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Comment by mym1990 | Hacker News Reader

mym1990

The mind has a way of tricking us into remembering many of the good things and fewer of the bad ones(or sometimes even rationalizing bad things into good ones). Not to say that the regret here isn't valid, but just to be careful how much stock to put into missing the 'good ole days'.

"The people who questioned my decision to become an extronomer were right. I was wrong. It seems too late to get back in."

This mindset irks me because this individual strikes me as being bright, talented, curious, and hard working. You are not wrong because you took a leap in life and it didn't work out perfectly, its a valuable learning experience. It is different if you assess the opportunity costs and risks and rewards with going back to astrophysics and decide that it is not worth it and move on...but to say it is 'too late' is you pouting and trying to let yourself down easy.

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This perspective IMO is informed by a slow-burning (like, career-scale) FOMO where if you're not as successful as the person getting $200k+ offers from FAANG right out of university then you are behind and a failure.

This is a persistent sentiment in CS and adjacent circles, I've noticed, and a serious hindrance to finding fulfillment in life and career.

It's not a race, it's an Iron Man, and for the vast majority of people just finishing somewhere they feel proud of is (should be) enough.

There is a real trap in always feeling like you need more career wise or comparing how you are doing to other people.

It's way too easy to shift the goal to being a little bit more successful then you currently are and it makes people miserable even if they are doing well by most people's standards.

Big tech comp numbers that get thrown around--and that are often inflated and have been at least partly driven by stock market gains--lead a lot of people to set them as the bar. And to feel that's what they need to achieve even if they don't especially like the work given that they can't imagine doing something that "only" pays $100K or $150K or whatever.

>they can't imagine doing something that "only" pays $100K or $150K or whatever.

“Comparison is the thief of joy”

I saw research from a few years back that indicated happiness peaked a little over $100k in salary and actually tended downward above that. It’s been my experience that people who are solely focused on salary tend to do so because they don’t know what else to optimize their life around.

$100k is close to twice what you make in academia unless you’re a professor.

You’re pretty close, onet says median wage is about $65k.

Would you say most of the people there are hustling for the chance at a professorship, early career, or just love the environment/work?

Depends on the population you’re asking about.

The postdocs are generally there to pursue a faculty position or to broaden their skillset and springboard to the next thing. 65k seems high for a postdoc in most fields though. My academic postdoc salary a few years ago was 50k, and that was considered generous.

Staff, research scientists, lab techs, and other non-postdoc, non-faculty technical roles in academia are not generally in the career path to a tenured position, so I’d guess environment/work would be primary motivators.

That’s why I said “close to”.

I work in a group that has about 30-50 students, 2-3 professors, 3 scientists, 2 postdocs, and 5 techs/engineers (depending on how you draw the lines). Professors make $200k. Scientists make $80k. Techs make $60k. Every single person is highly competent and could easily fetch a higher wage for their skillset. Nobody’s here because they think it’s a path to a cushy life. Working among exclusively smart people, having good conversations, not being in a nasty corporate framework, and doing work with purpose are all top reasons to stay in academia. The list of reasons not to is long (and easy to come by).

>Working among exclusively smart people, having good conversations, not being in a nasty corporate framework

This is a really interesting take to me because my experience was quite different. I thought many were smart in a vary narrow field but at times lost outside of it, prone to ego-based biases, and much more concerned with publication and funding than really intellectually curious. There’s definitely pragmatic reasons for the latter but it seemed to water down the pure intentions people have brought up in this thread.

Of course there were wonderful people as well, but I’ve found that in the private sector too. I guess it goes to show mileage may vary and perspective is a key component

I suppose I can't really speak for academia in general. I work in an electrical engineering department that is filled with physics curriculum, problems, and culture. The EE grad students don't know many of the things I learned in EE undergrad, but have hefty physics chops. Most everyone is a combined experimentalist and theorist. The pure theorists are a little less grounded, but everyone else knows where the expertise ends and are content to not discuss things they don't know about. If my colleagues were more of the typical grant-driven hotshot type I probably wouldn't have stuck around for any amount of time.

> You are not wrong because you took a leap in life and it didn't work out perfectly, its a valuable learning experience.

The author obviously understands this is a learning experience--that's why they wrote the essay in the first place. The challenge is that, on a practical level, starting over will likely take too many years, with too great a risk of not getting a job in academia. This is hardly "pouting and trying to let yourself down easy." It's the disheartening wisdom that sometimes you learn things too late in life to benefit from them.

Starting over? He literally says "I think I have gained skills and experience that can be very valuable to the astronomical community".

And that is on top of the foundation that he has already built in his earlier years. Unless there is some glitch where you lose all previous experience in life if you decide to backtrack a bit.

I guess ultimately I don't really know what the author's goals would be in academia, and I am not from academia...and that makes it difficult to really explore the situation.

He's also obviously missed out of a lot of new knowledge that's been produced while he wasn't there, as well as loosing some skills that haven't been used.

As for his goals, well most of the article is about the things he's missing so the straightforward guess is to have that back?

> but to say it is 'too late' is you pouting and trying to let yourself down easy.

I don't think the author is saying he has been out of the field too long, but rather that hiring committees (even postdoc advisors, or fellowship committees) looking for astrophysics faculty candidates are not going to give a second glance to someone who left academia for several years.

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