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On May 16 2010 21:46 nath wrote:
"In contrast, a doctor typically enters private practice at 29, a lawyer at 25 and makes partner at 31, and a computer scientist with a Ph.D. has a very good job at 27 (computer science and engineering are the few fields in which industrial demand makes it sensible to get a Ph.D.)."
FUCK YES!
going to grad school for Comp Sci next year, article scared me because my dad is also a physics professor and always told me this, but i guess it doesnt apply to comp sci! :D
That's because Computer Science isn't real science, 1s and 0s? please don't be ridiculous, everybody knows we only play video games and then just half-ass a few hours work and sell a program for way more then it's worth.
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I was totally expecting this to be a link to the "fuckin' magnets" video, lol
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On May 17 2010 01:24 Fraidnot wrote:Show nested quote +On May 16 2010 21:46 nath wrote:
"In contrast, a doctor typically enters private practice at 29, a lawyer at 25 and makes partner at 31, and a computer scientist with a Ph.D. has a very good job at 27 (computer science and engineering are the few fields in which industrial demand makes it sensible to get a Ph.D.)."
FUCK YES!
going to grad school for Comp Sci next year, article scared me because my dad is also a physics professor and always told me this, but i guess it doesnt apply to comp sci! :D That's because Computer Science isn't real science, 1s and 0s? please don't be ridiculous, everybody knows we only play video games and then just half-ass a few hours work and sell a program for way more then it's worth.
Everybody knows programming is not computer science and that those are two distinct subjects. Calling programming computer science is like calling lens making for telescopes astronomy. Related, useful, but not the same.
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I wouldn't go into a field with twice as many applicants as jobs. Pick your second choice.
And I have an issue with something he said, about scientists becoming computer engineers. So wait? How do you compete with people who've done 4 years of computer software engineering as a major? Unless you go through four more years (12 years now) of computer engineering. Get out while you still can.
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Not every scientist works at a university. There's much joy, and money, to be had by working in industry.
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Russian Federation4235 Posts
On May 17 2010 01:45 rackdude wrote:Show nested quote +On May 17 2010 01:24 Fraidnot wrote:On May 16 2010 21:46 nath wrote:
"In contrast, a doctor typically enters private practice at 29, a lawyer at 25 and makes partner at 31, and a computer scientist with a Ph.D. has a very good job at 27 (computer science and engineering are the few fields in which industrial demand makes it sensible to get a Ph.D.)."
FUCK YES!
going to grad school for Comp Sci next year, article scared me because my dad is also a physics professor and always told me this, but i guess it doesnt apply to comp sci! :D That's because Computer Science isn't real science, 1s and 0s? please don't be ridiculous, everybody knows we only play video games and then just half-ass a few hours work and sell a program for way more then it's worth. Everybody knows programming is not computer science and that those are two distinct subjects. Calling programming computer science is like calling lens making for telescopes astronomy. Related, useful, but not the same.
FFS programming is a science.
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On May 17 2010 02:00 Simplistik wrote:
Not every scientist works at a university. There's much joy, and money, to be had by working in industry.
That's true. But a physicist like the author of that article has no choice but to work for the university.
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On May 16 2010 14:58 L wrote:Show nested quote +On May 16 2010 11:59 Servolisk wrote:Seems like a load of standard events being over dramatized. I don't think he has any significant passion for his work and is a typical whiner. He even made a tenured faculty position sound undesirable :p He basically sounds like he is not getting any grants funded. Compared to most things, I find the academic track he described to be very meritocratic, in the long run. Ph.D. students and post-doc's are usually underpaid, but if successful have the opportunity to independently run their own research, and become a tenured professor-one of the best jobs possible. No successful post-doc really views it as a bad job, that I have seen  Speaking from a Bio perspective, I feel like the track is very competitive but full of opportunity to people who are dedicated. Uh, If you bothered reading, he says he's completely happy with his current state, but that undergrads nowadays are getting the shaft because they need to spend years and years as post-docs. I've worked in labs with absolutely BRILLIANT post docs who sacrifice everything for their research. When you learn that they're 37 and have been pounding out nature and lancet papers, but still can't find a tenure track position, it drives home just how much of a glut the market currently has.
People have had to spend years in post-doc for a while, maybe not in Physics idk. I wouldn't call it getting the shaft either. Successful, senior post-docs make professor equivalent salaries. Not that that is the major concern. Many people find it enjoyable too.
It is probably hard to talk between fields. It sounds like yours is a slightly different sub-area than mine since you mentioned the Lancet, you must be in a clinical oriented lab. AFAIK it is easier to publish higher in the clinical side in general, so maybe that is the reason. Or maybe you are talking about them publishing as second authors or later. Because as someone else said if you are publishing Nature as a post-doc, especially repeatedly, you have nothing to worry about. No one is going to say that it isn't competitive but my experience tells me that the people who do not succeed in this track did not work as well as those who did.
That is why I think the author from the OP has really no passion and urges people to "leave graduate school to people from India and China, for whom the prospects at home are even worse." Moronic -___- Maybe he is exaggerating to get attention to the problem (at the time), but his generality + negative bias is not going to get him to be taken seriously.
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United States24772 Posts
On May 17 2010 02:31 illu wrote:Show nested quote +On May 17 2010 02:00 Simplistik wrote:
Not every scientist works at a university. There's much joy, and money, to be had by working in industry. That's true. But a physicist like the author of that article has no choice but to work for the university.
It's not impossible for a physicist to get hired privately obviously but my experience has been that it's difficult to pursue.
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On May 17 2010 02:00 Simplistik wrote:
Not every scientist works at a university. There's much joy, and money, to be had by working in industry.
But no real freedom of research direction AFAIK. Professors running their own lab have extraordinary independence.
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On May 17 2010 02:31 illu wrote:Show nested quote +On May 17 2010 02:00 Simplistik wrote:
Not every scientist works at a university. There's much joy, and money, to be had by working in industry. That's true. But a physicist like the author of that article has no choice but to work for the university.
They generally don't want to work elsewhere. For most people tenure is the ideal position. And they are very independent with their own research, which is most of their job. Much more freedom than industry.
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On May 16 2010 23:53 heyoka wrote:
There is not a single professor anywhere who has gone his entire career without publishing a paper what gives you that idea that people like that exist?
He said a Nature paper, and he is completely right.
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On May 17 2010 02:26 BluzMan wrote:
FFS programming is a science.
Yeah sure, and so is political science. lol
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Well... I'm at least in CS. Programming, though, is not a science. It's quite literally engineering.
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My dream would be working as a scientist in a laboratory, messing with gene samples and whatnot. That would require a minimum 3 years (+2 to get even better chances) of studying. But I would like the job of having machines do half the work for me. I also like it being very monotone and routine. Would be the best job for me because I can slack around.
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On May 17 2010 01:09 Luddite wrote:Show nested quote +On May 17 2010 01:04 micronesia wrote:On May 17 2010 00:58 revy wrote:
I have a somewhat related experience that I will share.
3 years ago I graduated from college with a B.S. in Physics from a reputable university with decent but not stellar grades (my GPA went roughly as a positive exponential). Initially I decided I would carry through and get a PhD in Physics so I made a round of applications for grad schools while I worked as a waiter. Long story short I messed up a lot of the application process, received some outright rejections due to my poor grades during my early college career, and ended up with nothing to do around May 2 years ago.
I decided I would then hit the job market with my B.S. in Physics. Mind you this was during incredibly difficult economic times, but regardless I turned up a blank. I applied to every position I might be remotely qualified for, I exhausted every contact that my former professors and my girlfriends family had, hell I submitted my resume to places that weren't even hiring. November comes around and I still had made essentially no progress, I had picked up a 20 hour a week position as an educator at a museum to go along with my waiting tables on Friday/Saturday Nights. The museum position was fun, but I was a rather intelligent 24 year old with a B.S. in a hard science, I wanted to do something more technical.
So I approached the graduate school attached to my alma mater and started on a M.S. in Electrical Engineering in January 2009. With a B.S. in Physics I had some basic circuits (which put me in a huge hole) though, I had a heck of a lot more math than anyone else there. I worked my ass off to catch up, I had essentially no free time between my jobs and studying. It worked though, by the time summer 2009 rolled around I had a 3.8.
The thing about this M.S. in engineering program is that it is somewhat like a trade school version of a M.S. The challenge is there, don't get me wrong, they have very smart professors and students. The thing is that the professors are all PhD's who are professors on the side. Very few of the professors do so as their primary means of employ. They're all engineers in the field, many own their own companies or work for the big companies in the area (GE, Knoll's Atomic Power Lab, etc). So they farm talent directly out of their classes, this is what happened to me in early November 2009, I was offered a Jr. Engineering position at a small industrial electrical R&D firm.
Since then I've been juggling the difficult full time job + full time graduate student ordeal but It's something I'm familiar with considering how hard I had to work to catch up to people who had B.S. degrees in EE. My GPA is now up over a 3.9 and I've received several pay hikes which put me more than double the "standard postdoc salary" that Dr. Katz wrote about in the article above. I'm almost done with my M.S. I'll be done in under 1 month at which point I will get another nice pay increase.
Long story short (TLDR version) , my B.S. in Physics has helped me tremendously but when it came to getting a job it was essentially worthless. From the time I signed on as a M.S. Electrical Engineering student it took me exactly 9 months to get a GOOD job. Interesting story that I'm glad you shared... when I got my BS in physics (graduated in May 07 from umd) I wasn't in your predicament since I was planning and certified to search for public school teaching jobs... of course that represented its own challenges. So.. your bs didn't get you any kind of a reasonable job by itself from your searching, but your connections through your masters in engineering is what did it... I wonder what advice we should be gleaming from your experience. seems like his experience basically agrees with the article- way better job prospects with an engineering degree than with a science degree.
You know, I don't really know what you should take home from my experience, I would say that it somewhat lends credence to the article at the start. I couldn't buy a technical job with my Physics B.S and by the time I was halfway done with a masters in EE I had a good job. That said I would not trade my Physics B.S. for anything, I feel like the most important thing that Physics taught me was how to learn. By it's varied nature Physics throws you at all sorts of new problems in completely disparate fields and you are forced to adapt your thinking to solve them. This is the only reason I was able to make the transition rather seamlessly from Physics to EE, I knew how to learn quickly. This very talent is why I succeed at work as well, I see a new problem, I've never done anything like it before, and I just do it. It takes a long time and I make a ton of mistakes, but in the end I solve it. I'm not sure if that's how it works in other fields I'ld appreciate someone's experience in this regard.
If nothing else I guess it proves that if you work really hard you can get there, despite past mistakes.
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On May 17 2010 01:24 Fraidnot wrote:Show nested quote +On May 16 2010 21:46 nath wrote:
"In contrast, a doctor typically enters private practice at 29, a lawyer at 25 and makes partner at 31, and a computer scientist with a Ph.D. has a very good job at 27 (computer science and engineering are the few fields in which industrial demand makes it sensible to get a Ph.D.)."
FUCK YES!
going to grad school for Comp Sci next year, article scared me because my dad is also a physics professor and always told me this, but i guess it doesnt apply to comp sci! :D That's because Computer Science isn't real science, 1s and 0s? please don't be ridiculous, everybody knows we only play video games and then just half-ass a few hours work and sell a program for way more then it's worth.
Computer science is basically math, which is not a science but a subject in the field of liberal arts. From what I understand, computer scientists know how to program, but the course track offered in universities stress mathematical theory and proofs rather than programming know-how.
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The article is pretty much dead on btw. Except for the point that computer programmers make a lot of money. Many computer programmers make shit because of outsourcing. In fact in many engineering fields, the job market is more attractive in developing nations because that's where companies(US companies mind you) hire.
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On May 17 2010 02:31 illu wrote:Show nested quote +On May 17 2010 02:00 Simplistik wrote:
Not every scientist works at a university. There's much joy, and money, to be had by working in industry. That's true. But a physicist like the author of that article has no choice but to work for the university.
I dont know, maybe its different in the US... But here physicists get jobs pretty decently
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On May 17 2010 02:48 Ecorin wrote:
My dream would be working as a scientist in a laboratory, messing with gene samples and whatnot. That would require a minimum 3 years (+2 to get even better chances) of studying. But I would like the job of having machines do half the work for me. I also like it being very monotone and routine. Would be the best job for me because I can slack around.
this sounds just like a job working in the microbiology laboratory of a hospital or something. if you're being serious, that's what you should probably look into after getting a bachelor of science in biology or something like that.
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EPT
