4 ms·

The article briefly touched on something I find more dangerous: systemic conformity in academia. If you want to be influential, your best bet is to become allie

The article briefly touched on something I find more dangerous: systemic conformity in academia. If you want to be influential, your best bet is to become allied to academia. As the article notes, "independent" researchers are viewed with suspicion, if viewed at all. Since there are incentives to conform (albeit loosely) to some norms while perusing a PH.D. there is a lot of hill climbing and not a lot of long jumps.

chasingsparks 17y ago
P.S. Can someone with sufficient Karma post a poll asking level of education completed. Or maybe level of education desired would be more interesting. I'm curious about HN's academic demographics.
- daniel-cussen 17y ago
  http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=917219 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=917219
- deleted 17y ago
  [deleted]
Alex3917 17y ago
I think you are right that this is the real story. The article itself doesn't make a whole lot of sense. If the reason you are getting a Ph.D. is because you want to teach college kids or get a 'BGN' job, you are doing it for the wrong reasons. The only reason to get a Ph.D. is because you want to publish academic research. And if you show up without already knowing what you want to be researching, you're probably not ready to get a Ph.D. yet. That's not to say that academia isn't horribly broken, it is, but in some places it really seems like the author is going off in the wrong direction.
miloshh 17y ago
Which independent researchers did you have in mind? One example I can think of is in politically sensitive areas, where think-tanks bypass the peer-review process and try to get their "research" straight into media, through good connections. I think that is rightfully viewed with suspicion. If your point was that researchers unaffiliated with universities have a harder time to get through the peer-review process - I don't think that's true at all. Often I do not even remember if a paper I read in the past came from a university or an industry lab. For example, in computer graphics, one of the most prolific institutions when it comes to publishing papers is Microsoft Research Asia.
psranga 17y ago
"Long Jumps" is a myth imho. What appears to be a long jump to a non-expert on first glance, on deeper inspection will usually turn out to have involved multiple small incremental steps culminating a final discovery. Since we have to acknowledge somebody we usually pick the guy/gal who finished the job. I'm not saying that all work is equal, but imho planning for long jumps is impossible (it's not like researchers don't want to make big leaps in understanding). Examples which have changed my mind about this: Andrew Wiles' Fermat proof, evolution of RISC, quantum theories. I am pretty sure that if I dig into it, I'll find that relativity and evolution also built upon previous work.
- chasingsparks 17y ago
  I don't necessarily disagree. Instead, I would modify what I said originally. There are structural factors that make taking large risks less profitable to the researcher than taking small incremental ones. The small incremental steps are important, but the large risks are also important. I think that the portfolio of research that results from "professional academia" tends to underweight risky projects. I am not claiming that it shift towards a total random search; I only claim that we need more risky investment compared to what we have now.
- npk 17y ago
  > "Long Jumps" is a myth imho. You are 100% on point. The parent's poster's point on conformity is well taken. Still, "independent" researchers are viewed with suspicion because research is hard. As psranga points out, to make a long jump a researcher has to stay on top of the incremental steps. Unfortunately, for 99.9% of people, to do this they must be fluent with the literature and much more importantly talk with other researchers. No one works in a vacuum (and don't bother bringing up counter examples like einstein or newton). Conformity is a big problem. It might arise when too many PhDs are hustling for a small pie. I'm not sure.
  - stcredzero 17y ago
    Conformity is a big problem. What was the big heresy for one generation changes into "what you have to say to get tenure" in another.

chasingsparks 17y ago

P.S. Can someone with sufficient Karma post a poll asking level of education completed. Or maybe level of education desired would be more interesting. I'm curious about HN's academic demographics.

daniel-cussen 17y ago
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=917219 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=917219
deleted 17y ago
[deleted]

Alex3917 17y ago

I think you are right that this is the real story. The article itself doesn't make a whole lot of sense. If the reason you are getting a Ph.D. is because you want to teach college kids or get a 'BGN' job, you are doing it for the wrong reasons. The only reason to get a Ph.D. is because you want to publish academic research. And if you show up without already knowing what you want to be researching, you're probably not ready to get a Ph.D. yet. That's not to say that academia isn't horribly broken, it is, but in some places it really seems like the author is going off in the wrong direction.

miloshh 17y ago

Which independent researchers did you have in mind? One example I can think of is in politically sensitive areas, where think-tanks bypass the peer-review process and try to get their "research" straight into media, through good connections. I think that is rightfully viewed with suspicion. If your point was that researchers unaffiliated with universities have a harder time to get through the peer-review process - I don't think that's true at all. Often I do not even remember if a paper I read in the past came from a university or an industry lab. For example, in computer graphics, one of the most prolific institutions when it comes to publishing papers is Microsoft Research Asia.

psranga 17y ago

"Long Jumps" is a myth imho. What appears to be a long jump to a non-expert on first glance, on deeper inspection will usually turn out to have involved multiple small incremental steps culminating a final discovery. Since we have to acknowledge somebody we usually pick the guy/gal who finished the job. I'm not saying that all work is equal, but imho planning for long jumps is impossible (it's not like researchers don't want to make big leaps in understanding). Examples which have changed my mind about this: Andrew Wiles' Fermat proof, evolution of RISC, quantum theories. I am pretty sure that if I dig into it, I'll find that relativity and evolution also built upon previous work.

chasingsparks 17y ago
I don't necessarily disagree. Instead, I would modify what I said originally. There are structural factors that make taking large risks less profitable to the researcher than taking small incremental ones. The small incremental steps are important, but the large risks are also important. I think that the portfolio of research that results from "professional academia" tends to underweight risky projects. I am not claiming that it shift towards a total random search; I only claim that we need more risky investment compared to what we have now.
npk 17y ago
> "Long Jumps" is a myth imho. You are 100% on point. The parent's poster's point on conformity is well taken. Still, "independent" researchers are viewed with suspicion because research is hard. As psranga points out, to make a long jump a researcher has to stay on top of the incremental steps. Unfortunately, for 99.9% of people, to do this they must be fluent with the literature and much more importantly talk with other researchers. No one works in a vacuum (and don't bother bringing up counter examples like einstein or newton). Conformity is a big problem. It might arise when too many PhDs are hustling for a small pie. I'm not sure.
- stcredzero 17y ago
  Conformity is a big problem. What was the big heresy for one generation changes into "what you have to say to get tenure" in another.