tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post3311733862319512502..comments2024-03-28T18:17:00.135-05:00Comments on Computational Complexity: The Theory Postdoc CultureLance Fortnowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06752030912874378610noreply@blogger.comBlogger64125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-16100688902586533752011-02-22T02:43:40.130-06:002011-02-22T02:43:40.130-06:00Advisors deserve credit, including coauthorship, e...<i>Advisors deserve credit, including coauthorship, even for fulfilling their "fundamental duties," including suggesting problems to stuck students and gently monitoring their progress.</i><br /><br />It depends on what the problem is. If it requires original and deep insight to come up with a problem, then I would tend to agree that co-authorship is warranted. However, if it's a general suggestion to devise a different proof to someone's result, or to simplify some complicated-looking algorithm, or to extend a previous result, then an acknowledgement would be more appropriate. If coming up with such ideas is sufficient to be a co-author, then anybody can have a long publication list.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-50999578301493076012011-02-19T12:03:10.294-06:002011-02-19T12:03:10.294-06:00You are talking about extreme cases, often in othe...You are talking about extreme cases, often in other fields. I can't argue with them. I only argue with the student who was complaining earlier. <br /><br />Advisors deserve credit, including coauthorship, even for fulfilling their "fundamental duties," including suggesting problems to stuck students and gently monitoring their progress.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-32493980893896841822011-02-19T05:05:57.837-06:002011-02-19T05:05:57.837-06:00"Some students of course need extra help, and..."Some students of course need extra help, and need to be given a problem on a platter. If you are such a student and are resenting your advisor's name on your paper, then you should step back and think to the future. It is wise to be generous with collaborators, and not hold grudges over trivial issues. Your advisor no doubt has his or her reasons, probably including considerations as to how to fund your salary!"<br /><br />what makes you think you are talking with a student? your tone certainly reveals what kind of intimidation you would resort to in dealing with your students (and it seems you extend your arrogance way beyond that).<br /><br />it seems some vanities would be hurt very much if truth about their practices would be fully revealed. as i said, not all advisors are thieves who sign their students papers, and mine certainly was not. i got my phd way back and certainly do not steal from my students, who get their problems (and lots of help) without such expectations, i.e. signing a paper that they worked on without significant contribution from all those who are coauthors.<br /><br />but i have seen a lot of advisor abuse, from signing papers, to much worse things. however, that is not certainly always the case. just one example (and though it might tempt you to a new ad hominem attack, it has little to do with me or my field, though i know details quite well). a student/posdoc has a brilliant idea that will seed a sequence of papers in the field (say, combinatorial geometry). he tells advisor about this, and advisor not only signs papers, he completely excludes the guy from it. gives zero credit. <br /><br />ideas go both ways, with talented students often contributing both problem and solutions (in fact, without solution, student ideas are rarely credited at all). <br /><br />in normal circumstances, it is pretty clear who gets credit and for what, i.e. advisors do get signed on papers where they participated, and on those that they do not, they do not even ask to be signed. in one of my first papers, that rise to a degree of fame in the field, me and the other younger guy solved a longstanding problem, and a senior professor - not my advisor - was a coauthor (he didn't even provide a problem, that was learned about in the seminar), but in no way i considered this unfair - he provided guidance, we worked and wrote the paper together. that is not what i am talking about. <br /><br />what IS outrageous, and it does happen a lot (but only with certain type of people, who are NOT in majority), is when the advisor does not contribute to the work at all, but signs every paper. that is abuse, and i suspect the arrogant "anonymous professor" knows full well what i am talking about. this thing happens a lot in some experimental fields, and there could be some justification (especially if, as is often the practice, professor contributes at least to writing up the result), but there is no justification for signing papers in theoretical work, where problems are in fact pretty much in the open, yet some professors, whose "talent" is that of a manager, not of a scientist, chose to advance their petty careers on expense of the more talented students. I have seen this happen to several people in several fields, and it is this exploitation that any reasonable person with clear conscience would condemn. In some experimental fields abuse and exploitation is so extreme, that they drive students and posdocs to suicide - one ivy-league professor had 5 suicides over a decade in his lab, and only then he was banned from taking new "students" i.e. slaves who he so beneficially "supported".Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-75739413602242751542011-02-18T19:18:06.714-06:002011-02-18T19:18:06.714-06:00"Do we have an admission - a professor who th..."Do we have an admission - a professor who thinks providing a problem - a fundamental duty of an advisor - entitles him to sign a solution to a problem that he has not participated in?!" <br /><br />As has been pointed out, choosing the right problem is half the problem and is worth coauthorship. It does not matter whether the problem is from your advisor or from another colleague. <br /><br />I disagree that providing the problem is a fundamental duty of an advisor. Good students---and all postdocs---should be able to find their own problems. The advisor's role is to help guide students to find and attack the right problem. <br /><br />Some students of course need extra help, and need to be given a problem on a platter. If you are such a student and are resenting your advisor's name on your paper, then you should step back and think to the future. It is wise to be generous with collaborators, and not hold grudges over trivial issues. Your advisor no doubt has his or her reasons, probably including considerations as to how to fund your salary!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-40949311869887661602011-02-14T16:32:25.425-06:002011-02-14T16:32:25.425-06:00To 2:34pm Anon:
What if you give someone a proble...To 2:34pm Anon:<br /><br />What if you give someone a problem and you are not their advisor? So you don't have any obligation to fulfill the "fundamental duty of an advisor"? Why do you assume only advisors give students problems?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-42867570100048365622011-02-14T14:34:30.378-06:002011-02-14T14:34:30.378-06:00@An Anon Professor
Do we have an admission - a pr...@An Anon Professor<br /><br />Do we have an admission - a professor who thinks providing a problem - a fundamental duty of an advisor - entitles him to sign a solution to a problem that he has not participated in?! Amazing. <br /><br />Certainly most advisors DO NOT sign papers where their contribution is limited to their basic advising duties. They are happy with acknowledgments. But hey, there are true advisors and true thieves, and some apparently feel they are entitled to their intellectual embezzlement.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-61216437580741838832011-02-14T11:56:09.902-06:002011-02-14T11:56:09.902-06:00There are even more less serious cases, where role...<i>There are even more less serious cases, where role of advisor is little more than providing grant money with no direct supervision other than determining what the problem is.</i><br /><br />You think finding a good problem that is interesting _and_ can be solved with a reasonable amount of effort is easy? It takes me a couple of months, much trial and error, and a ton of reading and preliminary work, to find problems of this nature! And it is only once I find a problem like this that I hand it over to my students and postdocs to work on, so they often don't see the process that goes on behind finding and formalizing the problem.<br /><br />In short, finding a good problem is a lot of work. The only people who think finding a good problem is easy are clueless students whose advisors have always handed them good problems.<br /><br />--An Anon ProfessorAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-30716717795664599122011-02-13T15:23:10.922-06:002011-02-13T15:23:10.922-06:00It definitely does happen, I've seen it happen...It definitely does happen, I've seen it happen, and I know people who I trust and who later became succcessful scientists who said that their advisor did nothing. That's of course the most egregious behavior, and there is a wide spectrum of less egregious behavior too. My feeling is that the reason for this can be seen by looking at comment #41 on http://blog.computationalcomplexity.org/2009/07/time-for-computer-science-to-grow-up.html Read it and try to figure out why S would be interested this---I think the explanation is that he couldn't admit to himself what he had actually done and the conference allowed him a chance to pretend---it is so easy to fool yourself.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-77243115438337733922011-02-13T06:10:11.155-06:002011-02-13T06:10:11.155-06:00From my experience, I would say that it does happe...From my experience, I would say that it does happen that advisers take undue credit. It is rare, but it does happen. What happens far more often though is the opposite, where advisers give undue credit to the student to help them along.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-30213845455163617582011-02-13T05:39:06.386-06:002011-02-13T05:39:06.386-06:00It *does* happen. I know several blatant cases in ...It *does* happen. I know several blatant cases in fields ranging from chemistry to physics to mathematics. There are even more less serious cases, where role of advisor is little more than providing grant money with no direct supervision other than determining what the problem is. Such "advisors" sometimes write papers, that is at least OK but many times they don't get involved in any way. In most serious cases, that have repelled some people and basically destroyed their careers, advisors went so far to steal ideas and didn't even sign the ex students, powerless to fight back.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-57486577128929986792011-02-12T18:22:04.059-06:002011-02-12T18:22:04.059-06:00@9:31/4:38 I think you are compounding two *very* ...@9:31/4:38 I think you are compounding two *very* different claims. The first is senior faculty just putting their names on papers without doing any of the work. I have basically *never* seen this happen in our field. The second is of senior faculty putting so much of their time into writing grant proposals, reference letters, and all of the ancillary stuff that goes along with being a faculty member, that very little time is left for research. That I *have* seen. But I think that's mostly a combination of bad time-management, inevitable obligations, and a need for grants in order for departments to survive (most departments would be in big trouble without the overhead provided by grants). And I think these are also generally seasonal things. Overall I think most faculty find grad students and postdocs to be great partners in research, with teaching and learning a two-way street.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-65292731546904873792011-02-12T16:38:09.101-06:002011-02-12T16:38:09.101-06:00@4:02 PM-I don't think I am exaggerating anywh...@4:02 PM-I don't think I am exaggerating anywhere. The statement I said that many commentators made is one that I have heard from many commentators, including at least one above. The estimates on the increase in workload from advising students and postdocs are reasonable. Perhaps not doubling, but advising students AND postdocs AND getting grants to support them AND writing reference letters AND hiring them does add up to a large portion of time, at least 1/3. And I certainly am not exaggerating when I say that professors have complained that they haven't done research in weeks because they are advising students. So, where's the exaggeration, that it leads to only a 5% pay raise? Seriously, why do this?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-21454216967136677512011-02-12T16:02:30.492-06:002011-02-12T16:02:30.492-06:00"Many commentators have said that tenured pro..."Many commentators have said that tenured professors use postdocs to do the real research and then just add their name."<br /><br />This is an exaggeration, and you are compounding further exaggerations on top of it. Tenured professors still need to work, you know. :)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-33358544635854345972011-02-12T09:31:20.805-06:002011-02-12T09:31:20.805-06:00This is a totally serious question and I'd lik...This is a totally serious question and I'd like an answer. Many commentators have said that tenured professors use postdocs to do the real research and then just add their name. I fully believe that happens in some but not all cases. But why would anyone do that? If you have tenure what is your motivation in padding your resume this way? It may lead to a very minor pay increase over time, but at a cost of a lot of effort. If you don't have a deep interest in research, why bother effectively doubling your workload for a 5% pay increase or something, to pull some numbers out of a hat? And, if your interest is in your own research, this practice still doesn't help...I have spoken with several professors that lament that they haven't done research in weeks because they have been busy with students and postdocs. So why do people do it? I get why untenured people do, but why once you have tenure?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-7240218614352540272011-02-11T08:07:09.652-06:002011-02-11T08:07:09.652-06:00The increasingly dismal statistics associated to a...The <a href="http://faculty.washington.edu/sidles/misc/jobs.png" rel="nofollow">increasingly dismal statistics associated to academic jobs</a> are familiar to all. <br /><br />That white papers from blue ribbon panels have accomplished little in the past to reverse these trends, and are likely to accomplish little in the future, is clear to all ... even to the members of those panels.<br /><br />That these problems do not originate in shortage of jobs, or even a shortage of research funding, similarly is clear to all. These problems are merely the (severe) symptoms of an underlying (severe) disorder, that disorder being a shortage of economically viable enterprises.<br /><br />Specifically, what are those new enterprises? And specifically, what capabilities from CS/CT are essential to creating and sustaining these enterprises?<br /><br />If there are no good answers to these questions ... then the CRA working paper can be short, confident, and valuable to all young STEM researchers: <br /><br />----------<br /><b>"No substantial alteration to present adverse trends is foreseen, and no concrete actions are contemplated." </b><br />----------<br /><br />The new enterprises that are required to reach any other conclusion, are as readily conceived by junior members of the CS/CT research community, as by senior members. <br /><br />So what are these new enterprises? <br /><br />I pose this question because (IMHO) recent advances in CS/CT *do* offer some pretty good answers ... the question is, what are they?John Sidleshttp://www.mrfm.orgnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-32949001415790176872011-02-11T00:34:36.235-06:002011-02-11T00:34:36.235-06:00For once, I must say that I agree with Mihai Patra...For once, I must say that I agree with Mihai Patrascu.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-66271277213935113022011-02-10T19:47:05.624-06:002011-02-10T19:47:05.624-06:00I had many friends in gradschool and beyond from f...I had many friends in gradschool and beyond from fields with a strong "postdoc culture." My personal impression is that life in those fields is nasty, and I'm glad TCS is not there (yet).<br /><br />On the other hand, TCS luminaries have been day dreaming for a long time about turning our field into theoretical mathematics or some version of philosophy guaranteed to have no relevance in the real world. So what exactly did we expect to happen?<br /><br />On a more positive note,TCS postdocs are not too bad. In 90% of the cases, the host institution has no leverage over you, so you can have a good quality of life by simply ignoring the notion that you are currently employed as a postdoc. Just pretend you are a PhD student with unlimited discretionary time. Live 2 hours away just to make sure you preserve the independence.<br /><br />Some noble-sounding ideas, like using a postdoc to establish an independent track record, sound dangerously naive. If you want a job, you need politically powerful people on your side. An independent track record doesn't do much good in this field of ours.Mihaihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11599372864611039927noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-68004212998837496682011-02-10T15:52:14.059-06:002011-02-10T15:52:14.059-06:00The complaints of the "anonymous" collec...The complaints of the "anonymous" collective all are true and balid ... but how man of them are new? <br /><br />AFAICT, all of these points were well-covered in Richard Hamming's two great essays <i>You and Your Research</i> (1986) and <i>Mathematics on a Distant Planet</i> (1998).<br /><br />We are led to ask, given that little has changed in the past two decades, what grounds exist for optimism is there that substantial improvements will come in the next two decades?<br /><br />Blue-ribbon committees are unlikely to effect change, however well-qualified and well-intentioned their members are ... because these committees (and their various conclusions and recommendations) have not changed much over past decades and even past centuries.<br /><br />So what grounds *is* there for optimism ... particularly for young people? I doubt that any answer that I could give, would be as valuable as the advice that Richard Hamming gives, first at the end of his essay <i>You and Your Research:</i><br /><br />----------------<br />"Some of the reasons why so many people who have greatness within their grasp don't succeed are: they don't work on important problems, they don't become emotionally involved, they don't try and change what is difficult to some other situation which is easily done but is still important, and they keep giving themselves alibis why they don't. They keep saying that it is a matter of luck. I've told you how easy it is; furthermore I've told you how to reform. Therefore, go forth and become great scientists!"<br />----------------<br /><br />and then at the end of his essay <i>Mathematics on a Distant Planet:</i><br /><br />----------------<br />"As I regularly tell my students, 'In science and mathematics we do not appeal to authority, but rather <i>you are responsible for what you believe</i>.'"<br />----------------<br /><br />What has changed since 1986 and 1998, when Hamming gave this advice? Enormously much has changed ... young reseachers now have far more numerous tools ... tools that are far more powerful ... and far greater access to those tools. <br /><br />When I attend seminars in synthetic and systems biology, I see young people who have assimilated Hamming's radical message, and who are excited to participate in a math-enabled revolution that already is in-progress ... and is accelerating. <br /><br />This cheers me up very much! :)John Sidleshttp://www.mrfm.orgnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-68230076821270392762011-02-10T15:14:44.180-06:002011-02-10T15:14:44.180-06:00@Anonymous 1:08PM: " Comparing a UCLA surgeon...@Anonymous 1:08PM: " Comparing a UCLA surgeon with an average theorist does not make much sense to me. " If you reread my comments, you'll see that I didn't compare a UCLA surgeon with a theoretician. I was responding to John Slides comment that many surgeon's take a pay cut to work in academia. My point was that the even surgeons in academia make enough money that they start to see the diminishing utility of money. Even a moderately lavish lifestyle will not distinguish between an academic surgeon and a private practice surgeon. In contrast, there is a huge difference between a postdoc at $55k a year and a job at a bank at $200k a year, especially if you are starting a family and/or live in an expensive city. I'm not arguing the salaries should be the same, just closer together than they currently are.<br /><br />@Anonymous 1:08PM: "In the first meeting with my advisor, he clearly told me that if my goal was to make money in life, I was making the wrong choice." I never claimed that students are being duped into thinking the salaries are higher than they are. I do, however, think students are often mislead regarding the expected career path. Faculty members do a horrible job of conveying how hard it is to get a permanent research position, how long this will take, and the associated toll on one's personal life and relationships. Most graduate students think they'll get a job similar to their advisor's, and simple combinatorics shows this isn't near the truth.<br /><br />I have been to dozens of career panels throughout my academic career and never have heard a panelist speak candidly about the hardships of an academic career. On the other hand, almost every friend I have on this track has spent a good amount of time struggling with these issues discussed here. Part of this is sample bias (no one calls up the people who didn't make it to invite them to the panels) and part of it is that panelists are often (justifiably) insecure about discussing these personal struggles publicly. The result is that students go to these panels and here almost exclusively stories that end "so it was hard, but I stuck it out and I couldn't imagine doing anything else!". <br /><br />The "we do it for the advancement of humanity, not for the money" is a nice fairytale, but it is a facade. I have never once seen a faculty member turn down a raise and ask the money redirected to postdoc, student or research funding. The first priority with every NSF grant I have ever seen administered is the PI to pay himself the maximum summer salary permitted. When a faculty member gets an offer from a university he has no interested of moving to, what's the first thing he does? Decline politely and go about his day of research and discover? Nope! He uses it to try to get more money out of his current university. Often times this may include wasting a lot of peoples time at both universities. Are these selfless acts of discovery or free marketers maximizing their profits?<br /><br />Your advisor is telling a noble story, but it isn't today's reality.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-5124200804162813542011-02-10T14:33:34.643-06:002011-02-10T14:33:34.643-06:00Perhaps $50k is less than theory postdocs "sh...Perhaps $50k is less than theory postdocs "should" get or otherwise job conditions are imperfect, but it is more money than 99% of the people on the planet earn (see http://globalrichlist.com/ ) and working conditions are similarly better than most jobs in human history.<br /><br />Calling it "slavery" is offensive, given that there are many actual slaves and near-slaves in the world. This is a bit like the way people talk about being "raped" by being assigned difficult math problems in their homework. It reflects ignorance of the world, and also of the capabilities of the English language for expressing nuance.aram harrowhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01272118188252697149noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-84235246556176892162011-02-10T13:08:30.322-06:002011-02-10T13:08:30.322-06:00In the first meeting with my advisor, he clearly t...In the first meeting with my advisor, he clearly told me that if my goal was to make money in life, I was making the wrong choice. <br /><br />The reason why academics are paid much less than in industry is the very same reason that keeps research going: Most of us are doing this because, ultimately, we have been having lots of fun doing this. And in the end, we are ready to take compromises.<br /><br />To anon, 11:39: Comparing a UCLA surgeon with an average theorist does not make much sense to me. Compare him / her instead with a medical postdoc on a $38K NIH fellowhip. People tend to forget that the NIH postdoc salary standards are used as guidelines for setting postdoc salaries overall. And guess who works at / with the NIH? Yeah, right, not too many CS people ...Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-68653345836571904442011-02-10T12:54:01.930-06:002011-02-10T12:54:01.930-06:00Another question is whether postdocs are good for ...Another question is whether postdocs are good for research. I think that they are, since a postdoc can focus entirely on research.* <br /><br />On the other hand, it limits the kinds of questions you can research. A postdoc cannot invest too heavily in learning a new area or in a risky line of research because to land a job he or she needs immediate results. The pressure is much higher than the tenure clock's pressure on tenure-track faculty, and is a bit higher than pressure from grants. This research pressure is probably more harmful to TCS researchers than to biologists or other fields with entrenched postdoc cultures. <br /><br />* And on submitting faculty applications, and on lining up another postdoc in case those applications fall through, and on worrying.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-79676184124754039752011-02-10T12:48:05.760-06:002011-02-10T12:48:05.760-06:00My 2 cents: If you are dedicated to research and y...My 2 cents: If you are dedicated to research and your freedom is more important than money above a certain threshold, postdocs are an excellent idea. They enable you to build a track record apart from your dissertation advisor, and also allow you to "re-tool" with a change in focus, or an added area of expertise, if necessary. Working in an industrial research lab can also have this effect---it shouldn't be seen as such a fork in the road.KWReganhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09792573098380066005noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-67447537440544642482011-02-10T12:30:55.798-06:002011-02-10T12:30:55.798-06:00Anonymous, I agree that there is a huge disparity ...Anonymous, I agree that there is a huge disparity in the upper-bound incomes of mathematicians relative to surgeons ... names like Shannon, Simons, Scholes, and Shaw come to mind ... to consider the letter "S" alone ... and the evidence clearly establishes that mathematical incomes are far greater. :)<br /><br />Seriously, I work with level-1 trauma surgeons .. of which no state needs more than a handful. These top-ranked surgeons earn their pay: level-1 trauma procedures like (say) a forearm replant are more arduous than can readily be conceived.<br /><br />With a foot in both worlds, I have acquired similarly great respect for mathematics and medicine. But when it comes to educational practices, it's inarguable that by almost any measure, medicine performs better.John Sidleshttp://www.mrfm.orgnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3722233.post-26417623580769390392011-02-10T11:39:08.375-06:002011-02-10T11:39:08.375-06:00@Slides 7:22 AM: "This give-and-take calls fo...@Slides 7:22 AM: "This give-and-take calls forth excellence in both the students and the teachers; this excellence is worth more than the sacrified income." It's a lot less of a life difference to be a UCLA surgeon making $600k (compared to $1.2m in private practice) than it is to be a postdoc making $55k compared with the $300k he could be making in the the private sector. UCLA has 34 employees making over $500k, and a quick Google search reveals that nearly all of them are on the medical school staff. Also notice that the UCLA surgeon can easily pick up and go into private practice if she needs more money at vertically any age. A 35 year old theoretician can't just pack up and go into a career he could have had if he needs money. <br /><br />@Slides 7:22 AM: "This give-and-take calls forth excellence in both the students and the teachers; this excellence is worth more than the sacrified income." Also notice that the research labs and places like IAS, which don't have students, have no problem enticing top talent away from the thrill of teaching.<br /><br />@Slides 9:45 AM: "All of anonymous' complaints are inarguably true ... and they are true of surgical residents too." I don't agree that its the same for residents. By the time a surgical resident is 33, she is going to be raking in the cash. Hours worked as a resident are an investment that will almost surely pay huge dividends! You don't see too many underemployed surgeons. Hours worked as a theory graduate student is an investment that almost surely will break even or be a bust. I see tons of underemployed CS PhDs.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com