New Beta Version - October 10th (10/10)

[tu_79]

I don't want to derail much further, but - in essence - tenure-track academia becomes your life. It had been that way during PhD but I didn't have a child yet. I was gearing up for it, but I was told, pretty frankly, that I had better not plan on being with my new child much for the next 5 years. It wasn't so much advice as it was a threat that I had better be constantly working or my 5 year review would be rejected. I saw it happen to a colleague who had the audacity (sarcasm) to start a family during her 5 year. She was ousted year 3 for failure to complete a journal article on time.

Hostile stuff. Not worth my time. No one lays on their death bed thinking "man, I wish I could have worked more," but everyone wishes for more time with their family and friends in the end.

G

Sigh. Exactly what is happening right now to my wife. It seems that wanting a family is a taboo, unless you have the gold for hiring assistance. In her case, bad relationship with her tutor is not helping, either. She did not want to play department politics and went her way instead.
Now, after six years, she's considering to drop her PhD. Only one published article, the second one rejected and suffering bullying from her tutor, all that taking a heavy toll on drugs. Our decision to have a baby should have only delayed her one year, but now it seems that they prefer her out of business.

We could try in another university. In Portugal she's made a few contacts, but I have a stable job, family nearby and an apartment in property, so not that easy to move.

I don't know if academia is inherently toxic, but her workgroup surely is.

 

[Gazebo]

Sigh. Exactly what is happening right now to my wife. It seems that wanting a family is a taboo, unless you have the gold for hiring assistance. In her case, bad relationship with her tutor is not helping, either. She did not want to play department politics and went her way instead.
Now, after six years, she's considering to drop her PhD. Only one published article, the second one rejected and suffering bullying from her tutor, all that taking a heavy toll on drugs. Our decision to have a baby should have only delayed her one year, but now it seems that they prefer her out of business.

We could try in another university. In Portugal she's made a few contacts, but I have a stable job, family nearby and an apartment in property, so not that easy to move.

I don't know if academia is inherently toxic, but her workgroup surely is.

I hate to hear that. I am but one voice, but I have a friend (who dropped out of our PhD program due to advisor bullying) who once stated that the conflicts in academics are so cutthroat and so brutal because "the stakes are so low." It's true - I didn't want to hear it at the time because I was still intoxicated with the ivory tower. Realizing that I'm almost out of it (and spending less time on academia related tasks) has made me realize just how insular and banal it all truly is. You fight tooth and nail for university scraps, and the real truth is that no one really cares about what you do except...you. So either be willing to devote a lifetime to a topic that my have relevant to graduate students in a generation or two (until they get a PhD off of your work and repeat the mistake ad nauseam) and be okay with that, or find something else in life that is fulfilling. I've chosen the latter, and I feel liberated for doing so. Careers are not essential to defining who we are - they can be a part of your image, but we are told far too often as children and young adults to focus on 'what kind of career you want to become when you grow up.' We forget to live and enjoy things and be happy with just...being.

Edit: I should note that my personal decision was the latter, but there is absolutely nothing wrong with devoting yourself to your work or your career. It's all up to you. My point was just to state that whatever you do with your life is up to you...don't let anyone else bully or pressure you into caring about completing something that your heart truly isn't set on.


G

 

[pineappledan]

This came up earlier, but can you please take down the 5-20 version of VP in the stickied mod install thread?

 

[Gazebo]

This came up earlier, but can you please take down the 5-20 version of VP in the stickied mod install thread?

I will when I post the new beta (hopefully) tonight.

G

 

[Guynemer]

No one lays on their death bed thinking "man, I wish I could have worked more," but everyone wishes for more time with their family and friends in the end.

G

Also, wishing for more time spent playing Civ.

 

[CppMaster]

@Gazebo just out of curiosity, what made you to learn programming? It's not very common for historians to have that ability.

 

[chicorbeef]

You clearly don't know the PhD world... they have slaves, of course they don't call them that, they call them TAs...

Yup I don't know about the PhD world at all. I'm just a student right now.....

I don't want to derail much further, but - in essence - tenure-track academia becomes your life. It had been that way during PhD but I didn't have a child yet. I was gearing up for it, but I was told, pretty frankly, that I had better not plan on being with my new child much for the next 5 years. It wasn't so much advice as it was a threat that I had better be constantly working or my 5 year review would be rejected. I saw it happen to a colleague who had the audacity (sarcasm) to start a family during her 5 year. She was ousted year 3 for failure to complete a journal article on time.

Hostile stuff. Not worth my time. No one lays on their death bed thinking "man, I wish I could have worked more," but everyone wishes for more time with their family and friends in the end.

G

That's rough. Honestly, it seems unfair that the more work your put into your academic studies the more boxed in it seems to get. You would assume that after spending what must be $100K+ on your education and 12 years on your studies that you would not just be considered so replaceable (I assume that PhD holders in Comparative Imperialism are pretty rare in America?) but that doesn't seem to be the case.

Do you mind me asking what you're planning to do next? I wish you luck in whatever you're planning!

 

[glider1]

I don't know if academia is inherently toxic, but her workgroup surely is.

The demise of academia in Australia is amazing. I finished my humanities degree, was strongly considering masters but quickly realised that the humanities has become toxic and got out before my student debts became ridiculous. Academia and education generally as always, is a tool of politics and power and is subject to the ideologies of the era - in our age neoliberalism which is now in its fully matured most potent phase before the next ideology takes over. Essentially the humanties and the arts are merely a luxury of the economic growth phase of civilization. Now when times are tough, the dollar narrative rules and the sociopaths take over control of the university departments as they do whenever neoliberalism and "rationalization" work together (read the realignment of power structures).

 

[Gazebo]

@Gazebo just out of curiosity, what made you to learn programming? It's not very common for historians to have that ability.

I've always been mixed in interests. Developing online education solutions while working on Masters ($$$) pushed me into basics (HTML/CSS), then Java, then down into c#/c++... got bored and stumbled upon the Civ SDK. The rest is history...

Yup I don't know about the PhD world at all. I'm just a student right now.....

That's rough. Honestly, it seems unfair that the more work your put into your academic studies the more boxed in it seems to get. You would assume that after spending what must be $100K+ on your education and 12 years on your studies that you would not just be considered so replaceable (I assume that PhD holders in Comparative Imperialism are pretty rare in America?) but that doesn't seem to be the case.

Do you mind me asking what you're planning to do next? I wish you luck in whatever you're planning!

Yep. Thankfully I'm had a full ride all the way through, plus I taught and designed web courses while doing grad work so I actually came out of it with no debt and dollars in my pocket! A few dollars...okay fine just two.

G

The demise of academia in Australia is amazing. I finished my humanities degree, was strongly considering masters but quickly realised that the humanities has become toxic and got out before my student debts became ridiculous. Academia and education generally as always, is a tool of politics and power and is subject to the ideologies of the era - in our age neoliberalism which is now in its fully matured most potent phase before the next ideology takes over. Essentially the humanties and the arts are merely a luxury of the economic growth phase of civilization. Now when times are tough, the dollar narrative rules and the sociopaths take over control of the university departments as they do whenever neoliberalism and "rationalization" work together (read the realignment of power structures).

It is quite bad. I got in on the ground floor when they said that STEM degrees were flooded and liberal arts were the way to go...12 years later ABD hits, and the market is at a historical low. Too far along to stop then...

G

 

[Deadstarre]

@Gazebo i have a question about great musicians on https://github.com/LoneGazebo/Community-Patch-DLL/issues/4742 , if you have a moment to answer thatd be cool.

 

[Gazebo]

@Gazebo i have a question about great musicians on https://github.com/LoneGazebo/Community-Patch-DLL/issues/4742 , if you have a moment to answer thatd be cool.

signed, sealed, delivered.

 

[I_Play_Prince_Difficulty]

The rest is history...

heh

 

[Deadstarre]

signed, sealed, delivered.

fantastic, thank you. By the way im pretty sure the new belief tables for yield-per-follower are off by 1 yield; they are always giving 1 more than they should and the max caps out at 1 higher also. probably just a small error in the formula to do with the "1 yield minimum" implementation, take a look.

 

[Moi Magnus]

Spoiler Off-topic: PhD&Academia&... :

I don't know if academia is inherently toxic, but her workgroup surely is.

It isn't. I personnaly live in a bubble of kind peoples. (Though I frequently hear "horrors stories" of peoples outside of my domain and/or my laboratory)
I'm in a PhD of theorical computer science in France, and I think it helps:
+ Science -> When comparing what happens in science vs others domains, I found one key difference: cooperation. I don't know exactly why, but science research is far more cooperative than research in (for example) litterature. You need to work with people that understand things that you doesn't, or you will only find things that have already been disproved. And you are expected to do find things that will be usefull for the other researchers of your generation.
+ Theorical Science-> Stealing other's research is not something that (frenquently) happens. Chances are that nobody other than yourself fully understand what you are doing. Which mean that most knowledges are in open access (even work in progress).
+ Computer Science -> We have fundings. Sure, everybody is still complaining about "we don't have enough money", but compared to the general state of research, we are lucky.
+ Theorical Computer Science -> We don't need a lot of money. We don't have big experiences. The worst that can happens is "we don't have money to go to this conference" or "we don't have money to recruit this guy".

However, what is true is that PhD is not very "family-frendly". Plenty of researchers at my laboratory have a family (my tutor even take every wednesday, on top of week-ends, to take care of his son). France's high number of paid vacation do help for that. But as long as you don't have a stable job as researcher, you will be moved everywhere around and be expected to have a very flexible timetable.

 

[Grabbl]

in France

Spoiler :

From what I've seen and heard, France also in general is better at that than many other countries ( I'm not in the PhD-machine (yet)), thanks to employee-friendly laws (as you said) and -from what I've experienced - a better appreciation of the academic middle class. For that reason, I even consider going there if possible (I'm in Theoretical Physics).

 

[Gazebo]

Spoiler Off-topic: PhD&Academia&... :

It isn't. I personnaly live in a bubble of kind peoples. (Though I frequently hear "horrors stories" of peoples outside of my domain and/or my laboratory)
I'm in a PhD of theorical computer science in France, and I think it helps:
+ Science -> When comparing what happens in science vs others domains, I found one key difference: cooperation. I don't know exactly why, but science research is far more cooperative than research in (for example) litterature. You need to work with people that understand things that you doesn't, or you will only find things that have already been disproved. And you are expected to do find things that will be usefull for the other researchers of your generation.
+ Theorical Science-> Stealing other's research is not something that (frenquently) happens. Chances are that nobody other than yourself fully understand what you are doing. Which mean that most knowledges are in open access (even work in progress).
+ Computer Science -> We have fundings. Sure, everybody is still complaining about "we don't have enough money", but compared to the general state of research, we are lucky.
+ Theorical Computer Science -> We don't need a lot of money. We don't have big experiences. The worst that can happens is "we don't have money to go to this conference" or "we don't have money to recruit this guy".

However, what is true is that PhD is not very "family-frendly". Plenty of researchers at my laboratory have a family (my tutor even take every wednesday, on top of week-ends, to take care of his son). France's high number of paid vacation do help for that. But as long as you don't have a stable job as researcher, you will be moved everywhere around and be expected to have a very flexible timetable.

I’ll note that my experiences and concerns stem from the liberal arts, not academics in general. Science fields are absolutely in a better spot right now financially.

 

[Gazebo]

Just to note that I'd planned on a release last night, but ran into a small bug. Definitely going to release today, though I'll leave the existing 10-10 up in the event there's something amiss (as I'm gone next week for work).

G

 

[pineappledan]

Spoiler More Academia stuff :

I'll admit most of my exposure comes from sciences as well. My wife is doing her PhD in women's literature, but I'm doing insect genetics. Funding is always tight, especially when just starting out. Entomologists also are in a funny position with regards to securing funding and the nature of our research. In comparison to the science department, I've noticed there is a TON of sexual misconduct in the arts... Allegations are rampant in the arts, and this business with Steven Galloway, Avita Ronell, and many more, has touched off a massive inquiry into university policies. I don't know what it is about the arts, but people over there can't seem to keep it in their pants.

Last time a scientist made waves with sexual impropriety was with a tasteless T-shirt. Though I guess we've got those new atheist buttholes and Jordan Peterson, who may or may not be an actual nazi, so it's not like sciences don't have their own problems.

 

[PolandHasNoPastures]

Just to note that I'd planned on a release last night, but ran into a small bug. Definitely going to release today, though I'll leave the existing 10-10 up in the event there's something amiss (as I'm gone next week for work).

G

And I'm just sitting here, trembling with anticipation.
That or I had too much coffee.

 

[Guynemer]