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I used to want to be an astrophysicist or something similar in pursuit of understanding high energy/quantum/cosmic phenomenon and generally trying to do my small part in furthering our understanding of spacetime and the universe. However, The horror stories of getting a PhD and general complaints regarding the nature of academic research are a significant part of what lead me to change course and take an early exit from academia, and generally dissuaded me from that pursuit. The PhD's (Students and graduates) I talked to were all saying the same thing about terrible pay, terrible treatment, terrible grueling grinding hours, begging for funding that could fall through and sink your project no matter your merits or efforts or attempts to prevent it, the publish or perish culture, etc etc etc At first I thought they were just jaded or cynical and I was just talking to the wrong people, or perhaps the local uni was just atypically bad in someway, but as I branched out and asked more people from more institutions I kept hearing the same thing pretty much universally. I heard it then (over a decade ago) and I hear it still now. I'm sure there are exceptions, but of the many I've talked to, few feel it was worth it, and every single one agree it was a grueling grind regardless. And I fully understand that few things worth doing come easy, and that discipline and persistence can be valuable "rewards" in their own right (started my own business, more than once), but on the same token, that doesn't mean things need be so difficult or detrimental, nor does it mean that the process can't be improved or modified in some way so that it doesn't so mercilessly beat people down. Guess that's a long winded way of me saying: yeah, no shit. It can and should be better, and am not the least bit surprised it's on the decline. How bad does it have to get before there's a serious, genuine effort to fix it? Additionally, if there is such an effort underway, what is it and how can I contribute? |