graduate admissions - Why is it necessary to have a master’s in Europe to apply for PhD?

When I look for a PhD position, they always write that they need a master’s degree. However, most of the times I see that I have all the experience they are looking for. PhD is a lab-based work, so what they will do with the degree? Shouldn’t they take someone who is more good at lab work?

collaboration - Appropriate time to announce current research topics

I am currently a Ph.D. candidate in the field of economics and I'm starting to make significant head way into my research and submitting articles to journals. I get a really strong vibe in the academic community to protect my ideas and don't leak anything until it is appropriate. My general sense of this comes from my experience with various individual's ideas getting "scooped." While collaboration is obviously key to academic success, I also want to be wary of announcing any current research plans until it is appropriate.

My question is : When is it appropriate to discuss current research projects and update a CV or website?

When the paper has been accepted to a journal? After the paper has been submitted to a journal? A proposal has been drafted? After all preliminary research has been complete?

I appreciate your responses.

computer science - How do I keep my tenure track job search confidential?

I work as a research scientist for a tech company. I publish frequently in top venues in my area and, at the same time, I've been adjuncting at well-known universities to teach classes.

I don't feel I've ever left academia, as I keep collaborating and publishing with people from academic institutions, but I want to apply to a few (e.g., 10) tenure track positions in computer science, for a number of reasons that are not relevant to this question.

How do I ensure that my search/applications stay private?

My manager is well connected with the academic world (despite not being a researcher), and I do not want them to know that I applied and where I applied. Note that I do not need a recommendation letter from them, as I have multiple well-known researchers (faculty members in different universities) who will write one for me.

Answer

You should tell your references that you would like to keep your application confidential. The problem is that while the job search process is nominally confidential, leaks happen all over the place. For example, people call colleagues asking for informal assessments of applicants. They may not say the person is applying, but when you get a phone call like that, it is pretty obvious. Another example is that sometimes applicants give job talks during a normally scheduled departmental seminar. These are often "advertised" on the web. Again, even if it doesn't say job talk, it can be pretty obvious. At some point you are going to visit the school (if you make it that far) and meet tons of people. Asking/expecting the search committee to keep things quiet is one thing, expecting the entire faculty is another, expecting grad students and post docs is another.

neuroscience - Can the human eye distinguish colors in the periphery?

In the back of my mind I have the idea that human eyes can't notice the color of objects in the far periphery, and that any subjective perception of colors is done by the brain that tries to fill in the color percept.

Is that true?

Answer

It depends to some degree on what you define as peripheral vision. Until relatively recently, color vision in the peripheral field has been thought to be substantially less developed than color vision in the central field.

Most estimates of peripheral color perception place the limit of trichromatic (RBG) vision at no more than 30 degrees from fixation; the visual field was thought to be completely color blind at about 50 degrees of eccentricity.

Within the last 30 years, an increased understanding of the changing spatial scale in the peripheral field has led researchers to reevaluate what is believed about peripheral function. Virtually every measure of peripheral color perception can be improved by using a suitably large stimulus in the peripheral field.¹

Here is a schematic of distribution of cones in the retina. While cones are decreased in number at 60°, they do exist.²

Here is a schematic of angles on peripheral vision.²

Previous measured sensitivity curves farther into the periphery than thought. In one paper, detection thresholds for colored disks showed that color vision, in particular color vision mediated by the L – M cone-opponent channel (luminance or blue–yellow colors), persists up to at least 50 deg. The larger the color disc, the better the peripheral color vision.^[3]

The range of eccentricities over which red–green color vision is still possible is larger than previously thought. Color stimuli can be reliably detected and identified by chromatically opponent mechanisms even at 50 deg eccentricity. Earlier studies most probably underestimated this range. Differences could be caused by technical limitations and the use of stimuli of non-optimal size. (Emphasis mine) In agreement with previous studies we found that the decline in reddish-greenish L − M color sensitivity was greater than for luminance and bluish-yellowish S − (L + M) signals. We interpret our findings as being consistent with a functional bias in the wiring of cone inputs to ganglion cells (Buzás et al., 2006) that predicts a decrease but not a lack of cone-opponent responses in the retinal periphery.

_{1 Color vision in the peripheral retina
2 The Retina: Rods and Cones
3 Color perception in the intermediate periphery of the visual field}

thesis - Alleviating Dunning-Kruger effect without running into impostor syndrome

This is a question generally in decision making.

Is a balance between the Dunning-Kruger effect and the impostor syndrome possible for students? As a student one is generally graded on a regular basis, the marks may vary however, depending on the professor (at least where I come from). Is there a strategy to avoid the aforementioned two extremes or is academic life a balance act between both - occasionally hitting one or the other.

I'll give an example specific to my case: I have to decide whether to take a M.Sc. thesis in theoretical physics which will require me to do a lot of mathematics. It's interesting and I have passed math exams geared to physicists with (very) good marks, same for the lecture in physics which would be vital in this case. Alas! Due to the (perceived) variation in the level of the exams I am not sure whether my knowledge is actually sufficiently deep to try. Especially as the real math (mathematics for mathematicians) results are not so good.

Simply: evaluations suggest "yes" while my gut tells me "meh I think you may be overestimating yourself a bit." (though my mind then responds "f*ck it all, do it just to prove you can!")

Answer

A very important fact to be aware of is that Dunning-Kruger is a a cognitive bias that is about skill, not intelligence or ability/capacity to learn. So for instance a person who is a terrible driver may not know they are so bad because of Dunning-Kruger, but none of this tells us absolutely anything about their ability to improve their driving skills with practice and dedicated effort. The Dunning-Kruger effect on the unskilled makes it harder for a person to become aware of their shortcomings, but it says nothing about what happens when they realize they do in fact lack skill! On the other hand, the effect on the skilled is that they falsely believe that what is easy for them is - or should be - easy for others too.

The Impostor syndrome, by contrast, is about how a person assigns causation/responsibility to their own achievements and abilities. A person with Impostor syndrome doesn't say, "I'm at least above-average", unlike the unskilled person under the effects of the Dunning-Kruger bias (who doesn't necessarily think they are great, but just believes they are above average). Nor does the highly skilled person with Impostor-symptoms say "this is just easy, anyone can do this" - because that would actually be acknowledging they are in fact good at something other than fooling people into thinking they are good at something! No, the Impostor thinks everyone else is wrong in thinking they are good or intelligent or did something great.

So while both poles of the Dunning-Kruger bias and the Impostor syndrome are commonly experienced in academia, they don't actually exist on a single continuum where one is forced to try to balance between them. Therefore you actually have the possibility to live relatively free of both of them.

How do you do that?

Um....I'm not sure that I know?

...well, I suppose the best place to start is taking some time regularly to expand your circle and be around a variety of people. Volunteer in community programs (not merely academic ones!), spend some time on a sport, etc. In short, don't spend 100% of your time with students and professors, because you will get a warped sense of what everyone else in the world is really like and you'll tend to get some really unrealistic self-images going. It's the intellectual equivalent of getting your idea of normal physical appearance from fashion/exercise magazines and television. You don't want to get your perceptions all pretzel-like, basically.

There are also specific things you can do - like if you think you are just an idiot and you are just fooling everyone, read some YouTube comments for awhile; if you don't get the feeling that you are actually smarter and more reasonable than a lot of people in the world, seek immediate professional counseling because that's a real problem.

You can also develop some strategies for "sanity checking". For instance, you have taken previous classes and did well, but I'm guessing some of those classes weren't easy and you could have done better in some. Based upon the available evidence, doing a thesis as you propose probably won't be easy. There is also no evidence that you aren't capable of it at all - otherwise you'd have failed all those other classes. Chances are, at your level of math there are no free points for putting your name on the paper - if you got a score higher than 0, you know an awful lot more than you realize.

So you face a challenge - or a threat - depending on how you look at it. If you are interested and excited and don't feel it's a ridiculous impossibility (like, say, being drafted by the NBA) then you have a potentially interesting challenge. Can you do it? It's a distinct possibility, sure.

So now I'd advise the usual general decision-making strategies - pros and cons, risks and Plan Bs if things aren't working out, etc. In short, what you can try to balance is between the extremes of mindless confidence (Leroy Jenkins!!!!!) and constant impending doom (I am so screwed...). And I think that is pretty much just the challenge of life in a nutshell, so if you can master it before you die (or maybe just within a few thousand lifetimes) you'll have done something pretty darn amazing.

phd - In universities, how to team up with your colleagues?

Many times in universities, people don't dedicate much time to build friendly relationships with colleagues. Unfortunately, this happens both in the tenured positions and in non-tenured positions, with many bad consequences (such as for examples, many researchers actually don't know what other colleagues are researching on...).

I've always been thinking that building strong friend relationships with colleagues can be very useful and powerful, for careers but most of all to create a more serene work environment.

I think that a good way to create friendly relationships with colleagues is organizing extra-work activities, such as dinners, soccer matches, etc. Last week some of my PhD student colleagues organized a pizza dinner between colleagues. All my department (~150) PhD students were invited, but in the end we were just 9! :-(

What d'you do to build strong friend relationships with colleagues? Could you tell some success stories? Could you give some good advices?

Answer

In my experience, a lot of academics tend to shy away from things like a pizza party. I would suggest thinking about things that connect common interests. For example, consider starting a book club on some relatively broad topic of interest, or a group where folks read and comment on each other's work. These kind of things can be really valuable of they ring together folks from different specalizations. It is always good to get a different perspective.

As another example, think about setting up a brown bag lecture series. These can be great ways to get folks out of their offices and talking.

Beyond this, I would generaly suggest not trying to set up events that have 150 people invited. Think smaller and more targeted.

reference request - Guides for being an independent/freelance researcher?

Are there any books on how to be an independent/freelance researcher?

Answer

By being an independent/freelance researcher I will assume you mean being a researcher not affilated to academia or working at a research center.

First thing you shall consider is access to research sources. For example in academia you have acess to the university library, journal subscriptions paid by the university, laboratory facilities etc. Same goes for working as a full-time researcher for a national research center or a large corporation.

Additionaly, getting funding for your research(by the government) is harder if you are an independent researcher and easier if you are at university or a corporation.

In my opinion the best case would be to fund a company which offers products/services related to your type of research (e.g if your research interests are in statistics you would consider consulting, software, visualization tools etc.) and invest a percent of your income to your research.

Of course in that case you would not be an "independent" researcher. You would still be affilated to your company, which is acceptable. Every corporation, multi-national or relatively small invests time and money in research.

You may also consider checking the following questions of SE:

Applying for research funding as an independent researcher

Can I work as a freelance researcher?