-century literature, but to say that one loves these things is a stretch. A person who's capable of developing a fascination with X is equally capable of finding a "love" for Y; that's a core trait irrespective of niche-bound particulars. So when someone is forced into an unappealing niche by academic politics, lives a crappy lifestyle on account of the university's stinginess, and has a fractured family life due to overwork and constant geographic uncertainty, all while having to cope with distracting administrative and bureaucratic chores, it makes sense that this "love" of subject matter would disappear entirely. Most people realize, upon growing up, that they love their families and decent lifestyles more than intellectual abstractions.
  - whacked_new 18y ago
    I don't disagree with you, although that doesn't contradict what I said: I use "love" in a very strict sense, in the same way you use it in the unconditional sense. So another issue I didn't make clear was that many people who declare their love for a subject don't really know to what extent this love stretches. In my book it means being alive implies doing X, until life ends. Difficult for most, but not impossible :-)
  - yummyfajitas 18y ago
    This is very true. In my academic career, I've worked on foundations of quantum mechanics, numerical scattering theory, and now I'm working on medical imaging and computational geometry. On the side, I'm doing some web development (database stuff and also business optimization). I could do basically any technical work and enjoy it. There are some things I like slightly more and am moderately better at (not always the same thing), but those differences are marginal.
    - carterschonwald 18y ago
      How're you finding the culture of courant? Is it a place worth checking out for grad school for folks into cs theory + general mathy goodnes?
      - yummyfajitas 18y ago
        Pick an adviser. The school you go to is the school your adviser is located at. I wrote some previous comments on this topic: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=247160 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=247160 To answer your specific question, it's definitely a place worth checking out. There are great CS theory/math people here. The culture is friendly but a bit isolating. You will need to actively work at meeting people you don't directly work for.
- philwelch 18y ago
  It's fine to say that having a PhD in the humanities for the "love" of the subject is enough, but in at least some of the humanities, that won't get you anywhere. Philosophy, for instance, is an ongoing discussion, and unless you're in academia attending conferences and writing papers and getting published in the same journals that everyone else is, you're not really participating in the field. And you can't really do that unless you're faculty somewhere. It sucks, but that's also where the good philosophy gets done, and you can't do renegade philosophy outside of academia without losing a lot of important context and good work.
frossie 18y ago
This problem is not limited to the humanities. Academia in all fields depends on an army of young grad students and postdocs to staff the research trenches, many times more than there ever will be tenured positions for. In fact it is more insiduous in the sciences, in that people think they are gaining marketable skills that they can fall on as a Plan B. For example many delude themselves that they can program, because they had to write a few scripts to manipulate data in their research career. They get weeded out at early stages for software engineering positions ("Have you ever used a version control system" is a Damoclean interview question).
- timr 18y ago
  "They get weeded out at early stages for software engineering positions ("Have you ever used a version control system" is a Damoclean interview question)." If by "Damoclean", you mean "capricious", then I agree, but it sounds more like an interview anti-pattern. That question doesn't tell you anything about the candidate's capability of understanding a version control system, which is a far more important property than their particular experience with one VCS or another. This year alone, I've learned at least a half-dozen new tools and technologies that I'd never used in grad school. Yet here I am, using them to do productive work. Would you really not hire me because I'd never used a tool before?
  - frossie 18y ago
    I know this sounds unkind, but it is not a question of whether someone knows a particular tool, which I agree is not always essential. The overwhelming chances are that if a person has never used any version control system at all, they have not written software of any complexity and/or they have not written software in collaboration with others. The fact that they could, in fact, happen to be brilliant at both of those given a chance is an unknown quantity - and a pivotal part of hiring is to minimise the risk of someone not working out. Of course there are always good answers to questions even when the skill is not there; personally, I have yet to get one on this question. My advice to anyone who is a non-comp-sci grad (or lacks real software engineering experience for other reasons) that wants to turn into a programmer is to join an open source project and cut your teeth on that; not only is it going to give you an introduction to many things that count but it does so in a way that makes it very easy for a potential employer to verify them.

whacked_new 18y ago

A counter argument: if they are getting the PhD as evidence of mastery in a topic they love, it doesn't matter what comes after it, unless circumstances will force them to give up what they love until they die. If one can see just this far, they will be able to plan accordingly. Suppose they do, then there is no reason to change course. The point is to know what you want and why you want it; having figured this out, screw what other people think, unless your plans require that as a parameter.

banned_man 18y ago
A counter argument: if they are getting the PhD as evidence of mastery in a topic they love, it doesn't matter what comes after it, unless circumstances will force them to give up what they love until they die. The intrusion of bad "circumstances" is the norm in academia. Actually, it's the norm in life, but academia is set up in a way that makes it nearly impossible to recover. Also, the "love" people have for a subject or field is highly conditional (not that it should be any other way; that wouldn't make sense). This is mere attachment. Unconditional love for something so abstract probably cannot exist, and if it can, is not desirable in any case. It's legitimate to be intellectually fascinated by finite fields or 19th-century literature, but to say that one loves these things is a stretch. A person who's capable of developing a fascination with X is equally capable of finding a "love" for Y; that's a core trait irrespective of niche-bound particulars. So when someone is forced into an unappealing niche by academic politics, lives a crappy lifestyle on account of the university's stinginess, and has a fractured family life due to overwork and constant geographic uncertainty, all while having to cope with distracting administrative and bureaucratic chores, it makes sense that this "love" of subject matter would disappear entirely. Most people realize, upon growing up, that they love their families and decent lifestyles more than intellectual abstractions.
- whacked_new 18y ago
  I don't disagree with you, although that doesn't contradict what I said: I use "love" in a very strict sense, in the same way you use it in the unconditional sense. So another issue I didn't make clear was that many people who declare their love for a subject don't really know to what extent this love stretches. In my book it means being alive implies doing X, until life ends. Difficult for most, but not impossible :-)
- yummyfajitas 18y ago
  This is very true. In my academic career, I've worked on foundations of quantum mechanics, numerical scattering theory, and now I'm working on medical imaging and computational geometry. On the side, I'm doing some web development (database stuff and also business optimization). I could do basically any technical work and enjoy it. There are some things I like slightly more and am moderately better at (not always the same thing), but those differences are marginal.
  - carterschonwald 18y ago
    How're you finding the culture of courant? Is it a place worth checking out for grad school for folks into cs theory + general mathy goodnes?
    - yummyfajitas 18y ago
      Pick an adviser. The school you go to is the school your adviser is located at. I wrote some previous comments on this topic: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=247160 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=247160 To answer your specific question, it's definitely a place worth checking out. There are great CS theory/math people here. The culture is friendly but a bit isolating. You will need to actively work at meeting people you don't directly work for.
philwelch 18y ago
It's fine to say that having a PhD in the humanities for the "love" of the subject is enough, but in at least some of the humanities, that won't get you anywhere. Philosophy, for instance, is an ongoing discussion, and unless you're in academia attending conferences and writing papers and getting published in the same journals that everyone else is, you're not really participating in the field. And you can't really do that unless you're faculty somewhere. It sucks, but that's also where the good philosophy gets done, and you can't do renegade philosophy outside of academia without losing a lot of important context and good work.

frossie 18y ago

This problem is not limited to the humanities. Academia in all fields depends on an army of young grad students and postdocs to staff the research trenches, many times more than there ever will be tenured positions for. In fact it is more insiduous in the sciences, in that people think they are gaining marketable skills that they can fall on as a Plan B. For example many delude themselves that they can program, because they had to write a few scripts to manipulate data in their research career. They get weeded out at early stages for software engineering positions ("Have you ever used a version control system" is a Damoclean interview question).

timr 18y ago
"They get weeded out at early stages for software engineering positions ("Have you ever used a version control system" is a Damoclean interview question)." If by "Damoclean", you mean "capricious", then I agree, but it sounds more like an interview anti-pattern. That question doesn't tell you anything about the candidate's capability of understanding a version control system, which is a far more important property than their particular experience with one VCS or another. This year alone, I've learned at least a half-dozen new tools and technologies that I'd never used in grad school. Yet here I am, using them to do productive work. Would you really not hire me because I'd never used a tool before?
- frossie 18y ago
  I know this sounds unkind, but it is not a question of whether someone knows a particular tool, which I agree is not always essential. The overwhelming chances are that if a person has never used any version control system at all, they have not written software of any complexity and/or they have not written software in collaboration with others. The fact that they could, in fact, happen to be brilliant at both of those given a chance is an unknown quantity - and a pivotal part of hiring is to minimise the risk of someone not working out. Of course there are always good answers to questions even when the skill is not there; personally, I have yet to get one on this question. My advice to anyone who is a non-comp-sci grad (or lacks real software engineering experience for other reasons) that wants to turn into a programmer is to join an open source project and cut your teeth on that; not only is it going to give you an introduction to many things that count but it does so in a way that makes it very easy for a potential employer to verify them.