I've worked in the tech industry for almost a decade and I'm returning to the academy because the tech landscape is filled with scam artists, MBA's and ego-tripping managers - which would be tolerable if you actually got to work on something that wouldn't be completely rewritten or became irrelevant in two years time, but that's just not the case...
Correct me if I'm wrong but in the academy I hope to work on research which has at least some consequences on the future, and to find smart and kind people who are actually interested in knowledge for knowledge's sake, even if they are surrounded by gray bureaucrats.
Some people are like that, sure. But please don't make the mistake of idolizing academia because it's different than industry. There are plenty of scam artists doing P-hacking, MBAs leading universities and ego-tripping professors in academia as well. There's a reason the article describes a chapter titled "How to Survive Grad School With Your Soul Intact"; that'd be unnecessary if grad school was a very healthy place in the first place.
This is probably not what you want to hear, but in any place where lots of people work together (whether industry, academia, government or charity organisations) the social aspects of the work and the competition for status and resources will eventually overtake the actual work.
Your question "if not grad school, then what?" may well not have an answer at all.
I agree with this take, having dropped out from my PhD.
I have reluctantly come to accept over the years that my intellectual interests need to be catered to separately from whatever I need to do to economically sustain myself as an adult.
Some lucky people find a good fit (irrespective of institution, academia or industry) but most of us flail around most of the time.
I think the best bet to remain independent and be provocative is to retired. I'm preparing to join the FIRE movement, but I'll do my own thing on my own dime because I spent the last decade bending the knee to corporate overlords. I have learned much.
What would be a good way to make this a reality with serious consequences and satisfaction for the independent researchers? What specific platforms do you suggest? I know in today's world you can get information on any topic for free, and follow the path you desire in your knowledge journey, but to do it in a organized manner (with groups of people working towards some goals) is still a challenge. I was visualizing some sort of a dynamic topic/project based community website which has enough inbuilt authentication to allow serious groups of people to congregate, co-work, plan, execute and be successful in implementing their ideas, without suffering from the drawbacks of academia (or industry)? Does such a thing exist, or does it need to be built. We can of course extend this idea (if successful) to a more sustainable ecosystem of academia and industry including financial independence.
Through these experiences, you meet others in the same situation. Keep track of the good ones. An opportunity might come up for a group of you to do something later on. Regard each charlatan as a trainer.
There is also the startup founder path. That's what I chose, and I'm glad I did. I was tired of meaningless research and meaningless work. I wanted to build something real.
It could be that you're engaged in "the grass is always greener" thinking. "Scam artists, MBA's, ego-tripping managers" and people who exhibit similarly off-putting behavior are found in every area of human endeavor. But so are smart and kind people if you find the right environment. That being said, some fields do seem to select for the more unpleasant personality types because they are optimizing for other qualities.
It's not as simple as one being universally "better" than the other. It very much depends on which university/research group you are part of in academia, and which company you work for in industry.
My own grad school experience was pretty good overall, and I had little to complain about. I read the book mentioned in this post fairly early on and it sounded like the experience would be horrific, but mine wasn't. Possibly this was due to cultural differences between the US and Australia, the latter being where I studied. As I went through my degree and got into teaching though, I started to see enough warning signs that staying long term wasn't going to be a good experience, so as soon has I had my PhD I decided that's where I get off the train.
Since then I've worked in industry, and had both good and bad experiences. There are plenty of horror stories about poor managers, toxic company culture, etc. around I'm sure you're aware of. But there are also companies that have a good working culture, place a high priority on quality and technical excellence, and are generally great to work for.
Am I glad I went to grad school? Absolutely. It was a tough but rewarding experience, my current job (in the latter category above) is an opportunity that came about only because of the research work I did in grad school. I'd say the benefit of grad school is it opens up more opportunities for you to choose from, whether you decide to stay in academia afterwards or return to industry. Both can be good or bad depending on the specific institution/company you work for.
Congrats, you are enlightened. It's sometimes a bit sad to see things for what they are, but it's better than being naive.
If you want to just learn stuff, why not do some Master's degrees? You get close enough to the edge that you'll know a field well, but not so close that you end up spending a lot of time doing politics and advancing very little. You'll also get close enough to soak up advances from people who decided to do phds.
I thought about this as well for a long time and a friend just switched from academy to the industry.
She does math and statistics and stuff; She said she is fed up of writing papers with or without real usecases; Reproducability and co.
She also is now regretting the low salary and her not having much of savings due to it.
I gave myself a new goal instead: making as much money in a normal ethical way as possible, exiting with 50 and then doing what i want without pressure.
Perhaps i will write code or will do something totally different.
> I'm returning to the academy because the tech landscape is filled with scam artists,
...then I have some very bad news.
If you're doing a PhD, good luck and enjoy it - I think there's value in a PhD, still, despite the flawed system.
If you're doing research or going on to do research, then I hope you can find a niche full of scientists and not politicians. Those niches are hard to find.
That's not necessarily true. The difference between a brilliant postdoc working in a hot field who never made it and a tenured PI is the willingness to play the game. So if the game is filled with scammers exaggerating the value of their models, or overfitting to dubious metrics, then these PIs will go right along with it. In this case the con is at the systemic level, so that depresses the "honesty" of each individual across the board, regardless of their personal conduct. The other thing to consider is that in academia your PI is your boss, your principle source of professional reputation, and your HR. So there is no barrier between you and his/her human nature. Therefore pick wisely.
You must know that many in tech have a very different experience than you (proud of their work, like their colleagues, feel care and development from their boss.)
Similarly many in academics love their work and others hate it.
The difference probably has to do more with who you are / how you go about it / attitude than the field.
It would be valuable to reflect what makes you so miserable in your current field while others are able to thrive. I don't know your situation but some guesses: do you have enough focus on getting into the good environments (eg, Google?) and if so - what's holding you back? Skills, drive, attitude? Do you relate to people or are you a judgmental asshole? etc etc.
I don't know the answer but what I am saying is - you probably won't be happy in academia or anywhere else unless you figure out what's making you not happy where you are.
Of course, one must consider the possibility that the issues lie with him and not blame circumstances blindly, but as you can see we are many - and all of us have very similar difficulties and problems with how things are. This points to something systemic. To dismiss all of this as the complaints of malcontent crybabies would be silly.
People can find bliss and happiness even in the direst of circumstances - and sometimes they have no choice but to do just that. As obscenely well educated people living in first world countries, we do have a choice - and advocating complacency for the sake of making your life easier reeks of moral degeneracy if not outright solipsism (same goes for repurposing Zen - "wherever you go, there you are" - to help you turn a blind eye to the world). We can do better.
“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.”
Theoretically nothing you said is wrong. However the truth in my experience is that people who casually refer to their coworkers using language like "scam artists, MBA's and ego-tripping managers" have a lot wrong with them.
If this guy engages with his colleagues with that mindset, what kind of experience can he possibly expect?
And my point is - if he brought that attitude into academia he'd get he same outcome as well.
Doing science means doing politics - publishing, presentations, conferences, and tenure is all just a very slow and complicated way of finding consensus. It's inevitable at some point in a scientist's career that they run up against some controversy where it's not just "data and facts wins", but it's about relationships, leverage, negotiation, social clout, etc.
I've settled on a theory that the bulk of science that lives hidden in lab journal notebooks and dropbox files is stuff that's not too controversial or heretical, but that the investigator is too scared to share. There's an anxiety about wondering and making sure that it's good enough to pass peer muster. So then most stuff never gets shared, particularly negative results.
The best scientists are ones who managed to break through that social fear barrier, either by building up enough social power for themselves to withstand potential attacks, or navigating the awkward political risks and activism required to push a field forward. You can tell when someone lacks that aura by how worried they are about funding, because ultimately they haven't yet mastered being a politician. The good ones have enough charisma and confidence that they could run for office. At least most of the good professors and mentors I know have that spirit, but likely in spite of the academic system selecting for nails that don't stick out rather than because of.
Exactly my point. You would leave that to actual scientists. Now imagine Turing would have been busy with managing science instead of doing science himself.
It’s also a book about professionalization. Those who survive a phd, for instance, will absorb the ideals of the institution. A company like google (never worked there) needs an army of people to be creative but also stay in the lanes and not “talk politics”.
Great book... my copy was lent out and I hope it’s in circulation helping other people.
> Coming from an engineering degree, I simply could not believe that policy studies were a science. Since I was in law school, I couldn't catch on fast enough that for ecology students, habitat preservation was the sole and overriding goal of everything and not a subject with trade-offs that we should discuss. While I took econ, I didn't understand why you would have any faith in a law you couldn't derive and prove with data. I wasn't sure about econ's laws either, because after taking all that physics I thought that real laws enforce themselves every single time. In law school, the justice issues behind a decision were worth pointing out. But not in econ or ecology.
This is hilarious. I did engineering as well, and business school. I just couldn't believe it, you had these just-so stories in prose about why VHS beat Betamax or how great Toyota was, and that somehow qualified you for management. Econ was a bit more sensible, with at least some proper work quantifying things, but also some suspiciously simple models that gave practitioners the ear of government.
More and more I distrust non-technical people. It just seems that if someone doesn't come from a technical background, their modus operandi is simply to take stock of the social situation in their field, rather than try to look at the evidence. If they do come from the technical side, then they have a choice, so it's not all smooth sailing either, but at least there's a chance they'll listen to facts.
The guy to read about is Kuhn. He talks about how people establish the "facts" socially.
Which biz school did you go to if you don't mind me asking? From my experience, it's not that they believe in those stories, it's that they behave as if they believe in it. MBAs is about training pliant middle managers who carry out the wishes of those above regardless of their personal cognitive dissonance. Suppressing this personal desire to benefit shareholder value is a big part of it. And worshipping certain companies or narratives certainly make the suppression of individual easier.
> More and more I distrust non-technical people. It just seems that if someone doesn't come from a technical background, their modus operandi is simply to take stock of the social situation in their field, rather than try to look at the evidence. If they do come from the technical side, then they have a choice, so it's not all smooth sailing either, but at least there's a chance they'll listen to facts.
In the context of a team environment, where you need to rely on others to either manage or handle their delegated tasks effectively, I can see the merit in this. It’s not uncommon of course to have a non-technical founder who is more adept at bending social realities to their whim than competently managing a technical effort.
The risk I see in adopting this attitude whole-cloth though is that it seems to preclude seeing folks from the humanities, social sciences, etc. as having any value whatsoever in tech domains. Sure, we should all base purely technical decisions on the “hard facts”, but another part of understanding reality is to accept that much of what technical product development produces ends up in the hands of users and ultimately has potential to affect individual well-being on a large scale. That’s not to mention its unforeseen but often demonstrated impact on societies, governments, and markets.
The enabler for much of the regrettable status quo – rampant tech addiction and vanishing personal privacy, among other things – is myopic, tech- and facts-centered thinking that seeks to solve fine-grained problems at all costs without considering the broader social impact. The unfortunate truth is that the soft sciences must base their reasoning on things a little less certain than the laws of physics (which, since you mention Kuhn – those are also subject to change), but I believe they still have a seat at the table if we have any hope of building a happier, more sustainable, and more ethical future.
This is an issue anyone trying to make sense of the world sooner or later runs into, that most everyone else is playing a different game altogether, which has nothing to do with consistency, but rather your place in a social dominance hierarchy and ways of moving up or down.
By asking hard questions that people engaged in social dominance have no ability or interest in answering, you are seen as annoying. Annoying because those who play social dominance games cannot openly admit they're playing them and by asking hard questions, you are placing them in an impossible situation.
You are a smart arse that nobody playing social dominance games likes. Your refuge will be in learning to recognize what games other people are playing and adapting yourself to them, because they will not adapt to you - they are on a path that doesn't allow for compromise - people who engage in social dominance games view them as all-encompassing and all-important.
> people who engage in social dominance games view them as all-encompassing and all-important
This is because the value derived from the fact that almost everyone is playing, and therefore the rewards for "winning" are high.
I think it's a natural form of a network effect. Status is valuable because many people (Unconsciously) agree on what it constitutes, and participate in the game.
The moment you put more than three people in a room you have politics.
You have envies, jealousy , corruption,treason, sex, desires , power and complex social dynamics. You also have loyalty,interest and admiration , mutual support, play and fun.
I work with computers and machines that have no emotion, always do what are told to do millions of times without deviating an inch(or centimeter).
People are not like that. They will always surprise you, for the bad or for the good.
If you want to be successful, it is a good idea learning about people in anything that you will do, even for working in places where in theory you won't need it.
> You have envies, jealousy , corruption,treason, sex, desires , power and complex social dynamics
Of course there's that but more importantly, you'll have those who consider the facts honestly and those who misinterpret or deny them for their own profit.
> machines [...] always do what are told to do millions of times without deviating an inch
Off topic, but that's a grave misconception: machines do fail and sometimes in non obvious ways
> The moment you put more than three people in a room you have politics.
You seem to follow the line that people with diverging opinions cannot agree on facts. That's not true (for an example, read the article till the footnote), and IMO that's a dangerous, antisocial idea.
Of course agreeing on facts (and sometimes agreeing the facts are not well known) is only one thing. That does not make people agree on the solution.
It has always fascinated me how the moment you introduce two friends to each other, suddenly they start worrying who you spend more time with, etc. I prefer to have my friendships 1 on 1, of course that might be "concealment" in a way, since I do exist outside of that one friendship.
Virtually every "group" of friends I have been a part of had some sort of leader, and fragmented into smaller cliques somehow.
36 comments
[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 90.2 ms ] threadI've worked in the tech industry for almost a decade and I'm returning to the academy because the tech landscape is filled with scam artists, MBA's and ego-tripping managers - which would be tolerable if you actually got to work on something that wouldn't be completely rewritten or became irrelevant in two years time, but that's just not the case...
Correct me if I'm wrong but in the academy I hope to work on research which has at least some consequences on the future, and to find smart and kind people who are actually interested in knowledge for knowledge's sake, even if they are surrounded by gray bureaucrats.
Very competent scientists like Noam Chomsky have pointed out those exact reasons as to why he concentrates on academia & not cooperations
This is probably not what you want to hear, but in any place where lots of people work together (whether industry, academia, government or charity organisations) the social aspects of the work and the competition for status and resources will eventually overtake the actual work.
Your question "if not grad school, then what?" may well not have an answer at all.
I have reluctantly come to accept over the years that my intellectual interests need to be catered to separately from whatever I need to do to economically sustain myself as an adult.
Some lucky people find a good fit (irrespective of institution, academia or industry) but most of us flail around most of the time.
Independent research. Science doesn't have to be restricted to ivory towers. It's <current year>, we have the technology.
My own grad school experience was pretty good overall, and I had little to complain about. I read the book mentioned in this post fairly early on and it sounded like the experience would be horrific, but mine wasn't. Possibly this was due to cultural differences between the US and Australia, the latter being where I studied. As I went through my degree and got into teaching though, I started to see enough warning signs that staying long term wasn't going to be a good experience, so as soon has I had my PhD I decided that's where I get off the train.
Since then I've worked in industry, and had both good and bad experiences. There are plenty of horror stories about poor managers, toxic company culture, etc. around I'm sure you're aware of. But there are also companies that have a good working culture, place a high priority on quality and technical excellence, and are generally great to work for.
Am I glad I went to grad school? Absolutely. It was a tough but rewarding experience, my current job (in the latter category above) is an opportunity that came about only because of the research work I did in grad school. I'd say the benefit of grad school is it opens up more opportunities for you to choose from, whether you decide to stay in academia afterwards or return to industry. Both can be good or bad depending on the specific institution/company you work for.
If you want to just learn stuff, why not do some Master's degrees? You get close enough to the edge that you'll know a field well, but not so close that you end up spending a lot of time doing politics and advancing very little. You'll also get close enough to soak up advances from people who decided to do phds.
She does math and statistics and stuff; She said she is fed up of writing papers with or without real usecases; Reproducability and co.
She also is now regretting the low salary and her not having much of savings due to it.
I gave myself a new goal instead: making as much money in a normal ethical way as possible, exiting with 50 and then doing what i want without pressure.
Perhaps i will write code or will do something totally different.
...then I have some very bad news.
If you're doing a PhD, good luck and enjoy it - I think there's value in a PhD, still, despite the flawed system.
If you're doing research or going on to do research, then I hope you can find a niche full of scientists and not politicians. Those niches are hard to find.
You must know that many in tech have a very different experience than you (proud of their work, like their colleagues, feel care and development from their boss.)
Similarly many in academics love their work and others hate it.
The difference probably has to do more with who you are / how you go about it / attitude than the field.
It would be valuable to reflect what makes you so miserable in your current field while others are able to thrive. I don't know your situation but some guesses: do you have enough focus on getting into the good environments (eg, Google?) and if so - what's holding you back? Skills, drive, attitude? Do you relate to people or are you a judgmental asshole? etc etc.
I don't know the answer but what I am saying is - you probably won't be happy in academia or anywhere else unless you figure out what's making you not happy where you are.
People can find bliss and happiness even in the direst of circumstances - and sometimes they have no choice but to do just that. As obscenely well educated people living in first world countries, we do have a choice - and advocating complacency for the sake of making your life easier reeks of moral degeneracy if not outright solipsism (same goes for repurposing Zen - "wherever you go, there you are" - to help you turn a blind eye to the world). We can do better.
“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.”
If this guy engages with his colleagues with that mindset, what kind of experience can he possibly expect?
And my point is - if he brought that attitude into academia he'd get he same outcome as well.
I've settled on a theory that the bulk of science that lives hidden in lab journal notebooks and dropbox files is stuff that's not too controversial or heretical, but that the investigator is too scared to share. There's an anxiety about wondering and making sure that it's good enough to pass peer muster. So then most stuff never gets shared, particularly negative results.
The best scientists are ones who managed to break through that social fear barrier, either by building up enough social power for themselves to withstand potential attacks, or navigating the awkward political risks and activism required to push a field forward. You can tell when someone lacks that aura by how worried they are about funding, because ultimately they haven't yet mastered being a politician. The good ones have enough charisma and confidence that they could run for office. At least most of the good professors and mentors I know have that spirit, but likely in spite of the academic system selecting for nails that don't stick out rather than because of.
Great book... my copy was lent out and I hope it’s in circulation helping other people.
This is hilarious. I did engineering as well, and business school. I just couldn't believe it, you had these just-so stories in prose about why VHS beat Betamax or how great Toyota was, and that somehow qualified you for management. Econ was a bit more sensible, with at least some proper work quantifying things, but also some suspiciously simple models that gave practitioners the ear of government.
More and more I distrust non-technical people. It just seems that if someone doesn't come from a technical background, their modus operandi is simply to take stock of the social situation in their field, rather than try to look at the evidence. If they do come from the technical side, then they have a choice, so it's not all smooth sailing either, but at least there's a chance they'll listen to facts.
The guy to read about is Kuhn. He talks about how people establish the "facts" socially.
In the context of a team environment, where you need to rely on others to either manage or handle their delegated tasks effectively, I can see the merit in this. It’s not uncommon of course to have a non-technical founder who is more adept at bending social realities to their whim than competently managing a technical effort.
The risk I see in adopting this attitude whole-cloth though is that it seems to preclude seeing folks from the humanities, social sciences, etc. as having any value whatsoever in tech domains. Sure, we should all base purely technical decisions on the “hard facts”, but another part of understanding reality is to accept that much of what technical product development produces ends up in the hands of users and ultimately has potential to affect individual well-being on a large scale. That’s not to mention its unforeseen but often demonstrated impact on societies, governments, and markets.
The enabler for much of the regrettable status quo – rampant tech addiction and vanishing personal privacy, among other things – is myopic, tech- and facts-centered thinking that seeks to solve fine-grained problems at all costs without considering the broader social impact. The unfortunate truth is that the soft sciences must base their reasoning on things a little less certain than the laws of physics (which, since you mention Kuhn – those are also subject to change), but I believe they still have a seat at the table if we have any hope of building a happier, more sustainable, and more ethical future.
My question is, how do we bridge that mistrust?
By asking hard questions that people engaged in social dominance have no ability or interest in answering, you are seen as annoying. Annoying because those who play social dominance games cannot openly admit they're playing them and by asking hard questions, you are placing them in an impossible situation.
You are a smart arse that nobody playing social dominance games likes. Your refuge will be in learning to recognize what games other people are playing and adapting yourself to them, because they will not adapt to you - they are on a path that doesn't allow for compromise - people who engage in social dominance games view them as all-encompassing and all-important.
This is because the value derived from the fact that almost everyone is playing, and therefore the rewards for "winning" are high.
I think it's a natural form of a network effect. Status is valuable because many people (Unconsciously) agree on what it constitutes, and participate in the game.
You have envies, jealousy , corruption,treason, sex, desires , power and complex social dynamics. You also have loyalty,interest and admiration , mutual support, play and fun.
I work with computers and machines that have no emotion, always do what are told to do millions of times without deviating an inch(or centimeter).
People are not like that. They will always surprise you, for the bad or for the good.
If you want to be successful, it is a good idea learning about people in anything that you will do, even for working in places where in theory you won't need it.
Of course there's that but more importantly, you'll have those who consider the facts honestly and those who misinterpret or deny them for their own profit.
> machines [...] always do what are told to do millions of times without deviating an inch
Off topic, but that's a grave misconception: machines do fail and sometimes in non obvious ways
> The moment you put more than three people in a room you have politics.
You seem to follow the line that people with diverging opinions cannot agree on facts. That's not true (for an example, read the article till the footnote), and IMO that's a dangerous, antisocial idea.
Of course agreeing on facts (and sometimes agreeing the facts are not well known) is only one thing. That does not make people agree on the solution.
Virtually every "group" of friends I have been a part of had some sort of leader, and fragmented into smaller cliques somehow.