Should I admit that I was a first-year PhD student in future interviews? As you may know, I was a first-year student and forced to leave and it was a long story, I have posted here. My question is: since I pledged myself to be honest and tell the truth, the interviewers when they hear that they are negatively affected. Recently, I have applied for a position and I was shortlisted to 4, and then when they heard my case they told me we want someone who can commit, I told them my story positively and never mentioned any negativity. I have received an email from ex-PI who forced me to leave asking that he received an email from the interviewer and I saw the email that he is extremely interested, and the ex-PI asked me what I have told them about the lab so that he can be consistent with my words, honestly, I didn't have a good intention from his email, I have been always honest and candid, but the ex-PI used to lie based on multiple situations. I have been rejected. I am struggling as I was blamed and honestly, the reason for leaving is that I am an independent researcher and ex-PI didn't like that. However, I look through interview embarrassed sometimes and a nervous little bit because of their reaction like have a taboo. I don't want to lose any future interviews, I have noticed that students apply elsewhere and don't mention they are a current student in a specific program, however, my situation is awkward as I spent one year and my name is still indexed in their website although my webpage is removed. Please, suggestion, should I hide it, but I tell myself it isn't ethical.

It is typical in applying for a job, graduate program, etc, to account for how you've spent your past time. If you are an undergraduate student for some years, then maybe a master's student, and then there is a gap in your resume from when you were a PhD student, it will jump out at anyone reviewing your application.

It doesn't look good that you've left your program, but it looks worse if you have no answer for how you spent that time, and worst of all if it becomes clear you intended to mask your time as a previous grad student.

No matter how you go about this, it looks bad that you did not complete a PhD program. Applicants for a PhD are assessed primarily based on their perceived likelihood to be a successful PhD student. As a past unsuccessful PhD student, that perceived likelihood decreases, especially if your past PI says bad things about you and people believe them.

In the short term, you likely need to gather some new references. You need people who can vouch for your ability and potential as a researcher. Depending on your field, the availability of such positions may be limited, but in my own field I would advise taking up employment in an academic lab as a technician. The barrier to entry is much less than for a PhD position where an institution is dedicating themselves to you over several years. Your PI in that lab will be able to recommend you to programs that you subsequently apply to, and confirm to them that your prior experience was a fluke.

You asked for candid advice, and I am doing my best to give it. If I was reviewing your application, and saw that you left a PhD program after a year, I would not want to take you on as a student. Regardless of whose fault it is, there are many many qualified candidates for most PhD programs. If you got grants and publications, that may help, but you still have clearly had a personal conflict with your past PI and have accused them of many bad things. The last thing I would want would be to take you on as a student, bright as you may be, and then be accused of similar things myself. I wouldn't have any objective information to assess whether you are a victim as you claim or not, unless someone else, whose input I trust, gives me information about the situation.

My advice is to not mention a single year of work somewhere else.  It gets lost in the noise when you are looking back at your life from many years in the future.  Plus Europe can be very fussy and cloistered and cronyish.

Actually maybe you should bail from academia.  Go drive trucks in the Permian.  Well maybe that is a little much.  But get involved in US E&P.  It's still America out there.  At least for now.


Citing a paper with multiple versions In my area (computer science) it's common for a paper to be posted on arxiv, then appear in a conference a few months later, and finally appear in a journal several years later. This raises the question: which version should I cite?

The general practice I've seen is to cite the latest version. However, I do not agree with this general practice for several reasons:

The chronology becomes unclear. e.g. I might say "Bobson [Bob14] builds on the seminal work of Adamson [Ada15]" It looks like the chronology is backwards, but the correct chronology is that [Ada15] appeared on arxiv in 2013 and then appeared in a journal in 2015.
The most recent version is often not the best version to read. For example, the conference version of a paper is usually heavily abridged (due to a page limit) and the journal version is hidden behind a paywall and strangely formatted. Thus the arxiv version is usually the best version to read.
If I am citing a specific part of the article (e.g. "Theorem 4.2 on page 23") that only appears in the arxiv version or has a different number in the journal version, then it doesn't make sense to cite the "wrong" version.
It means I have to keep updating my citations as the paper moves through different versions. And this leads to inconsistent citations.

The only advantage I see to citing the most recent version is that it  indicates how "good" the paper is, as indicated by the prestige of the conference or journal.

I am often tempted to cite the arxiv version in these cases, as it is gives the best chronology and is usually the most readable version. (I can justify it by saying that this is the version I actually read.)

Is going against this general practice acceptable? Might I annoy someone by not acknowledging that their paper appeared in a very prestigious venue? Or would someone be unhappy that I don't have the venue information in my references?

How should I cite articles that have multiple versions? In particular, how do I communicate (i) the correct chronology, (ii) the version with the right information, and (iii) the conference/journal that accepted it?

One solution is to cite all the versions, but I think that is impractical and confusing - and I have never seen it done.

In math we have the same issues.  Here is what I do, most of which is standard:

If a paper has been published, always cite the published version.
If you want to point out the chronology, in particular because it is not clear from publication dates, do it in the text.  People understand that publication dates do not align perfectly with when the papers were originally written.  (My papers don't appear in the order I wrote them.)  If you refer to arXiv versions, it is easy to see the chronology, at least up to the level of month/year, from arXiv ids.
If something is accepted to a certain journal/conference proceedings, you can say "Journal XXX, to appear" in the references.  If you want to say something was announced at a certain conference, you can say so in the text.
Make references (e.g., theorem numbers) to the version you cite.  I personally like to include version numbers in arXiv citations for this reason (e.g., arXiv:1601.0000v37).  If you want to refer to something that appeared only in a previous version, I would cite the published paper if published and say in the text something like: This result appeared as Thm A.B.C of an earlier version (arXiv:1601.0000v36) of [citation]" possibly with some remark about why it's not in the current version.  (Hopefully, if you're using it, it hasn't been removed because there was an error in the proof.)  But if the paper has not been published, you can either do a similar thing or just put a citation to the version you want to refer to.  However, it's probably best to point out in such situations that the result doesn't appear in later versions so the reader doesn't accidentally check the wrong version.

I have the same problem and cannot offer you a solution for which I claim it to be the correct one. However here are some thoughts:

For work citing other work like in your example "Bobson [Bob14] builds on the seminal work of Adamson [Ada15]" I would use the version [Bob14] references since this is the one [Bob14] builds on.
I usually prefer a peer-reviewed publication to arXiv.
Typically I stick to the first peer-reviewed publication I used and only "update" if a later version contains a result that I need.


How does copyright work on screen captures? I am writing an article comparing three pieces of software. I have taken screen shots of all of them and would like to use them in a non-open access article. Given the intended journal, there is a reasonable chance of the images being on the cover. What are the copyright issues associated with screen shots?

Specifically, one of the pieces of software is free and open source (GPL v2), and two are free as in beer, but closed source with unknown licenses and no EULAs. To further complicate matters one of the closed sourced pieces of software looks and functions very much like a proprietary piece of hardware produced by a massive company. Three years ago I contacted the developer of the software and asked about using a screen shot and he said it was fine. The software is still widely available, but the direct download from the developers site now has text indicating that the massive company has "requested" that it be taken down. I own the physical hardware and am not aware of any crazy licensing restrictions. I could use a photo of the physical hardware if that is better.

You need legal advice. Talk to an attorney.

Perhaps your institution has one that you can take advantage of. Everything from here on out is rank speculation, and even your attorney's advice may not protect your from suit.

If you can, get permission from each source you want to take a screen capture of. There may be copyright protectable elements in those screen shots. There may also be trademarked elements.

If you cannot get permission for whatever reason, you may have to rely on fair use. Fair use is a defense to an infringement suit not a get out of jail free card. By using a copyright or trademark protected work without a license, you run the risk of lawsuit. Your institution may not be willing to rely on a fair use defense. Also, your publisher may not be willing to rely on a fair use defense (since they will be the lawsuit target).

I personally think your use is without question a classic and canonical example of fair use, but that doesn't mean that you will prevail in publishing without permission. Many venues require that your sign a form saying that you have the copyright or permission to use all your images, so be careful.

If there's no explicit prohibition against it in a EULA and it is publicly-available software, just mention the source of the screenshot, either in small print on the cover or in a colophon.  Remember the law belongs to you at least as much as them and academics have been too passive in helping courts settle these issues.  And the proof of it is shown in other`s answers suggesting you should contact a lawyer.  But in the United States, the Law is explicitly reserved for the People, not lawyers.  These aren't difficult cases to think about.  Academia has been dealing with the issue of fair-use for centuries.  Just look at the issue as if it were your own special software, and you'll be able to figure out reasonable and "fair use".


Style in citing two authors in the same sentence I have a sentence with two concepts and two quotations from two different authors. It goes like this

  Some is true because of concept one, that is "quotation one",
  and concept two, that is "quotation two".

Concept one and two are both from Author A while quotation one and two are from Author B.

What would be an elegant way to cite both authors at the end of the sentence making sure:

The reader will be able to attribute each concept/citation to the write author,
The reader will be able to understand which work (and from which page) the quotation is from

First off, citing papers is not about giving credit to first authors, it is about making literature traceable to readers. This is a key part of scientific writing, providing sources. The format for citations is of course focussing on first authors who may, or may not, be the main contributor (remember that author order varies between disciplines). A secondary aspect is the fact that many evaluations of academic status is based on authorship and as such authors may not be credited as much as they should. This is, however, not the reason for why we reference the way we do. So, from this perspective, I do not see why you necessarily need to emphasize the name of someone other than the first or second author (I am now thinking Harvard-style references where two-author papers have both names listed in the in-text reference).

If there is a scientifically based reason for highlighting the originator, one could write

  Concepts One and Two (reference to B) were first developed by A [then I would argue some form of explanation of why this distinction is scientifically important should follow or be included]

or

  A originated the concept one and two (Reference to B) [then I would argue some form of explanation of why this distinction is scientifically important should follow or be included]

Note that this would seemingly take away the importance of B, which in many reference systems would look strange and implicate something may not be right with the articles. I therefore think it is wise to clarify why you feel the work of A is such that it requires highlighting. Clearly, I cannot judge the case since all details are unavailable. As a side point, reviewers will likely pick up on any inconsistencies and ask for clarification in a case such as this, unless the reasons for the formatting is either clear from your writing or well known in the community.

If this is suppose to be a research paper, one can cite both the authors in Chronological manner.

In your case "concept one" is from Author A and "quotation one" is from Author B and those are repeating in the same order, so citing them as \cite{A, B} will work fine.


MBA recommendation letter from the board member of another business school? I know someone very well who is a board member of a business school at one of the world’s top ranked university. This university has a great business school for undergraduates but the MBA program is not at all held in high regard.

I have my eyes on a highly ranked MBA program at another university.

My question:

  Will a recommendation from a board member of a
  business school improve my application or harm it when applying for an MBA program
  at another university?

I can see it harming my application because if I am such a good applicant for an MBA then why would the board member endorse my application for another university? Why wouldn’t he try and make me attend the MBA at his business school?

On the other hand I can see it improving my application. For someone in his position to endorse my application to attend another business school shows I must be a very good fit for where I want to go.

  Do I ask this board member for a recommendation letter or find someone
  else? What are some of the pros and cons of asking this board member?

I can see it harming my application because if I am such a good applicant for an MBA then why would the board member endorse my application for another university? Why wouldn’t he try and make me attend the MBA at his business school?

Because, like you said, the other program is much better. If he knows and wishes you well, he won't try to prevent you from benefiting from a better program. Also, he cannot force you to attend his business school and you may have very good non-academic reasons to prefer another place. Perhaps your partner lives there, perhaps the job opportunities are better or the school has better career services, perhaps you just want to change your environment.

  Do I ask this board member for a recommendation letter or find someone else? What are some of the pros and cons of asking this board member?

First of all, it doesn't hurt to think of a back-up plan in advance, in case the board member declines to write a strong letter.

Generally speaking, a recommendation letter from a board member of a good university should not harm your application. However, whether it will improve it depends on the capacity in which he knows you. Was he your professor in some classes where you performed exceptionally well and can commend on your analytical abilities? Does he have first have experience of working with you in the industry and can talk about your leadership potential, etc? Does he know you from some outstanding community service that you have performed? Look at how business schools describe their ideal candidates (they usually have a section like this). You want your recommendation letters to speak directly to those qualities based on their first-hand experience and giving specific examples as evidence.

In other words, his status of as a board member can amplify an otherwise strong application letter. However, if it is going to be something superficial, then it's better to look for someone else. And, of course, you don't want to be related to that person.

Will a recommendation from a board member of a business school improve
  my application or harm it when applying for an MBA program at another
  university?

From personal experience, it makes no difference. The admissions team has to treat all recommendation letters the same, whether its from the President, or from your neighbor. Otherwise, it would offer an unfair advantage to those who have more resources to procure such a recommendation letter from someone more affluent.

  Do I ask this board member for a recommendation letter or find someone
  else? What are some of the pros and cons of asking this board member?

Certainly ask this board member for a recommendation letter. There are really no pros or cons. It's almost like when you asked high school teachers for recommendation letters for college - doesn't matter if it was your math teacher or your gym teacher.


Relative Advantages/Disadvantages of Interdisciplinary Degree vs Discipline-Specific Degree I am applying for a PhD and when I was speaking to my potential advisor they discussed the possibility of me applying for an interdisciplinary degree that is offered by the institution as an option instead of the discipline specific degree in applied mathematics. The supervisors field is in mathematical biology and my dissertation work would be as well, and working under the assumption that they will take me on as a student, I am wondering what the advantages and disadvantages of the interdisciplinary degree might be relative to a degree that focuses on a specific discipline.
For example, how would a PhD in an interdisciplinary field affect paths forward for a PostDoc position? There are probably some particular advantages and disadvantages that are not obvious to me, so I am putting this out to the community.

The main reasons are pretty obvious, I think.
A narrow field of study will (probably) make you more suitable for employment in that field and less in others.
A wider field of study will (probably) give you more options, but those who have specialized in something will have the upper hand (again, probably) over you it their specialty.
None of that is necessarily true and you can always either broaden your outlook later or specialize further as necessary. So, I suspect that any effect is most important only for your first job.
But it also depends on the individual program. I can imagine one in which the mathematical techniques are pretty generally useful, but also one in which they are not. This might be worth exploring with you proposed advisor.
On a different dimension, an interdisciplinary program might leave you more grounded in applications, where a straight applied math program might (not necessarily) leave you wondering how to actually use what you have learned.

This answer is for the US academic job market in mathematics, where the majority of positions are more focused on teaching than research and where many colleges and universities have combined departments of mathematics rather than separate pure and applied mathematics departments or even more specialized departments.
A specialized interdisciplinary degree program is a good way to prepare for a  focused research career in that interdisciplinary area of research, particularly if that area is new and growing.
A more traditional program grounded within a discipline may be more helpful in preparing you for a faculty career within a typical mathematics department.  As an applied mathematician teaching in a smaller department at an institution that isn't focused on research, you'd be expected to be able to teach a broad range of courses in mathematics, from calculus to linear algebra, ordinary and partial differential equations, mathematical modeling, mathematical biology, numerical analysis, and maybe even some probability and statistics.  It's likely that a more traditional degree program with a broader range of graduate courses would better prepare you for this kind of teaching work.
Some specific things to consider:

Do graduate students in the interdisciplinary program work only as research assistants or can they get experience as TA's within the math department?

How broad is the course work that you'll take as a student in the two different programs?

What areas are covered by the preliminary exams in the two programs?

How have previous graduates of the programs done on the job market (both immediately after graduation and after some years (say 5-10) in the profession)?


How good are entrepreneurial opportunities for faculty members? How easy is it for faculty members working at a reputable university to become entrepreneurs?
If the faculty member sees an opportunity for a great product and wants to set up a small office with a few engineers working with one or two students, will the university sponsor such a venture?
How enthusiastic or forthcoming will the industry and VCs in general be towards this?
Lastly, how common are such professor-run companies for, say engineering faculty in top US schools?

This is quite common in American universities, and there are probably thousands of start-ups that have arisen out of university-based research. The question of financing such a venture is of course a challenging one to answer, but with the right contacts, is usually available.

I can think of at least four or five such start-ups in the department I attended for graduate school, and I imagine there are several more in the planning stages.

As for how enthusiastic industry and VC's are, well, I think it depends entirely on the strength of the idea, and how "market-ready" the concept is. The sooner it's ready to go, the more enthusiastically people will flock to it.

I think the main issue is that a lot of entrepreneural mindset is eliminated from faculty, but if the faculty has the right mindset there is no limitation to a venture, especially if the faculty has tenure.


Under which circumstances (if ever) should a prospective post-doc apply for a position advertised for a PhD student? Many academic positions are advertised for PhD students. Does it make sense to apply for such a position even if you already have a PhD, in the hope that they might also consider a post-doc instead? Why would the hiring institution not want a post-doc instead of a PhD student? Why would a prospective post-doc not want such a position?
In case somebody wonders why I'm asking:

Often, there are many more projects advertised for prospective PhD students than for prospective post-docs.
Many of the projects seem to be scientifically challenging enough to be interesting also for a post-doc, especially if one is switching fields or completing the project in a shorter time frame.
I cannot see why institutions would be opposed to hiring post-docs instead of PhD students, considering the much higher qualification they bring. I can imagine that there are some limitations attached to funding, though.

For context, I am in an engineering / computer science field in Europe, where PhD and post-doc positions offer comparable salaries.

While it might sometimes be possible to convert the funding from a PhD to a postdoc position, in general I don't think it's a good idea to apply as a postdoc for a PhD position. That being said, you can always contact the PI and ask whether they would have another position for a postdoc.

Often, there are many more projects advertised for prospective PhD students than for prospective post-docs.

This is due to several reasons:

First not every PhD student continues as a postdoc: a lot of them go to industry, some of them quit or fail... and some of them achieve a mediocre PhD which doesn't allow them to get a postdoc job. So mathematically there must be more PhD positions than postdoc positions: if say only 20% of PhDs continue as postdocs, there must be roughly 5 times more PhD positions offered than postdoc ones.
Universities have a duty to teach students, they don't have a duty to hire temporary research staff. The number of PhD students taught is an important target indicator for an institution, whereas the number of postdocs is more a result of their success at grant applications.

Many of the projects seem to be scientifically challenging enough to be interesting also for a post-doc, especially if one is switching fields or completing the project in a shorter time frame.
I cannot see why institutions would be opposed to hiring post-docs instead of PhD students, considering the much higher qualification they bring. I can imagine that there are some limitations attached to funding, though.

I've heard the very vague estimation that one year of postdoc is equivalent to 3 years of PhD in terms of research productivity (incidentally, they are often paid around 3 times more in countries where the PhD is a grant). There's some truth to the idea that a postdoc can do the same job as a PhD faster.
However there are also important differences which can make a PI choose a PhD rather than a postdoc:

a PhD topic can be more prospective and evolve over time.
the PI might want the PhD to test their own research ideas, so they want to supervise the work closely. On the contrary, a postdoc is usually more independent.
supervising PhDs is a must to advance their career.
co-supervising a PhD student is a common way to start a collaboration with a colleague, whereas a postdoc doesn't need much supervision (if any).

It's important to understand that universities are not like companies, they are not looking for the best quality/price ratio for a task. The goal of funding a PhD is not only to answer a research question, it's also to teach somebody how to do research so that they can contribute to society later. This is why the main reason for an institution to hire PhD students is simply that it's an essential part of their mission, that's why they receive public money. This is also why there are indeed very often limitations on the funding, simply because a lot of PhD funding comes from national or international programs meant to increase research capacity by training researchers.

General answer: Where there's a will there's a way. If the PI/lab is interested in your talent or proposal, there is a chance they will make it work.
I think you are correct noticing that advertisement for position means they need something. And you as postdoc can fill the gap. The issues is that PhD positions often seems to be funded from different sources than postdoc positions.
That being said, you can only try to reach out. There is nothing you can lose.


If I refereed a paper at one journal (and it was rejected) should I referee it again when it's sent to another journal? A couple months ago I refereed a paper for one journal. Due to a number of factors, I recommended that it not be published in that particular journal, and gave the author a bunch of comments on how they could easily improve the manuscript. The editor of that journal followed my recommendation (and perhaps the recommendation of other referees I am unaware of) and did not accept the publication.

This morning I received another review request, this time from a different journal but for the same manuscript. I've never had this particular situation occur before, and am wondering what the expected thing for me to do is. Should I review the manuscript again as if I hadn't before, should I let the editor know first and see what they say, or what?

There are no problems associated with you reviewing a paper again, regardless if it resubmitted to the same or a different journal. Since you have seen the paper earlier and know its earlier problems you can better judge how it has improved and to what extent it is now publishable. You should definitely let the editor know that you have been involved in the process of this paper earlier even if he/she has not indicated the paper has been rejected somewhere before. That information provides the editor with a better perspective of the development of the paper and can make the decision to accept or reject easier since the willingness or capability of the author(s) to improve the manuscript is set in perspective.

You can always contact the editor and state that you are willing to take on the review but felt it was necessary to convey the information. I do not see it as necessary but it is of course a nice gesture.

I generally say "no" in these circumstances. I would say "yes" under either of two circumstances

1) I believe it is suitable for the second journal but not for the first

2) The paper is so wrong that the authors seem dishonest.

Ultimately, the whole journal peer review things comes down do finding two reviewers who think it's worth publishing. The same person rerefereeing is really just wasting everyone's time.


Is it common for a journal to reject a paper after accepting it subject to minor revisions? Is it common for a journal to reject a paper after previously accepting it?

When a paper of mine was first reviewed, one of the reviewers was okay with the paper and the other one requested minor revisions. The journal clearly said that the paper was accepted, subject to minor amendments and even went on to mention tentative publication dates. I then quickly made the required revisions.

Both the initial reviewers accepted it, but the editors solicited a third reviewer. These reviewer’s comments were not that specific but just referred to things like some of the citations are too old and he had problems with the methodology and contribution and then in other places he goes completely off topic saying that the paper implies certain things that I certainly do not say and are very far from what I am discussing in this paper. Now the journal has rejected the paper.

Is it common for a journal to reject a paper after previously accepting it?

It’s certainly not common, but it’s also not entirely unheard of or something that should never happen per se. Coincidentally something along that lines happened to me yesterday.

See this from the journal’s point of view: When they consult somebody as a reviewer, they assume them reliable and thus it would be odd to fully ignore their judgement. If this reviewer raised severe objections, it would be unwise of the journal to leave them unaddressed.

On the other hand, if two reviewers gave a positive evaluation of your paper, it seems equally unwise to reject your paper without even giving you the opportunity to react to the third reviewer’s criticisms. I thus strongly suggest that you check the wording of the journal’s decision letter and your paper’s status carefully as to whether your paper was actually rejected or they just want you to address the third reviewer’s comments and decide upon that. If your paper was actually rejected, you might want to consider a rebuttal due to the above reasons.

What seems a little odd is that a third reviewer was considered at this stage. Could it be that this reviewer was asked in the first round of revision and turned their review in only recently for some reason?

Finally, a sidenote: If the reviewer actually argued against your paper because it “implies certain things”, this gives you a strong argument for rebuttal. Even if a paper’s result imply that the first law of thermodynamics does not hold, it should not be rejected on that basis.

Journals do whatever they want without oversight or logic. It is generally a tactic used with new authors who aren’t well known or have a long track record with the journal. It can be due to many other reasons ranging from blithe idiocy of some apathetic whimsical or unqualified reviewer. But, there are certain nefarious impulses that are at play (i.e. power struggle within an institution or journal or an industrial contact asks them not to accept a certain paper). Integrity in publishing is present in certain journals, in many other journals it is who you know. Nepotism, even when it’s double blinded (so called) reviews! Go figure the world of print works like the world of people!


What does it mean when a paper is rejected but encourages resubmission without a suggestion of new experiments? My paper has been rejected but encouraged re-submission. The reviewers were overall positive said it was well written and that all the analyses were correct. The problems pointed out were changes to the introduction and conclusion to change the scope of how the experiments are framed, not to any of the experiments themselves. There were no mentions of lack of novelty or other common reasons for rejection. There was also no mention that anything I wrote was overstated or incorrect.

I am unsure of whether to  re-submit when it has been rejected for this reason because I don't understand how a manuscript could be rejected if the experiments were correct and found to be novel?
If the problem is that I need to modify my introduction and conclusion than why not accept the manuscript, since re-writing the introduction/conclusion would not be very difficult. I would consider doing so would be a minor revision.

I am wondering whether anyone has had this type of rejection before and if they decided to re-submit or submit elsewhere?

Many journals are now encouraged to publish the data on the "efficiency" of the review process, e.g. the average time before initial submission and publication. Expected time to publication may be an important consideration for authors, along with the journals impact factor.

So, imagine that you run a journal, where a paper on average goes through 2.5 rounds of review and each round takes 3-6 months. If you sum it together, 12+ months from submission to publication would not look too attractive. But you only need to sum up if you invite revisions. If you "reject and resubmit", then technically you look at a completely new submission, and it counts as a new paper in your statistics. So, your processing rate gets shorter (which authors like), and your acceptance rate gets lower (which makes your journal sort of a prestigious one, tough to get into).

This is the main reason (in my personal opinion), why so many journals now rebrand "major revision" decision (and often "minor revision" as well) as "reject and resubmit".

If the reviewers didn't express much dissatisfaction, or rather, expressed general satisfaction, it may have been an editorial decision. I suspect that the journal's editors know their readers well and are just trying to match your paper to reader expectations. Some journals place a very high value on the presentation, which you indicate is fine, but the editors may just want the introduction to make the significance of the results clearer for their subscribers.

I think it is to your advantage to work with them on this. It may be the difference between a good and a great paper.


Can a Ph.D student change his adviser, if he is supported by a Research Assistantship by the adviser upon admission (and possibly first year)? According to my offer, I am admitted to the Ph.D program and funded by a Research Assistantship by Professor X. Nevertheless, I am interested in other research directions, and we are supposed to decide our adviser by the end of the first semester.

Is it appropriate to change adviser in my case, as I am funded by Professor X?

It is usually possible, but plan for two things to happen:

[Almost certain] You will lose this RA-stipend. RAs are usually in the context of specific projects and under the supervision of specific advisors, so when you decide to work on an entirely different project with a different position (which is typically your right as a PhD student) you become ineligible to be funded in this way. You need to understand that most RAs come from projects, where a PI has promised to a funding agency or company that a certain project will be delivered within a time frame. If you then decide to work on something else, the PI needs to find another person to actually do the work that has been promised. Note that this does not necessarily mean that you won't have a stipend anymore, but it will likely need to be a different source (e.g., either a TA position or an RA sponsored
by your new advisor).
[Possible] There may be some fallout with the PI sponsoring the RA. I guess most people can accept that sometimes the first year shows that you are not an ideal fit and switching advisors is the best solution for everybody, but planning to switch all along when accepting the offer may understandably lead to some bad blood. In essence, you are trying to milk a year of funding out of a project you have no intention of actually contributing to long-term. Many people will find this highly disagreeable.

By rights, you can (in most universities).

However, it will be super-awkward.

It seems like you did not enter the program through a scholarship but with a job (RA-ship) to fund your studies. This is an academic way of saying, "I give you a job. I also admit you in the program."

Therefore, you are free to choose any supervisor but you need to keep your job as your source of income (you eat, wear-cloths and sleep under roof, right?). Your current supervisor is your reporting officer for your job.

Best is to have an open-talk with your current supervisor. Usually, they are understanding and (though hard to believe) supportive.


Is it OK to ask a professor if they have a postdoc position available? I am a PhD student working in applied probability theory. I have submitted my PhD thesis and started to apply for postdoc positions.

Is it OK to ask a professor whether they have a position available? If so, what should such an e-mail contain?

Yes, it is fine. It never hurts to ask. Some people will ignore you, but some people will reply.

I advise you to have this conversation in person and not via email.

When you are face to face with this professor you will be able to read their body language. If you ask the question and they appear annoyed or uncomfortable then just end the conversation quickly and politely. If, however, you see they show interest, then you may inquire further.

When setting up the initial meeting, you can write a simple email stating who you are and asking what times the professor is available to speak with you.


Can an advisor use student's data for journal publishing without prior consent? A master's student did research under an advisor.  As part of the research, the student had collected and processed a lot of data and finally published the thesis as well. After a few years,  the advisor took a small portion of said data from the master's thesis and published a paper. The student is not a co-author nor was prior consent sought to use that data. However, the advisor added the student's name in the acknowledgment section. Is there anything wrong on the advisor's side? After all, the advisor had also actively guided the research and collection of data and may feel they have a right to use that data without the consent of the student.
The student played no role in publishing the paper except for the fact that a part of the student's published master's thesis data was used for this journal publication. The student was hence not added as a co-author but was acknowledged.

A paper should not be published without the consent of all the authors.
Collecting and processing data may or may not make someone an author; it depends on the details and the discipline.  We cannot evaluate this for you.
If you live in a jurisdiction where data is not protected by copyright law, then technically anybody who gets a copy of your data can publish that data wherever they please.
https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/11359/can-you-copyright-data

Note: the answer below makes an assumption about what you meant by "processing" data. I am assuming you mean that the student collected the data and then analyzed them to extract useful information and this is the information that was then put in context by the advisor and published. If by "processing" you just mean filling out a spreadsheet or otherwise making the data available for analysis as opposed to actually performing the analysis, then that's different and my answer does not apply.

What you are describing sounds to me like a clear case of academic malpractice where the advisor is stealing someone else's work. I may be misunderstanding the situation, but you wrote: "the student had collected and processed a lot of data".  This means the student did all the work of data collection and analysis. I realize this may depend on your field, but I struggle to imagine a situation where the person who did all the data collection and analysis doesn't merit authorship of a paper that is based on said data and analysis.
So yes, from what I can understand and the details you gave, the advisor is absolutely in the wrong. The student should not only have been consulted, but more importantly, the student should have been an author. The fact that the advisor had actively guided the research and collection of data is irrelevant. That's what advisors are supposed to do and that's why, at least in many fields, papers are published under both the advisor's and the student's name. In my field, biology, this would typically have the student as first author and the advisor as last and corresponding author.


Is a postdoctoral scholar expected to work during the summer? I am considering applying for postdoctoral positions in the US.
However, I would like to find more information about
how it is like to be a postdoctoral scholar.

Question 1:
Is a postdoctoral position a full-year position (12 months)
or an academic-year position (9 months)?

Question 2:
How should I interpret postdoctoral salaries?
For example, an MIT postdoctoral information page (see link)
lists the minimum postdoctoral salary
for a person with 0 years of experience at $42,000.
Is this salary for 12 months, or for 9 months?

In general, postdoctoral positions—unlike faculty positions (in the US)—are considered to be 12-month positions, with the salaries determined accordingly. You are not normally expected to provide your own funding for the summer months, nor are you expected to find outside employment.

If this is not the case, then it should be explicitly mentioned in the advertisement for the position. However, this is so rarely encountered that it would be very much outside the norm for postdocs.

Post-docs come under staff category not faculty, so it's always 12 months. More than 50% places expect you even too work in weekends.


Is it appropriate to cite a piece of academic work when the author has been charged with child pornography? It has recently come to my attention that a renowned scholar in my field whose academic journals have been highly influential in my area of research has recently been charged with child pornography. Is it possible to separate the scholar from their work? And will my thesis research, in turn, be judged for referencing the work?

Of course it is appropriate. Why not? They did relevant work, so you have to cite them. With citing, you do your duty -- you are in no way saying you "like" the cited persons.

Of course, I am assuming that their research is sound and is not somehow influenced by the child pornography. It was a different case if there were problems with the research.

On the other hand, not citing them could get you into big (or small) trouble.

Others calling this an "ad hominem fallacy" or saying you must "separate the scholar from their work" are wrong. In a system where citation is the currency that fuels careers, you can't separate them; any resolution of this dilemma must acknowledge and attempt to mitigate the fact that the author cited does usually benefit from citations. This is particularly true in cases where the author is still alive and still has a career, but in the case of hateful ideologies (e.g. Nazi works), there is also the aspect of citation benefiting the ideology that lives on past the author.

Now, how do you do that? It's hard, and academia doesn't have good solutions right now. Fixing the whole academic publishing system and citation economy is related, but not really something you can wait on. From an academic integrity standpoing, you do have an obligation to accurately cite work you used, were influenced by, or built on. But if this person is a "renowned scholar" and "highly influential" in his area of research, there's also a good chance that he's going to get off with a slap on the wrist, partly due to the justice system and academic community considering him "too big to fail" or considering the "value of his work" too important to jeopardize by ostracizing him.

Sadly, I don't have any good answers for how to fix this or even avoid being complicit in it. But I do think it's worth saying that the people who are telling you it's not an issue are morally bankrupt.

On a related note, the Unabomber was once cited with a footnote "Better known for other work."


Are UK faculty salaries in computer science low compared to salaries in United States? I'm looking at faculty ads for computer science in the UK and noticed that the average salary range seems to be significantly lower compared to the US. Typically, a starting Lecturer ( = Assistent Professor) can expect an annual salary in the range of only 35k - 42k GPD which is in the range of 55k - 66k USD.

On the other hand, if I look at the academic job market in the US, then this would be considered an average PostDoc salary at best, whereas the lower limit for computer science assistant professors seems to be around 80k. Considering that faculty gets this amount for 9 months in the US rather than 12 as in the UK and taking into account the higher income tax rates of the UK, this gap becomes significantly big.

Does the UK system include certain perks that the US system does not have that I'm missing here?

Are there other ways that UK faculty can make up for this quite significant gap?

You are trying to compare a US salary to a UK salary using the current exchange rate. I do not think this is particularly relevant. Even if you are willing to ignore differences between the UK and US in terms of work/life balance, teaching load, and job security, you probably want to compare the quality of life that a salary buys you and not what would happen if you converted it to USD. The starting salary for a CS lecturer/assistant professor, when converted to USD, is much lower for a UK academic than a US academic, but there are differences between the value of a US and UK salary.

While you say the UK tax rate is higher, that is a huge over simplification. Two random online tax calculators I used gave a US income tax of 24% on an 80,000 USD salary and a UK income tax of 25% on a 42,000 GBP salary. This ignores US state (and possibly city) income tax. The UK VAT of 20% is much higher than typical US sales taxes, but not everything is subject to VAT/sales tax. Even if you can accurately calculate an average total tax liability, you still need to account for purchasing power.

I have work in both the US and UK in comparable cites (not NYC/London) and tend to think that the value of my UK salary is a little lower than value of my US salary. It is worth noting that UK salaries are much more consistent across fields. This means that I make the same as a CS lecturer in the UK, but that in the US I would probably be making 10% less than a CS assistant professor. My guess is that for CS there is a substantial, maybe 15%, hit in quality of life that an academic salary buys.

In the US your starting salary is often your salary until you get tenure/promotion while in the UK you get a larger salary every year. There is a performance based pay raise, that essentially everyone gets, which is generally about 2.5%. This means the gap between the US and UK values gets smaller every year and after 6 years, when one is preparing to be promoted, the gap is pretty small. Further, UK salaries also have a cost of living adjustment. For the past few years this has been about 0.5-2% and less than the inflation, but it wouldn't surprise me if the union negotiates a big salary bump, maybe 10%, in the next few years. This would really close the gap.

It is also worth noting that a US assistant professor is not directly equivalent to a UK lecturer. I think a US assistant professor is often a few years ahead in terms of productivity and experience.

Salaries (of any job - not just academic) are usually due to a number of reasons -
1) The demand for that job
2) the number of applicants
3) The value that the employer puts to that job / person
4) How much the employer can afford (sometimes but not always related to 3 above)
5) What the employer can get away with

In case of UK, I think (5) plays a more prominent role than the other 4 reasons. The annual salary for lecturers tends to start at £ 31,000 with very low increments. After taxes, and contributions to insurance etc, this yields around £ 1800 per month, which admittedly is a pretty miserly sum when one considers that at least half of this is spent on rent.

1) Demand for a lecturers job - is fairly moderate / low. There tend to be a few jobs advertised - but most of them are the result of disgruntled lecturers leaving. Very few jobs are being created due to additional departments or growing numbers of students. Unlike countries like China and India where going to college is the norm for people of all classes (and hence people save for college since the child is a toddler), it is not so in UK. Education is not a priority for the average UK citizen. This simply lowers the number of students further.

2) Number of applicants -
Actually, due to the above stated reason, there are a rather limited number of British citizens available for faculty positions. However, this tends to be compensated by educated people from EU, and sometimes from Asia. While British teachers consider it their right to be paid fair wages, and demand them, this is not always so for their EU and Asian counterparts. The result supports reason (5).

3) The value that the employer puts to that job / person
Is quiet high. Education is a big business in the UK and lecturers are among the most important cogs in this apparatus. However, one always needs to assert this importance to prove it in the UK (not just in academic, but in many other professions too except perhaps for banking, financial services, real estate and politics).
Student feedback is taken regularly and published openly (however, only around 20-30% students actually respond to these official surveys thus limiting the visibility of good lecturers  in the larger scope of education)

4) How much the employer can afford -
Unlike many other sectors where employers genuinely cannot afford to pay more, universities are not so. They earn rather well, and the fees paid by EU/UK as well as overseas students tend to be to the tune of £ 8,000-£ 11,000 annually in an ordinary university. At UCL and Cass, it is even higher and to the tune of £ 15,000-18,000.

These tuition fees cannot be directly compared to tuition fees in USA and other countries as actual classroom lecture hours in the UK in most universities are lower than their counterparts in USA - as low as 12-16 hours per week for a Masters level course, and just 20 hours for under graduates per student per week.

Also, Universities tend to pay far lower rates for rents, gas and electricity than their business house counterparts.

5) What the employer can get away with-
Sadly (for lecturers - and hence students, as good lecturers tend to leave) and happily (for deans, and upper level management), universities in UK have been able to get away with low salaries. The fact that the lowest median wage in the UK is even lower makes it that much easier for universities to escape scot free. The fact that the number of British students attending classes in UK is so low, means that this is not an issue to the British voter currently. You will recollect that none of the campaigns last year said that they would try to improve the education system for British people.

And hence, UK faculty salaries are so low.


Any pointers for reading articles digitally (on screen)? First of all let me apologize for the title, as it is perhaps very vague. The issue is as follows; I have stopped printing my articles and instead starting reading them on screen via my library manager software (Papers2).

The problem is that I find it's MUCH harder to focus when I am reading on screen and thus takes much longer for me to read articles on a screen. It's almost like I get some sort of digital dyslexia... As possible reasons, I figure small things like new mail notifications, screen brightness, sitting/standing posture etc all weigh in somehow. But I suspect that the subliminal association of "how I normally read stuff on a screen" might have a larger effect. In other words since I am normally skimming through stuff when I am in front of the screen, my brain might try to take in information the same way when I am trying to read an article, which of course is a recipe for failure...

I wonder if it's just me or if this is a common phenomenon? Additionally I would appreciate if I could get some tips on how to tackle this problem. Obviously printing all papers is an option but it's neither elegant (creates a mess on/around my desk) nor is it environment-friendly.

I have terrible eyes and this is a very real problem for me. Although I'm not an eye care specialist I can say anecdotally that there are a few things that have really made all the difference for me.

First: if you wear glasses, get the computer lenses. Usually they are some kind of an off yellow to cut glare. These really help to reduce eye strain.

Second: look away from the screen every few minutes. Try to focus on objects away from the screen that let you change your focal distance. I find that doing this for just a few moments at the end of every paragraph really helps.

EDIT: Use natural light if you can. I've found that turning my desk so that the ambient light from the window illuminates my screen has also helped me a lot. You have to be careful of glare but when I finally got everything situated it made a notable difference.

Third: media counts a lot. If you're going to use a tablet or eReader look for something that has front/side lighting. Many people like the new Kindle paperwhite but I prefer the Kobo glo. If you're looking for a more stationary solution then I highly recommend a good projector. Prices have come down quite a bit and you can now get an 'OK' projector for just a couple of hundred dollars. It will take a little bit to acclimate yourself to the new reading format but once you do I think you'll find that you like it.  I know that I do.

There are several relatively new 13.3' e ink devices on the market now that could give you what you are looking for — good experience of reading articles digitally, making notes on the margins and highlighting parts of the text: Two Boox Max; Fujitsu Quaderno A4; Sony Digital Paper 13.3; QuirkLogic Papyr; Ratta Supernote.


Perception of Phi Beta Kappa on a resume? I'm a student in the US, about to graduate with a BS in zoology. I've just been invited to join Phi Beta Kappa and am trying to find some more up-to-date discussions of whether or not it's worth it and I see a lot of conflicting opinions/information.

It costs $99 for me to join, which some have said reflects poorly on the society, while others say PBK is super prestigious and eye-catching. I've seen some saying it has gotten them positions, and others say its meaningless or they even look down on people who include it on their resumes.

I'll most likely go to grad school eventually and have no intentions currently to do any work/study outside of the US (I've seen many folks from outside the US saying they see honor societies and have a negative reaction because of Greek Life). Anyone have thoughts on this?

I am looking at this from a European perspective.
Also I focus on the perception and not whether this is accurate, which does not matter that much – whether you like it or not.
You can neither expect readers to research this detail of your CV to fully understand it nor to suppress subconscious bias by the impression they get from items they do not fully understand.

As confirmed by some of the comments by other European members here, the vast majority of information of US Greek-letter societies that trickle over to Europe is about drug abuse, sexual misconduct, dehumanising initiation rituals, and nepotism. Therefore mentioning a membership in such an organisation (without any further explanation) risks leaving a bad impression. At the very least I would try to mitigate the risk by explicitly denoting it as an honour society – which can only have so much effect since that’s not a protected term.

Also, while a little Internet research suffices to debunk the worst associations, it does not leave the best impression:

It’s surprisingly difficult to find a recent independent characterisation on this society. You mainly find self-representation and Wikipedia (which is currently dominated by self-representation). The best you can find with reasonable effort are two articles from 1996 and 2005, respectively, about declining membership and recognition, in which the society leaves a rather entitled impression. Also, this very question and others on this site are already amongst the first things you find. This somewhat suggests that the society has since evaporated into meaninglessness.
The society’s main activity appears to be selecting and recruiting new members and documenting their achievements, which strikes me as awkwardly circular. There a few awards, scholarships, and fellowships, but these seem secondary.
The primary selection criterion seems to be grades, scholarly achievements, and learning another language, which should be featured on your CV anyway. It seems like a society that charges mountains to put a golden badge on them stating their height (analogy stolen from Leonard Cohen). Thus, listing membership appears to be somewhat redundant.

Mind that this is just an impression (after all the difficulty of finding information from reliable sources is one of the things that form this impression), but at the very least it suggests a considerable marketing failure.

I personally think honor societies are overrated, and I say this as someone with a 3.93 GPA who  was invited to join many (for their fee, of course). They may have more value if you were planning on entering the workforce after undergrad. For example, they might help you land an internship. However, they carry little weight for grad. school admission committees who primarily care about research experience etc.

*My opinion is based on my experiences as someone with an undergrad. degree who wants to attend grad. school, not someone who's actually been admitted or who has sat on admission committees. (However, I can't see them factoring in an honor society membership.)


What would be the difference between the public and private graduate schools in US? Okay, so back in my country, the difference between private and public colleges is pretty visible. I have worked in biotech labs of both kinds and know that there's a lot of restrictions on using costly instruments in private colleges whereas we get a lot of liberty to get hands-on lab experience in public ones and sometimes they even encourage the person to conduct independent research without any external interference and to let the person fall and learn. In an internship at a private research lab, I had to ask them multiple times (more than 10 times) to let me use a PCR just once (as I needed it in my project thesis) during my stay there for a good two months. They were doubtful about "someone new" manhandling the instrument despite me having been rigorously trained to set-up that machine in the past (You'll be able to comprehend the annoyance if you have a biology background.) This was one incident and I certainly do not wish to rant about the other ones here. This year, I would be applying to US universities for doctoral studies. I have never been to the US, but I have applied to both category. Should I be concerned about such incidents occurring there in private institutions? Also, here the government institutions are highly reputed and have a very stimulating environment much better than any private institutions.

I have found a similar question before here, but I feel that people mainly talk about funding issues here.

For graduate school, there are generally few differences. A couple potential factors:

Funding and other resources may be easier to obtain at private schools. On the other hand, there are rich public schools and less well-off private schools. The other factor is that public schools are often larger, so they sometimes have better shared resources (e.g. computing clusters).
Probably the biggest difference is the undergraduate make-up, which only affects you indirectly. At larger public schools you are more likely to TA as a graduate student, which is both good (easy to get TA funding) and bad (may be harder to avoid TAing).
Some public schools have unionized graduate students/teaching assistants. Almost no private schools have these unions. Whether this is good or bad is an open question.
In very rare circumstances, public school funding can be affected by political winds. There was one recent high-profile case where a large public university's budget was severely cut over a couple of years, but I can't think of any other recent cases. This is extremely unlikely, but possibly a factor if future cuts are being discussed.

The type (public/private) of the graduate program you go to is unlikely to make a major difference in your experience. What matters much more is the quality and characteristics of the program, which is largely independent of public vs. private. Each department is unique, and it's worth closely researching both the research being done and the culture that exists there when choosing where to apply to and where to go.

In addition to the excellent points that Roger Fan makes, there are huge differences between American schools that are often bigger than the difference between public and private institutions.  For example:

There are wide differences in the quality of the undergraduate students that institutions attract.  Quality includes:  intelligence, prior preparation, and motivation to succeed academically.  At some top-notch graduate schools, the average undergraduate is smarter than the average graduate student, and knows more math.  At the other extreme, some schools deliberately recruit students who could not get admitted anywhere else.  This will affect your experience as a Teaching Assistant.  (Many public schools are known for high drop-out rates, compared to similarly prestigious private schools.  This suggests that either these public schools are not vetting their admissions as thoroughly, or that their support for marginal students is worse, or both.  I have seen examples of both.)
Some schools rely on "weeder classes" to identify which undergraduates are best suited to particular majors.  I have heard that being a T.A. in a "weeder class" -- which sets up under-prepared students to fail -- is a particularly unpleasant experience.  (The worst T.A. experience I have heard about was in a private school, but public schools are more likely to rely on "weeder classes".)
Some schools have great funding, from research grants, tuition, endowments, and/or government subsidies.  At the other extreme, some schools are "operating on a shoe-string budget".  (I have heard about both public and private schools with shoe-string budgets.)
At some schools, you can take the courses you need to take, in the quarter or semester you want to take them.  In smaller schools, courses might not be available every term.  In overcrowded schools, you might be forced to postpone classes due to overenrollment -- or never allowed to take a course that is offered by a particular department.  (Even within a single school, some departments can be "small", and others "large".  The overcrowded schools I have heard about were public, not private.)
Some schools make a point of encouraging students to live on campus, or nearby.  These schools tend to keep their dormitories open year-round, including over holidays.  Other schools have dormitories with beds so narrow that it is impossible to roll over without waking up, and force students to find other housing three weeks per year.  (The schools I have heard about with great dormitory systems were private, not public.  The schools I have heard about with poor dormitory systems were public, not private.)
Some schools make a point of having strong programs (outside of their majors) to develop students' skills in math, technical writing, speaking English, giving presentations, drawing, organizing business plans, et cetera.  Other schools have mandatory "writing" classes that encourage students to emulate badly translated writing, and prohibit using real-world examples in essays.  (The school I have seen with the terrible writing program was public, not private.  In general, private schools have better reputations for encouraging networking and entrepeneurialism than public schools.)


Is it bad if my mom comes to a conference with me? I am going to my first conference and my mom wants to join.  (She can probably get funding from her university to accompany me, even though she is in a different field.)  Will it reflect badly on me if we stick together?

You ask about "stick together". This is probably not an ideal idea.

Generally, in a conference, you want freedom of action. Going with your mother may induce you to "talk to the known" person whenever you are unsure; i.e. you talk to her whenever you are not sure how to approach people - the notorious "escape route" - but this is exactly what conferences are not for.

When I went to my first conference, I made a point to talk to as many people as I could. At the beginning, it is quite a leap of faith. But later you find, it is fun, you get to know people, and you get to know new research directions and ideas. Sometimes it feels difficult, but remember: all you people have one thing in common - the topic of the conference. You are very unlikely to go wrong starting a conversation about that.

If you are unsure how to start, start with people which look like they are alone at the conference, and probably a bit lost. They will be grateful to get somebody to talk to; you may meet interesting colleagues (don't think that, because they are alone, they are not good scientists - good scientists may not be good at socialising), and notch up a good deed, to boot.

It is fine to take your mother to social events and the like, but I recommend that, if she joins the conference, say, because she is interested, that she stays mostly in the background and does not send signals of "supervision" to others or - even more importantly - to you. If you can keep that balance, then, by all means, bring her with you.

The obvious answer is a RESOUNDING "yes."  Invite your mom to come on her own dime and credentials.

When you present your paper, stop, point her out to the seven people in attendance at your session, and acknowledge her, calling her out as a beloved colleague in the unrelated field of xyz.  Blow her a kiss, say "thanks, mom!" and go on with your paper.

Spend MOST of your time at the conference schmoozing with colleagues.


Why is getting a PhD considered "financially irresponsible" by some people? I've been reading this question, whose premise is that going directly into industry after (presumably) just a bachelor's will make you more money than doing a PhD and then going into industry. To my surprise, most people seemed to agree with the OP.

My thinking has always been that, yes, going into industry with just a bachelor's will make you some money in the short term, but it will also:

A) Land you in a relatively low level position to start.

B) You will eventually hit a ceiling past which you cannot rise.

My thinking has always been that with a PhD you will start in a relatively higher position, and you will not hit a ceiling, so in the long run you will make more money. Why is my reasoning wrong?

I don’t have experience in industry myself, but know several people who do (and have made the transition from industry to academia and vice versa).

Broadly speaking, getting a CS PhD in the USA with the intent of switching to industry after will result in about $500k in lost wages. This is accounting for about 5 years of PhD salary vs programming salary, raises, bonuses etc. The jobs that necessitate a PhD in industry are few and far between, and are highly competitive. Thus, starting a PhD with industry in mind, and assuming you’ll get that job is, statistically speaking, unrealistic. There are still many good reasons to still do it!

It’s a fun and fulfilling endeavor that offers you a chance to think freely about things you care about for 5 years!
If you are entrepreneurial then I know some people who start companies based in their PhD work.
If your undergraduate degree isn’t in computer science then your PhD can be treated as a semi vocational degree (though granted a masters will do as well)
If you’re interested in moving to the USA then a PhD offers a path to permanent residence.
You like research and want to leave the door open to academia. In that case a PhD is a must.

If money is your main concern then yes, you should not go for a PhD.

If you are more concerned with risking your the tasks in your working life to be 99% trivial under-stimulating boredom traps if you don't go for a PhD, then you should go for a PhD.

The thing is, you don't know how boring or understimulating you would find typical BSc or MSc tasks to be until you try working for a year or two.


How to get through the rigorous phase of PhD? I am currently a PhD student working out research and also doing mathematics for my PhD research. Most of the time these days I spend on studying -- maybe 15 to 16 hours per day. I believe that I joined the PhD as an active student, but now I am not as active as I used to be in the initial years. My productivity is less these days as I try to avoid mistakes in my research. I have started feeling nervous in front of my colleague as I don't have any publications until now.

I always try to prepare my best but these days fail quite frequently and make silly mistakes which are annoying. Sometimes I even forget the basic definitions. Looking at myself during my initial two years I find myself a fool these days. I think this is called the rigorous phase of PhD where your ideas have to pass rigorous mathematical proofs and I am quite independent these days.

Question: How to get through the rigorous phase of PhD?

Take a (short) vacation immediately.

By working 15-16 hours a day you are making yourself too exhausted and tired to be effective. That is also probably why you make mistakes. You should take a break that is long enough to reset, and when you come back aim at reasonable working hours (depends on a person and circumstances but for most people this is 40-60hrs/week).

This sounds like the classic negative spiral.  In broad strokes,here's how it works:

You work hard because you're conscientious and because the material is hard
You work long hours and start to skimp on physical activity, recreation, etc.
Your tiredness makes you make more mistakes than usual and not to learn as efficiently
Your mistakes and frustrations increase your anxiety
Your anxiety leads you to work harder and longer hours, and further deprive yourself of healthy breaks

Sometimes it's helpful in these situations to check in with one's primary health care provider.

You and your doctor might want to consider medication to support you during this challenging period.  Or perhaps not.  Regardless, it can still be helpful to check in with him or her, in a number of ways:

S/he can have you fill out an anxiety screening questionnaire, and have you come in for a follow-up after a certain number of months, to see how you're doing.
S/he might suggest a therapist.  Cognitive therapy has a good track record with these anxiety situations.
Sometimes an underlying physical health situation is exacerbating the anxiety, and making some improvement in the one can help with the other.
The doctor will have your long-term health in mind and may suggest some simple preventative measures intended to improve your general health.  It's surprising how much this can help a person's outlook on life.
Talking the situation over with the doctor can help one gain perspective.


Is it ok as a junior PhD student to review ranked conference papers? I am a Ph.D. student in computer science and still in my first year. My professor just assigned a review task of a A-ranked conference to me in order to review research papers submitted by original authors (almost 8 papers).

So far, he wants me to take over the coordination with my fellow Ph.D. colleagues in my department to finish this task asap. So I have to distribute the papers with the right colleague according to his/her research interest and experience.

But, since I am still in the first year (even I am doing well 'as my colleagues say' and published two research paper in peer-reviewed conferences), I want to ask if is it common and normal thing in academia to let junior researchers review high-quality A-ranked conferences research papers, and whether the conference editorial chairs know about this conduct from assigned committee members as external reviewers.

Yes, this is pretty normal. Many conferences even have a "sub-reviewer" field in the submission form where the professor can note which of their students actually did the review.

The professor should conduct some quality assurance however. In my previous group we had a meeting to talk over our reviews, in my current group the professor takes our comments and checks them over before submitting them himself.

I think you did not do a review from what I read in your question. you just classify the papers based on the reviewers' interest. However, there is no risk in your task because if you classify the paper incorrectly that mean you did not understand the topic so the reviewer will return it back for a second shot. Definitely, you will get benefit by helping your colleagues with the revision process.


How to contact another PI as a PhD student wishing to discuss their research? I'm halfway through my PhD and will be visiting another country for a conference. While I am there I would like to talk with some of the local researchers and hopefully visit their labs and discuss their research. I intend to email some of the researchers in my field in advance and ask if they would be happy to have a chat about their research and possibly visit their lab (briefly on the visit, more like a lab tour than anything else).

What is the best way to ask these PI's (via email) if I could meet with them while I am in town to visit their labs and discuss their research?

Essentially, the best way to ask is to phrase things exactly as you have.

“Dear Professor $Name,

My name is Anon, and I’m an Nth year PhD student studying at University of Science. I’ll be in Wakanda for a conference from Date1 to Date2, and I was hoping to use the opportunity to meet with some local researchers whose work I have been following.

I was wondering if you might have time during that period to sit down for a chat about research, or perhaps have me visit your lab? I understand schedules can often be quite busy, so I’m happy to be as flexible as possible given the conference schedule.

Regards,
Anon”

This is a typical sales situation.  Please bear in mind, the PI receives plenty of emails each day.  Emotionally, it'll be very easy to rebuff the proposal by email.

Your chances of "selling yourself" are much better by talking to the PI over the phone, ideally after the PI's lunch break (research shows people are more likely to view a proposition positively after they've eaten).  If you get along on a personal level, the chances of a rebuff are greatly diminished.  Also, the PI would have to overcome the emotional barrier of rejecting your proposal verbally rather than in an email.

I know, phone calls are awkward.  But you do want to talk to the PI, isn't it? So you may as well start today.


What to do when your student is convinced that he will be the next Einstein? As an adviser, I have found it to be a detrimental motive for a student to focus solely on surpassing Einstein in achievement, for many reasons. One student in particular has busied himself with the deconstruction of relativity and strives to break it down and replace it with a much better system. Not only that, he's attempting to construct a theory of quantum gravity and the refutation of string theory, among many other ridiculous sounding tasks.

The student told me earlier that "Einstein's physics will soon come to an end." when I asked him about his work on his thesis.  Then when I saw his thesis, it was complete gibberish, wrong in many aspects. I tried to tell him this but he simply wouldn't listen and told me "You do not understand anything."

He then went to looking for a different adviser but failed, since nobody wanted to work with a man who wants to "surpass" Einstein. When he was rejected by everybody, he came back to me and we were on equal terms again. But now, he's trying to write another thesis. And he told me AGAIN that "It'll be something that will break string theory."

Every student that does physics today at least has a feeling, however slight it may be, to be the next Einstein, to have a revolutionary impact on science, but it's quite saddening that only 1 out of 900,000 people would actually do so. And for this student of mine, I know for sure that he'll soon fall into a well and never get out of it again.

This situation can be likened to a very similar situation in mathematics, as if your proof of a famous conjecture turns out to be wrong, say good-bye to your reputation forever.

I must mention that I do not want to drive him away completely from this. If the student indeed finds a "real" problem in fundamental physics, then let him work further on it. But this must not be the only thing that he should work on, which he is doing with the most robust motivation.

A big problem is that the student has a highly peculiar personality and is introverted; if you tell him something, he has a distaste for authority and considers himself to be the "smartest" and superior than all of everybody he knows, including me. He says that "People in physics today lack imagination" and things of this sort.

I am rather confused. What should I do? Should I try to leave him, or should I tell him in some way to quit doing this and focus on something more plausible and if he doesn't do this then I should do something else?

Let the standard processes of education and research take their course. This student will probably not survive them to receive the degree, and that is as it should be. Tough love: warn, then let the system do its thing.

The central issue I see is that this student is clinging tenaciously to a goal of disruptive fame rather than a goal of advancing research. This happens; it's a difficult thing to screen out at the application stage (where unreasonable ambition is not entirely uncommon, and not usually a dealbreaker). You can suggest that this is an inappropriate goal, and it sounds as though you have -- but you can't force the student to hear, much less change.

I would be inclined to keep my interactions with this student as concrete and immediate-goal-oriented as possible. Have an agenda for every meeting, and pull the student back to it when a megalomanic rant is imminent. Deflect, e.g. "Yes, but when will you have {thing with imminent due date} done?" or "Interesting. Write that up into a conference abstract and submit it to {conference}."

You are well within your rights to "fire" the student as your advisee, I would think. I don't know how that works where you are (or whether it's even possible), but to some extent your students become part of your professional reputation, and this one will not reflect well on you.

There are indeed some red flags here for possible mental illness.

It is possible to have some challenging mental health stuff going on, AND produce brilliant scientific results.

It's time to ask your student to get a mental health screening.  You can ask this of him because you care.

As a matter of fact, it is part of your ethical responsibility as his advisor.

If you're in any doubt about how to request the screening -- that's where you can reach out to your department or university administration.

That can be a short conversation.  Example:  I see some mental health red flags in a PhD student of mine.  He has grandiose scientific ambitions that are disconnected from scientific reality.  He feels superior and alienated from peers and mentors.  He has great potential, but I am worried about him, both for his academics and his well being.  I would like him to get a good mental health screening.  How can we go about this?

Make sure the person doing the screening is good.  A conversation with a bad therapist can be worse than doing nothing.  Have a conversation with the therapist yourself first.  You will be able to tell if the person is smart, can listen deeply, has an intuitive understanding of how alienating it can be to work in cutting edge science.  Make sure the screening includes bipolar (to give you an idea, you can look at this questionnaire.)

Much can be done to treat and manage mental illness.  Step one is to screen and, if necessary, diagnose.


How to approach American English vs. British English spelling in a paper? I am currently writing a paper, for which my title and core problem is spelled differently in American and British English.

I don't worry about my professor preferring one way of writing over the other, as I'm not residing in an English-speaking country, but:

After all, my paper is being written in English, even it won't be published. Thus I wonder:

Is there a "standard procedure" for such cases, at least in US Ivy League universities or in certain citation styles? (I am currently using APA, 6th (our prof. didn't prescribe any specific citation style) as it suits my personal preference of how a reference should be cited and displayed.)

I will definitely mention both words in the "keywords" area, but other than that I will go with one spelling, namely the American English one. The word is "harmonization", if that should be important.

Sorry for my lack of initial research, I found this SE question though.

I typically don't worry about this question as a writer.  For what it's worth, I'm based in the United States, so I default to American English.  I always spell check my papers, but in the more than 25 papers that I've submitted, I've never gotten any feedback about using American spelling rather than British spelling; this question is very relevant for me since many of my papers are on graph colo(u)ring.  It may be useful to note that in the journals that I submit to and read, I've seen both American and British spelling.  (I think many editors typically let the authors choose which they prefer.)

So my suggestion is this: choose either American or British spelling and stay consistent throughout your paper.  Don't lose any sleep over this.  It will not be the deciding factor in whether your paper is accepted.

However, for doing a literature review, I feel your pain...

The best thing is to pick and choose the sensible spellings from both dialects. I'm Canadian, but I refuse to write neighbour, a synthetic spelling which has a superfluous letter. On the other hand, the American spelling center (rather than centre) holds no advantage of brevity, and betrays only ignorance of the Latin root centrum in which tr aren't separated.

Regarding -sation endings versus -zation, these are a favored in a handful of languages like French, Dutch, German. However, not in others like Italian, Spanish, Romanian, Croatian, or Czech.

-sation is bad etymology. For instance the Online Etymology Dictionary gives us this for the word organization:

mid-15c., "act of organizing," from M.Fr. organisation and directly from M.L. organizationem (nom. organizatio), noun of action from pp. stem of organizare, from L. organum "instrument, organ" (see organ). Meaning "system, establishment" is from 1873. Organization man is from title of 1956 book by American sociologist William H. Whyte (1917-1999). Related: Organizational.

As you can see, the original Latin has a z. Since we don't gain any brevity, again, we should go with the spelling which respects etymology. In this case, it is the American one.

Forget borders: respect etymology and favor brevity, but do stop short of writing night and light as nite and lite.

I would hang a footnote on the occurrence of a word with a contentious spelling, explaining my position on spelling and that is that. Academics do not have to be tied to other people's conventions based on national borders.


Should professors with Chinese names be addressed with surname only or both names? How would I address a professor with a Chinese name?
I am unsure whether I should use only the surname, or both forename and surname, because the order of mentioning forename and surname is reversed.
When my professor's name is forename: Yi, surname: Zhang, should I then address him with

  Dear Professor Zhang,

or with

  Dear Professor Zhang Yi,

Being an Asian myself, I'd use 'Dear Prof. Zhang.'

In Chinese culture, it can be considered rude for a junior to address their senior by the full name, that's just the way we're brought up to address our seniors, well at least for me...

Being a Chinese professor isn't the real issue. I guess the cultural context is more important here.

Is the professor in China? Then you probably should refer to him/her as Prof X, because that's what Chinese customs expect. On the contrary, is the professor in some other non-Asian country? Then ask for what he/she prefers.


Why would an academic write a textbook for free? Recently, I became aware of a Java programming textbook
Introduction to Programming Using Java, Seventh Edition
which is to my surprise, free as in:

  The most recent version of this book is always available, at no charge, for downloading and for on-line use.

Question: Why would the author (David J. Eck) make this textbook free?

I have found that almost always,
authors of academic textbooks prefer to make money
from sales of their textbooks,
rather than writing a textbook which is available freely without cost.
(I don't have any statistics to back up this assertion.
However, throughout my undergrad and my PhD studies,
in about 95% of the courses which I took,
the prescribed textbook was published by an academic publisher such as
McGraw-Hill, Pearson or Springer.)

Closely related question:
Massimo Ortolano
claims in this comment that most authors would not be able to make much money
from sales of academic textbooks they have written.
Can someone give me an estimated amount of earnings per textbook sold?

As the author of this particular free textbook, I can say that the previous answers have covered things pretty well.  "Introduction to programming using Java" started in 1996 as a set of class notes written in HTML with embedded Java applets -- which all seemed pretty exciting in the heady early days of the Internet.  I had published an earlier textbook in the usual way, and made not much money from it, which is true of the large majority of published textbooks.  I had recently been promoted to full professor, possibly the most secure job in the world where the only further promotion available to me would move me into (shudder) administration, so it would make little difference to my career if I self-published a book instead of submitting it to a regular publisher.

I lost creative control over my regularly published textbook.  The copyright was assigned to the publisher until it goes out of print, which it will probably never do in these days of print-on-demand.  There has never been a second edition.  My Java textbook, on the other hand, has gone through seven versions and has been updated fairly regularly.  I get the ego boost of hearing from people all over the world who have read it (something I can never seem to get most of my own students to do).  The web site still gets hundreds of visits every day.  It has certainly had more impact on the world than if I were selling it.  And if someone doesn't like it, I can politely point out that they can write their own textbook, or even make a modified version of mine.

So, my main motivation was to write a textbook that I could use in my own courses.  Selling it would make me very little profit.  And since I use free software all the time, it's also a way that I could give back something to the open source / creative commons community.

Arguably, writing books for profit/ promotion/ prestige is a violation and corruption of the scientific method. Descartes, Discourse on the Method, Part 6:

  And so I have had to give up the idea of completing physical science
  all by myself; how far I get in the knowledge of nature will from now
  on depend on how many of these crucial experiments I am able to
  conduct. I was going to make this known in the book I had written, and
  to show there how generally beneficial such experiments could be,
  presenting this so openly and plainly that virtuous people would be
  obliged both to report to me the experimental results they had already
  achieved and to help me to work on the experiments that remained to be
  made. I mean really virtuous people — ones who desire the general
  good of mankind — not ones who merely claim to be virtuous or are
  merely thought to be so.


Should I disclose invisible disabilities to my supervisors during my PhD? Long story short, I'm halfway through my PhD and have recently started receiving help for invisible disabilities from the university, although I have not disclosed the details of these disabilities to my supervisors. My supervisors know that I receive university support for 'medical issues' but they do not know specifically what these are.

A recent discussion with my supervisors lead to them saying they cannot support my request for accommodations or advocate on my behalf without knowing exactly what 'medical issues' I have. I have no problem disclosing specific situations I sruggle with (e.g. that I can be distracted easily, that I often misunderstand people etc), but do not want to put a label on the actual diagnoses as it does not describe how these disabilities affect me specifically and there can be a lot of misunderstanding around these diagnoses.

So my question is, do you think it is fair for me to not disclose my exact disabilities to my supervisors but request their support for accommodating my 'medical issues' and impairments?

As an aside, as per university policy I am not required to disclose to anyone except our disabilities branch (which I have done), through which we can request accommodations, support, and advocacy without needing to disclose to other university staff (lecturers, professors, supervisors) our disabilities (for example, someone who is visually impaired can request audio recordings on medical grounds without being obligated to tell the lecturer the reason for the request i.e. being visually impaired).

I have no problem disclosing specific situations I sruggle with (e.g. that I can be distracted easily, that I often misunderstand people etc), but do not want to put a label on the actual diagnoses as it does not describe how these disabilities affect me specifically and there can be a lot of misunderstanding around these diagnoses.

This is key. It sounds like you are fine with going into detail on your symptoms (and therefore your need for accommodations), but you're not comfortable disclosing the exact diagnosis. Given that your advisor is not your medical professional, they don't need to know the diagnosis.

So, if there is a need to, you can tell them your issues, but don't tell them the diagnosis. Be polite, firm, and center the conversation on your genuine need for accommodations.

  "You've asked me about my medical issues and my need for accommodations. I'm not always comfortable discussing this, but it's important for you to know that the main symptoms cause me to be easily distracted, occasionally misunderstand people, X, Y, Z..."

If your advisor presses you for the "name" of the medical condition, you can say

  "The precise diagnosis isn't really relevant - what's important here is I have genuine medical issues that need accommodations. Thank you for helping me do my best work."

The last sentence here reframes the conversation to the advisor's role of helping you to achieve success, rather than on their morbid curiosity about your specific diagnosis.

Maybe it will be easier to answer to this question instead of yours: Why should I avoid to tell my supervisor ? are you afraid of his reaction ? or how he is going to judge you ?

If you have no answer to this question, if you are not afraid of something else, so tell him, I think that it will be easier for your cooperation

In general, as a PhD student, I have the feeling that we too often fear from our supervisor and we have such like a father/son relationship where we are strongly afraid from a too severe father. But it is important to remember that it is not the case, also your supervisor is human so he can understand your problem, explaining it can help in general.

So, in my opinion I think that you should do it


How is Google Scholar changing academic evaluation? Google Scholar is making it very easy to track (their measure of) citation counts, h-index, etc. for individual researchers. Is this changing how academics are evaluated? Do tenure committees now bring up google scholar profiles, or do they continue to prefer other sources for citation data? Is there pressure to make your Google Scholar profile public?

Yes, promotion and hiring committees look at Google Scholar, especially in fields like computer science where Google's citation data is more comprehensive than other sources like Scopus, which misses many citations of and by conference papers.  In this respect, Google Scholar hasn't really changed the way people are evaluated, though; we've just replaced one unreliable (and expensive) source of questionable statistical data with a slightly less unreliable (and free) source for almost (but not quite) the same data.

Much more importantly, though, Google Scholar makes it easier to find electronic copies of papers, which makes it easier for committees to judge each candidate's work directly.  In this respect, Google Scholar has had a significant impact.

At my place, people who are doing well have public Google Scholar profiles, while those who shouldn't and probably wouldn't get tenured hide their profiles, probably because their publication — and thus citation — records stink.


4 weeks after on campus interview - ask about update I had an on-campus interview for a tenure track assistant professor position in mathematics about 4 weeks ago.  The interview seemed to go well, I felt I was well-received.  I was told at the end of the interview that they had more interviews scheduled over "the next couple of weeks" and would then begin to make offers.

I interpreted this as two more weeks of interviews, meaning it's been two weeks since interviews have likely finished now.  I have no idea how long it takes to prepare offers or when it is reasonable to ask for an update.

Not sure if it's relevant, but I am currently a Ph.D. student in mathematics, defending this semester, and have an unusually diverse teaching background (for a Ph.D. student anyway).  This is a teaching-focused institution.  I'm sure my competition is probably more experienced (not likely soon-to-be Ph.D.s like me, but rather people who have had post-doc experiences, etc.)

Is it reasonable to ask about the status of the search?

It's possible that they simply haven't yet finalized their ranking, gotten approval,  and made the first offer.  It seems more likely or that they have done so and you weren't their first choice.  You can certainly ask what the status of the search is, and they'll probably tell you whether or not an offer has been made, but don't expect to be told who has been made an offer or whether you're still in consideration.

If you are still under consideration and everyone ahead of you on the list turns down their offers, then you might get an offer later.

Yeah, sure.  In addition to the info, it keeps your name top of mind and/or gives them a chance for additional discussion.