E.O. Wilson on Becoming a Great Scientist(fs.blog)
fs.blog
E.O. Wilson on Becoming a Great Scientist
https://fs.blog/2015/12/e-o-wilson-how-science-works/
30 comments
> If your level of mathematical competence is low, plan on raising it, [...]
This makes me think for how many people basic math competence remains an obstacle for getting into science.
Shameless plug for my new book about "basic math competence" for adults that think they "suck at math." See extended preview here: https://minireference.com/static/excerpts/noBSmath_v5_previe...
The material is similar to the more advanced books on mechanics, calculus, and linear algebra, but contains ONLY the essential material from high school math that is the most practical and useful for day-to-day "quantitative analysis."
This makes me think for how many people basic math competence remains an obstacle for getting into science.
Shameless plug for my new book about "basic math competence" for adults that think they "suck at math." See extended preview here: https://minireference.com/static/excerpts/noBSmath_v5_previe...
The material is similar to the more advanced books on mechanics, calculus, and linear algebra, but contains ONLY the essential material from high school math that is the most practical and useful for day-to-day "quantitative analysis."
This looks really promising. I love the idea of a condensed math book (hopefully a refresher) on all the things I ought to know.
Yes, it has been a lot of fun working on these "basics" and double the fun since I was also translating the material to French, which forced me to really dig deeper and explain things properly[1]. I also worked on the concept maps and made them available as a standalone free file, in case that might be of interest to you, see [2]. Last but not least, I highly recommend learning SymPy[3] in parallel with your math review—it's a computer algebra system whose API closely mirrors the math verbs (e.g. expand, factor, simplify, etc), so it makes for great practice tool.
[1] https://minireference.com/blog/multilingual-authoring-for-th...
[2] https://minireference.com/static/conceptmaps/math_concepts.p...
[3a] https://minireference.com/static/excerpts/noBSmath_v5_previe...
[3b] https://minireference.com/static/tutorials/sympy_tutorial.pd... (same as above but in IEEE journal format)
[1] https://minireference.com/blog/multilingual-authoring-for-th...
[2] https://minireference.com/static/conceptmaps/math_concepts.p...
[3a] https://minireference.com/static/excerpts/noBSmath_v5_previe...
[3b] https://minireference.com/static/tutorials/sympy_tutorial.pd... (same as above but in IEEE journal format)
Wonderful, thanks! And I see you're also a McGill grad. Even better!
Well, it is good advice, but you also have to keep in mind that it has become a lot more competitive since the time that E.O. Wilson became a Harvard professor. He grew up in the age of an expanding faculty, not competing with the entire world for a professorship, and let's just say... a world interested in the lives of ants.
Not to cast any doubt whatsoever on his impressive scholarship and advances for the public good of science at all, but the environment he succeeded in is not the same world that today's young professors face.
You should do all the things he suggests. But don't expect that that alone will lead to greatness without a lot of luck too.
Not to cast any doubt whatsoever on his impressive scholarship and advances for the public good of science at all, but the environment he succeeded in is not the same world that today's young professors face.
You should do all the things he suggests. But don't expect that that alone will lead to greatness without a lot of luck too.
Well, it is titled "on becoming a great scientist," not "on playing the academic system for adequate remuneration and a tenure track position." Great scientists are the same kinds of people and they do the same kinds of things, it's just now becoming a great scientist is not a path to feeding a family.
What's the difference between a math phd and a large pizza?
A large pizza feeds a family of four^H^H^H^H two.
I need to make adjustments for pizza inflation too, even though it still beats out the phd. How depressing.
A large pizza feeds a family of four^H^H^H^H two.
I need to make adjustments for pizza inflation too, even though it still beats out the phd. How depressing.
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Second this. I read a few chapters of the book and put it down. I was quite disappointed by its irrelevancy to the current state of the academia. Nothing against his time. It's just that the world has changed dramatically.
Did you read a PhD is not enough! I found the level of cynicism in that book to be much more relevant to being a scientist today.
Really? What made you think that? For example, the first “lesson” is to find a scientific niche early that will be hot in 5-10 years.
This seems like decent enough advice to a young scientist.
This seems like decent enough advice to a young scientist.
My advice is to only buy the winning lottery tickets and to stop wasting it on the losing tickets.
I think his advice is a little more valuable than that. I've seen plenty of grad students who just work on whatever their advisor is interested in and don't think about the future. Periodically re-assessing to figure out what will be important in the near future could be helpful to them.
First, I love E.O. Wilson. I can pick up and read "Consilience" from almost anywhere and find a gem or two in it. But he is a gentle idealist, a good man who's made good in the world. And his words are at least in part a statement about should be, not just about what is. And I agree with him. Professor and Scientist are ultimately distinct because the former is bound to academia's peculiar and dark rules, and the latter is not.
Startups famously cannot afford to do science, Big Corp. doesn't have an R&D budget, academia is stultifying, so that leaves...Gentleman Hobby Scientists! The kind of people who are a software architect by day and watch 3blue1brown at night, or watches Steve Caroll's "Biggest Ideas in the Universe" series (great, btw). The kind of people who 20% time was made for. The kind of people who kick themselves for not dropping out in 1996 when they had solid funding for an internet startup available, but they wanted to finish their degree.
But yeah, "greatness" is always going to be about luck more than anything. The only consolation is that no matter how great you become, on a long enough timeline you will be forgotten. Heck, go out on the street and ask about "minor" scientists like Lavoisier or Leibniz or Gauss or Bohr or Brahe or, heck, Archimedes. You will get blank stares, or worse, ridiculed! So yeah, "greatness" (which they used to call "immortality", interestingly) is a pretty bad reason to do science, in my opinion. OTOH if you want to push the boundaries of human knowledge, and want to be the first to see it (and also one of the first to appreciate the progress of others), then that sounds good to me.
Startups famously cannot afford to do science, Big Corp. doesn't have an R&D budget, academia is stultifying, so that leaves...Gentleman Hobby Scientists! The kind of people who are a software architect by day and watch 3blue1brown at night, or watches Steve Caroll's "Biggest Ideas in the Universe" series (great, btw). The kind of people who 20% time was made for. The kind of people who kick themselves for not dropping out in 1996 when they had solid funding for an internet startup available, but they wanted to finish their degree.
But yeah, "greatness" is always going to be about luck more than anything. The only consolation is that no matter how great you become, on a long enough timeline you will be forgotten. Heck, go out on the street and ask about "minor" scientists like Lavoisier or Leibniz or Gauss or Bohr or Brahe or, heck, Archimedes. You will get blank stares, or worse, ridiculed! So yeah, "greatness" (which they used to call "immortality", interestingly) is a pretty bad reason to do science, in my opinion. OTOH if you want to push the boundaries of human knowledge, and want to be the first to see it (and also one of the first to appreciate the progress of others), then that sounds good to me.
Agreed that at least some luck (and the avoidance of bad luck) is essential for a modern academic career.
As I recall -- Not quite explicit in Letters from a Young Scientist: He worked really hard and is prolific. For those lucky-enough to hit personal resonance with a field of study, what looks like others to be really hard work is enabled by the joy of great passion.
It is a great book -- definitely worth a read.
As I recall -- Not quite explicit in Letters from a Young Scientist: He worked really hard and is prolific. For those lucky-enough to hit personal resonance with a field of study, what looks like others to be really hard work is enabled by the joy of great passion.
It is a great book -- definitely worth a read.
This is fascinating because it never mentions the role of publishing in the field of science. There is a huge pressure to "publish or perish" which seems at odds with much of the advice given here.
Because EO Wilson had the great fortune to be borne into a world less focussed on peer review citation index scores and annual grant applications. Other people did ranking and grants were just handled differently.
It's from a time when the university system worked better. Now, to be a Real Scientist, you have to hire someone to churn out the meaningless papers for you or not be an academic- just be independently wealthy and stick your results on your website.
Pursuing greatness without diverting energy to eminence gets more science done.
one can always follow Einstein' path, get a job and doodle your equations in your spare time.
Ramon y Cajal's "advice to a young investigator" is still quite good as well: https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/advice-young-investigator
Although he suggests that the best thing a female scientist can do is be a good helper to her husband! He was a man of his times, to be sure.
Yes he was. 'Man of his times' is a good phrase. I wonder how the behaviour of moralizers of today who castigate those in the past, often with little or no appreciation of the mores of their period, will be viewed in a couple of hundred years time.
>>> need for extreme focus over a long period
The budding chorus of "fund the researcher, not the project" is finding solutions. UBI stipends and crowdfunding are a far cry from MacArthur Genius Grants for All (~$500k/anum). But the success of Fold.it, a citizen science protein synthesis game, demonstrates viable alternatives. The competitive landscape now isn't in the form of a Leibniz–Newton rivalry between humans. It's human+AI vs human. DeepMind with it's unlimited budget and GPU cluster can solve protein folding in less time than a theorist penning their grant application!
The budding chorus of "fund the researcher, not the project" is finding solutions. UBI stipends and crowdfunding are a far cry from MacArthur Genius Grants for All (~$500k/anum). But the success of Fold.it, a citizen science protein synthesis game, demonstrates viable alternatives. The competitive landscape now isn't in the form of a Leibniz–Newton rivalry between humans. It's human+AI vs human. DeepMind with it's unlimited budget and GPU cluster can solve protein folding in less time than a theorist penning their grant application!
Hamming's lectures are great in highlighting the challenges young scientists face and the importance of political acuity
I love when the comment section gives me more good reading material than the original post. Kudos to the community!
This is about old pre-plague book "Letters to a Young Scientist," article from 2015.
Deborah Gordon’s [3] work on red harvester ants may also be of interest to the HN community:
> In 2012, she found that the foraging behavior of red harvester ants matches the TCP congestion control algorithm.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letters_to_a_Young_Scientist
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._O._Wilson
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deborah_M._Gordon