My girlfriend is getting her PhD. We are planning a vacation right now. She works in a lab as a researcher, which is not a "real job" since she's getting her PhD. There are no specific regulations for vacation time, or anything for that matter. However, she's unsure how long she can take for vacation, and unsure whether she should ask her P.I. This is an example of the irony of academia.<p>On one hand, the lack of clear policies and regulations governing academia is one of its greatest advantages, because it gives your mind space to explore, and expands creative freedom. If you want to work from 5pm - 3am, nobody will stop you. Ultimately you work for your own advancement, set your own goals, and plan your own schedule.<p>On the other hand, when other people are involved, especially those with "seniority" like P.I.'s and advisors, it's no longer obvious what decisions you should make. You need to consider more than just yourself, but the lack of regulation creates ambiguity in the "politics" of academia. How do you balance the expectations of those with some power over you, with the expectations you have of yourself? I imagine this question is a source of pressure for many academics, especially those who are extrinsically motivated.
I left in the middle of a PhD for mostly this reason. I was introduced to politics of the department very quickly because I learned my advisor was not popular with most of the rest of the faculty. Only two of them would collaborate with her. She had a big fight with one of the more established researchers over patent rights a few years back.<p>I had met her as an undergraduate five years prior to when I became her grad student. She was pleasant, albeit a little pushy, but nothing offputting. She had changed in the interim. She would yell at me (and her other students) in her office for the slightest mistakes. During a meeting with other researchers and my colleagues she accused me of not completing my work. It took all my strength not to tell her to fuck off and walk out. Mind you, this woman gave me a rare A+ in her course just a few years before because I did stellar work.<p>She's certainly infected by the anxiety of academia and she passes it on to her students and subordinates. When I saw how being a university researcher transformed her I decided to give up my chosen route. It didn't seem worth it to me if there was a significant risk of becoming a bitter asshole.<p>I became a software engineer. So I probably make double what she does, I have a fraction of the anxiety and I'm not a bitter asshole.
The worst consequence of this insecure, anxious, hypercompetitive culture is the near-impossibility of sincere collaboration. I speak from my experience as a very successful grad-student and postdoc in synthetic biology and neuroscience. Unlike equity in a startup, the kudos credit for publishing a high-impact paper is really only split between the first author and the lab PI, removing any incentive for trainees and labs to work together on larger projects. Of course, a great deal of noise is made in grants and PR about academic collaborations, but they are always paper affairs of convenience in securing funding, never truly incentivized joint missions, at least not in the biological sciences. I can't count the number of attempted collaborations that I've seen collapse in heated acrimony. As a result, most academic science is a very lonely affair, and the ambition of what can be achieved today in experimental biology is completely constrained by what one poorly-trained young researcher can do in a few years of hard labor with only a modicum of outside help and advice.
How to get the best out of people is a millennial long question. Egyptians used whips and slaves, we have been using money and propaganda lately, but everyone uses something that may or may not be the most optimal method. The issue is that people are individual and respond differently each time you ask them. My condolences on the loss of life (I too have felt like the world was asking far too much of me and I had no way out) but suicide is rarely the answer. Quitting your job, going to live in Montana for a while, having far too many beers, considering that everyone around you is an asshole, those are good options. And yes, I know it is real hard to climb out of those dark mental holes and realize this, but damnit you have to try.<p>If there was 2 things I wish the whole world could know, truly know deep down, they would be that you personally are worth all the stars in the heavens, all the grain in the fields, all the water in the oceans, and that everyone else is worth exactly the same amount; that we are all priceless.
"There is no trace of evidence that you can get the best out of people at high-level tasks through pressure and competition. The opposite is true. Worried people get dumber. They may be faster at carrying rocks… but they do not get smarter."<p>That last sentence is a great turn of phrase.
Going into academia seems like the dumbest thing only smartest people do.<p>Jump into a job market where you compete against the bright and ambitious individuals who will do everything to out-work you to fight for a small prize pool.<p>The ending will most likely not be a happy one.
> This is not, I shouldn't have to say, how academia works. Peter Higgs, of Higgs Boson fame, said that there was 'no Eureka moment' to his work, and he only has 4 papers listed on Google Scholar: but what papers! Science rarely has a Eureka moment: it's rather a series of careful, thoughtful developments of work done by one's forebears and peers. A management which demands a Eureka a day is one which doesn't just not 'get' academia, it's a management which contradicts the academic method and it's one which has forgotten that it's meant to serve the needs of science, the arts, students and researchers, not the insatiable maw of attention seeking 'Leaders' (that's the word they use now) and the PR office. It's also a management that kills.<p><i>slow applause</i>
Life is an 'anxiety machine.'<p>Claiming academia killed this specific man is in extremely bad taste. And if we're speaking in generalities, I'd need to see evidence that academic positions correlate with higher rates of suicide.
I didn't stay in formal education beyond high school so I can't really comment, but from that article:<p>"Unfortunately, some of his colleagues felt that he did not secure sufficiently large research grants. So he was to be fired."<p>However, Imperial College' statement on his passing claims otherwise:<p>"Contrary to claims appearing on the internet, Professor Grimm’s work was not under formal review nor had he been given any notice of dismissal."<p><a href="http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/newsandeventspggrp/imperialcollege/newssummary/news_4-12-2014-18-0-17" rel="nofollow">http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/newsandeventspggrp/imperialcolleg...</a>
Professor Grimm's death is a horrible tragedy and a major blow to the community. He will be greatly missed by those who were fortunate enough to know him.<p>Perhaps institutions that issue grants should require that the receiving organization ban "quotas" from their internal policies.<p>Condolences to Prof. Grimm's family and friends.