Academia Stack Exchange
Academia Stack Exchange

Most Popular

more tags
1500 questions
93
votes
14 answers

Should I seek professional help because I have a lot of math books?

I’m a graduate student in mathematics. One day, there was a discussion between graduate students about how many books a working mathematician has. Then each student would talk about their personal math library and then they would name their…
Alexandria
  • 783
  • 1
  • 5
  • 6
93
votes
7 answers

How to avoid a hostile takeover of first authorship during medical leave?

A colleague has approached me with a tough situation. I'm unsure how to advise her. She is a postdoc, and will soon take a month-long planned medical leave. Her adviser, a senior research scientist, has a history of reshuffling authorships of…
Industrademic
  • 3,926
  • 3
  • 21
  • 35
92
votes
2 answers

I am non-tenured and have been offered a tenure-track position at my current university, but I don't want to stay here long term. What should I do?

I work at a midwestern university in a very small department in a specialised field in the Humanities. I've been working here as a non-tenure track assistant professor, and have been offered a TT position. I genuinely dislike the place I live in,…
juno41
  • 703
  • 1
  • 5
  • 7
92
votes
12 answers

How can I avoid being "the negative one" when giving feedback on statistics?

Results get sent around a group of biological collaborators for feedback. Comments come back from the senior members of the group about the implications of the results, possible extensions, etc. I look at the results and I tend not to be as good at…
user2390246
  • 12,317
  • 6
  • 35
  • 56
92
votes
9 answers

Referee says the proof is wrong, but it is not, what to do?

About 3 months ago, my co-author and I submitted a mathematical paper to a journal. Yesterday, we got the editor's response and the paper has been rejected. The reason is that the referee thinks that our results are wrong or trivial. However, we…
import.all
  • 933
  • 1
  • 6
  • 8
92
votes
6 answers

How to become well-known in the research community while being a PhD student

This question is mainly about building useful contacts during the course of the doctorate. How does one keep the relevant community in other universities informed about his/her research work? One way is obviously to publish the work in reputable…
Bravo
  • 22,951
  • 24
  • 98
  • 150
92
votes
12 answers

Why do professors want to make sure that their notes written on the blackboard will not be published?

I am a university student and have recently found out how much easier it is to use my smart phone to take snapshots of notes professors write on the blackboard during lectures (since I am quite bad at understanding and writing at the same time, it…
David Frank
  • 833
  • 1
  • 6
  • 7
92
votes
9 answers

Am I reading enough of the scientific literature? Should I read for breadth or depth?

Ever since starting graduate school I've tried to make scientific reading a part of my daily ritual; I track pages read using Beeminder, and the graph doesn't lie. It keeps me honest. I aim to closely read and summarize 5 pages per day and skim a…
jurassic
  • 1,971
  • 1
  • 16
  • 16
92
votes
7 answers

As a department head, what to do if a professor leaves without giving out grades?

I am department head. An adjunct professor teaching two courses in my department left without notice. He did not deliver the grades to me. We have no staff in that field to give the final exam again. Even so, I wouldn't know how to convince the…
Mohammad Hassan
  • 601
  • 1
  • 5
  • 4
92
votes
11 answers

How do professors advise PhD students that are smarter than them?

I will be starting a position as an assistant professor shortly and I have recently received applications from PhD students who in my honest assessment are likely a bit smarter and more talented than me. There is a decent chance I will be in a…
user2562609
  • 6,960
  • 4
  • 37
  • 52
92
votes
12 answers

How should I proceed when a (famous) professor says I'm not good enough for research?

I am a PhD student in a Computer Science department, doing research of a mathematical nature. Some of my research problems drifted from my advisor's area of expertise, so I reached out to a researcher from my department about it (who is a world…
Leo
  • 781
  • 1
  • 5
  • 6
92
votes
7 answers

Are there good reasons to avoid using color in research papers?

I do scientific research, and I noticed for a lot of plots, the different curves are represented with different styles, but they are all black. For instance, one curve may be a solid line, one may be a dashed line, one may be a dotted line with…
James
  • 4,633
  • 6
  • 31
  • 32
92
votes
10 answers

Donating money to scientific research after my death

I'm lucky - I probably won't have to provide for any loved ones after I die (they can take care of themselves). That means I can use my assets on whatever I want, and most likely, that will be science. The exact amount I can spare depends on how…
Allure
  • 127,528
  • 50
  • 325
  • 493
91
votes
21 answers

Is 8:00 AM an unreasonable time to meet with my graduate students and post-doc?

I am a recently graduated PhD, but for the past few years I have been on an 8:00-16:30 schedule with a lunch break at noon. I arrive between 7:45-8:00 and get started immediately. Now I am on as a continuing research scientist and have been…
user1717828
  • 3,861
  • 3
  • 20
  • 28
91
votes
8 answers

Should I report an accepted PhD thesis in which the literature review is copied verbatim from sources?

While writing the literature review for my doctoral dissertation, I picked up a few recent dissertations on similar topics from the library to get some pointers on references and style. As I was reading some of the articles cited in one of these…
IndyJ
  • 921
  • 1
  • 6
  • 7
1 2 3
…
99 100