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Comment by dschuetz | Hacker News Reader

Good for him. Because of this: "My supervisors have a rather superficial understanding of Quantum Computing, and I feel like their idea to start a project in that domain was to a not inconsiderable extent motivated by the prospect of granted research funds, not primarily by their desire to achieve a deeper understanding of quantum stuff."

It's always about grant money. Especially with anything that starts with Quantum <insert buzzword here>

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At least in most countries in Europe, where a PhD is expected to be a paid job, and unless you are from a really rich institution, you need grant money to take PhD students. There is no other way to do it, except for taking unpaid students, which is typically not considered an ethical thing to do.

And yes, sadly, being successful in asking for funding means pitching the hot topics du jour, which typically don't coincide with the most important or interesting things to do from a scientific point of view. Although asking for grants in quantum computer having zero experience in it does sound a bit too much.

We really need funding to go to people, not projects. Having to pitch specific projects when asking for funding does more harm than good IMO.

> We really need funding to go to people, not projects. Having to pitch specific projects when asking for funding does more harm than good IMO.

I agree but this was the original idea behind tenure, and here we are. The question is how to return to this understanding of its meaning.

Why is no one considering that this PhD student is wrong and that his supervisor does in fact know what they are doing? Starting in a new field is hard, and it takes years to get a broad view of the field in order to understand what directions to take. As a PhD student you are not expected to be able to do this: this is why you have a supervisor who has enough experience. Maybe the supervisor does have a clear vision as to where to take the research, and the student does not yet see this?

Because what you are saying is the default situation in research. Students don't speak up, because they are taught to keep their heads down whether they are right or wrong. The default assumption is that the supervisors know what they are doing, but this student has shared his experience that this is not always the case. Maybe you should start considering that maybe supervisors are wrong sometimes too?

it's possible, but as far as I can tell enough of the quantum computing literature is overblown to make the anecdote plausible

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