Showing posts with label researchers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label researchers. Show all posts

Tuesday, April 24, 2018

Those immortal egotists


There are people in society generally who think they’re going to live forever. They don’t acknowledge that they’ve gotten older, or if they do, it’s always got to be at the expense of someone in their vicinity. As in, ‘yes, I know I’m 75 years old, but you’re getting old/older too’. It’s as though they can never accept that they are old and that the world is no longer their oyster. They also cannot accept that the younger generation is replacing them at work, nor do they want to facilitate this process in the slightest. They will be lying on their deathbeds protesting that they still have so much to do, that their work is so important, and that no one can take their place. Never have I heard one of them say that they are satisfied with their long careers and that it’s time to hand the torch to the younger generation. They grudgingly give up their cushy leadership positions, they resent that they cannot get funding past a certain age, and when they are hospitalized for a serious illness (true story for one person I knew, now deceased), they are already making travel plans to hold their next lecture in one or another foreign country. They refuse to acknowledge old age or infirmity. Mortality does not exist.

I am no age discriminator. I am happy for the past-retirement age people I know who are still happily working in my workplace. Most of them have made their peace with their age and their retirement, and work part-time helping out on different research projects where they can contribute with their expertise. Win-win for all involved. The people I’m talking about are the few retirees who think they still rule the roost and that everything revolves around them, their wishes, and their projects and ideas. The egotists, the great immortal scientists, who cannot accept defeat or the fact that the younger scientists are taking their places. If you are one of these people, you will get zero sympathy from me. Why? Because everything is about you, your career (mostly on ice), your 'promising' future, your next research project that’s going to make you a star. You are pissed that the rest of the world doesn’t see how great you are or how much you have to offer. It doesn’t matter that you don’t care about the rules and regulations that have grown up around the practice of science; no, you want to do science, and you want your students to do science, the ‘way you always did it. It worked for me. I don’t care about the rules and regulations, and neither should my students, because I said so.’

I have no problem with a lifelong intellectual interest in science; I see that I will also have it when I am old. But I have a big problem when your unlimited ego interferes with the lives and careers of students who depend on you to be a mature person, to let go of your ego and to put their lives and careers first. But no, the great almighty immortal egotistical scientists cannot do this. They cannot let go, because that would be tantamount to admitting they were old and mortal. They cannot see reason, they cannot be mature, they must throw tantrums when their wishes are hindered, and they must get their way. All in the name of what? What is it they are going to achieve now in their mid-70s? I don’t doubt that their contributions are still worthwhile. I do doubt that their contributions are going to lead to abundant funding for their immortal research projects. I think that the really good scientists in the world are those who can pass the torch to their students and to the younger generation, who are generous with help and praise, and who do not set up roadblocks every step of the way for the students they mentor. These are the non-egotists, and these are the scientists who will be immortalized by history.


The four important F's

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