ssw1n
Urban Legend in the department says that in one of the offerings of his classes, there was this smug student, who would chime in, and comment on the material being presented at every chance he got.
One day, while the faculty was presenting a particularly tough topic material to the class, the smug student raised his hand and asked, "Would it be OK if I ask a stupid question?"
The faculty looked at the student's face, grinned and said, "It is perfectly fine. After all, there is nothing such as stupid question." He paused for a bit, and then completed his sentence. "But there is only such a thing as stupid student."
Also, what is that statement that amounts to "Nobody uses Android in San Francisco"? I found it pretty ridiculous ....
And here's another, with much more objective tone: http://www.pgbovine.net/PhD-memoir.htm
My take on the subject matter is that:
- When getting into the PhD. track, one should be aware of what he/she is getting into, and be prepared for the resulting lifestyle.
- One should have an extraordinary drive (even to the point of personal obsession) to search for answers towards the unsolved problems in his/her field of study despite knowing the consequences that will be imposed onto his/her life by this intellectual journey.
- One should find a PI whose personality clicks with his/hers, and whose research he/she is motivated to work on. It is pretty rare to match these two parameters perfectly, but one can weigh trade-offs, and work with the best available while still maintaining his/her aspirations.
- One should realize that, regardless of popular belief, academia is business with its own business model: understanding the intricate business logic behind the model will facilitate one greatly in his/her quest.
- One should realize that like every human society, academia has its own fair share of personalities and egos, and intrapersonal skills matter, a lot.
Sadly for most people, it is more about Corporate Culture and Interpersonal Skill and Street Smart and blah blah blah than being really competent and getting real things done.
- There are male programmas in America (in fact, the rumor says that most of the programmas are male) and,
- The strange ritual of male programmas from America is that they start to recite these about 100 strange sounding words, and ask you if you know any of them.
It is only human nature: to strive for authority, to build little exclusive clubs around it, and to suck up to such authoritative group of people for a sense of security if one not part of such a group. Decades and decades (centuries and centuries?) of human society has trained people in this mechanism regardless of race, gender or religion. So ValveSoftware, even with good intentions, is fighting against a trait that is part of being human. Regardless of how flat Gabe wants it to be, some people will become more and more important on the part of the company they are working on as their time goes by at Valve. And they will form old-timers club who will feel like they are on the next level, and start to form the barrier from the rest.
Only viable solution towards truly flat structure would be to not give anyone a chance to become an old-timer, a.k.a., one too important/authoritative: recycle people to different parts of the company as soon as arguments like this one arises: "OK group, what you all are suggesting for this product's next phase is really great and all, but we will need to ask Mr. X because he had been working on the product since the first iteration, and he knows about it all, so he knows what is best for the product."
"OMG! I deleted my Facebook account two months ago, and my friends just told me that they wished me birthday on my timeline last night. OMG! Facebook, I trusted you! Why!? OMG!"
Seriously, I love the last sentence of the article: "That is why I may delete my Facebook account. And that is why you should too."
If Facebook will not delete the posts on the Timeline, why is the author still believing that deleting the account will genuinely delete the account? The data you disclosed to the social network is here to stay. The only way you can stop is to not give it more.
[6] Fire Safety and Building Security Systems? Yes
It would be really great if options for other languages are available too. I am looking forward to learn French and German. I tried Duo Lingo, but it did not help me much in speech department. From my past experience, it has to be the movies, and TV shows to assimilate the speaking part.
I love your attitude! I am still half your age, but I expect to be rolling and rocking like you do when I am your age, and beyond ! :)
If you find a smart, sane and beautiful woman doing graduate research, it is highly probable that she is already married or planning for marriage with her boyfriend/partner as soon as she is out of school. (Well, this is from my experiences in Science and Engineering departments. Might be different for other fields.)