I spent the better part of a decade doing academic research, and now have spent the better part of a decade doing startups and software. If I could choose to d

I spent the better part of a decade doing academic research, and now have spent the better part of a decade doing startups and software. If I could choose to do anything while also being assured of a stable living, I'd do the research again. The thing about the software industry is that "interesting" tends to be defined down -- for example, you'll be working on a CRUD app, but the "interesting" part is that you're doing it "at scale". Or you'll be doing some "interesting" refactor of a hard piece of software, that isn't interesting in any other way. Or most insidious of all...there's nothing really "interesting" in your job, and you just get inured to the day-to-day nature of the work, which always tends to look the same. The difference is in the big picture, and for most software jobs, the big picture just drains your soul. I'm pretty lucky in that the project I'm working on now has a truly "interesting" technical component, but it still doesn't compare with the idea that I could be working on an interesting technical problem that also might lead to a new antibiotic or vaccine...or just discovering something new. I miss that part.