What I will miss about working as an academic research scientist

This past Monday was my last day as a full-time employee at my university hospital. I can now call myself 'retired'. Not out to pasture 😀, just retired from the job I've been doing for the past thirty years. My department hosted a small and very nice retirement party for me on Monday afternoon; most of the attendees were current and former research group members, department leaders, research technicians, and collaborators. The reactions from co-workers and colleagues to the news of my retirement have been mixed; all of them wish me well, some understand why I'm leaving now, some wonder if I'm retiring too soon and if I will be bored, one woman said right out loud how lucky I was to be retiring. I am glad I decided to retire now. I look forward to a new chapter in my life and to the freedom to put some of my ideas into action. 

There were several talks given about me and my contributions to the department over the years. Those who held the talks were those who have known me the longest. They know what I have accomplished as an academic research scientist. They also know how much help and support I've given others. I was described as having integrity and as someone who believes in fairness/fair play. Those are very true statements; I abhor nepotism, borderline corruption, rewards given to those who do not deserve them. The list is long. I was also described as a driving force by my former boss, who talked about how I brought new techniques into the lab and performed some work (published in 2007) that virtually no one else in the world had done before. Those were nice words to hear. He also described me as someone who can say no, and that is also true; I am not just a yes-person. I have my own opinions and thoughts; I respect what others have to say but if I firmly believe in what I want or in what I think is best for a project or a group, I am hard to dissuade. 

But it is the people I have worked with over the years that I will miss the most. Projects come and go, grant funding came and went, prestige disappears, but what matters the most is how you have treated those who worked for you and with you. It always surprises me how so few people really understand that. People remember how they were treated; I will always remember how well I was treated by the three men (the triumvirate--Frank, Zbigniew and Myron) I worked for at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. My co-workers here in Oslo described me as 'raus'. In English it means 'willing to share and to give a lot, to give without the expectation of anything in return, not miserly'. That was also good to hear, because it's true. I know some leaders who are miserly; by hanging onto their knowledge they hang onto the control they have over others, because it is mostly control and power that they want. God forbid someone under them should 'challenge' their knowledge. But being a miser costs, because misers are not good leaders, and those who work for misers remember their utter selfishness and egoism. I learned 'raushet' from working for others who were 'rause', the men I worked for at Memorial. They gave of their expertise, patience, and knowledge, willingly. They wanted us to succeed. They wanted us to shine. They wanted us to 'outgrow' them. Those are good leaders, and those are the leaders I remember, not the miserly ones, not the rude ones, not the ones who never give of their time willingly. I've met far too many of the latter. 

We scientists would have published very little of our work without the competence and expertise of the research technicians who have worked in our groups over the years. So they are the people I will miss the most. It was a pleasure and a privilege to work with them and to publish articles together. I will miss doing research--the intellectual freedom to pursue an idea and to see where it leads. There is almost nothing that comes close to that feeling of freedom when it all works out. But science the way I enjoyed doing it has changed. I commented on that change in my speech at the end of the party; science is big business now--big money and big research groups. It wasn't always that way, and I prefer the days when research groups were small and money didn't rule. I said that to my audience. Because that is true too. Small is nice. Small allows you to care about the projects and the people involved. I'm grateful for a career that allowed me to do that. 

Scientist forever

I saw this saying on a coffee mug that was advertised on Facebook, and it struck a chord, apropos my previous post. I think I will buy this mug as a reminder that no matter what, I will always be a scientist. In a more serious vein, as long as we continue to read, learn, discuss, hypothesize, gather and summarize data--we remain scientists.......

The image credits are as follows: Copyright:© Illustrator Georgie Retzer #illustratorg - http://www.redbubble.com/people/illustrator
Information extracted from IPTC Photo Metadata

How a scientist's worth is measured in academia

I promised myself that I wouldn’t post too many work-related pieces anymore, mostly because there’s so little about modern workplaces these days that is positive in my estimation. Most of the posts would just be depressing. You might think that 'noble' academia would be somewhat better than non-academic workplaces that are simply out to make a profit, but you'd be wrong. After reading this article online yesterday, I simply had to comment on it, as depressing as it is. It is a tragic real-life story of a gifted scientist in England named Stefan Grimm who simply couldn’t take the pressure of the ‘business of science’ anymore and committed suicide (http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/news/imperial-college-professor-stefan-grimm-was-given-grant-income-target/2017369.article; http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2861588/Professor-dead-cash-row-Cancer-scientist-said-told-fellow-academics-chiefs-treated-like-s.html). Before he did, he wrote an email to his colleagues telling them about what had happened to him and how his workplace had treated him. This incident took place in England, but I can assure you that the ‘business of science’ in Norway is no different. Universities and research institutes treat their scientists in much the same way; the only difference is that universities here cannot fire their scientists for not hauling in huge amounts of grant money, because scientists are unionized and that affords them some protection. But if they could, universities and research institutes would fire scientists without money because they are a drain on the workplace; it doesn’t matter if they have years of expertise, if they are professors and can teach, or even if they write articles and publish frequently. This country is no different than any other westernized capitalistic country in the world when it comes to worshiping money, even if it likes to think otherwise about itself.

For those of you who romanticize the world of academic scientific research, this article should rid you of any notion that there is anything idealistic or even noble about academic research these days. There isn’t. Firstly, it’s BIG BUSINESS now, and it’s been big business for a while. Money is the operative word. Those who make it to the top and gain power, those who are ‘successful’, are those who drag in hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars in grant awards. In other words, your funding is ALL that matters; it defines your worth in your workplace—period, and if you don’t get funding, you are worth nothing to your workplace. Even if you got funding five or ten years ago, not one person who sits in a leadership position cares about that or even cares enough to remember that; the ONLY thing that matters is: did you get funding this year, this month, this week? And did you get a lot of funding? What is the innovative potential of your work and can it make us money? Are you patenting your work? Theoretically, I don’t have a problem with the idea that a workplace should benefit financially from the research of its employees if their work leads to a profitable drug or treatment, for example. But it’s gotten way out of hand in reality.

Secondly, there is subtle AGE DISCRIMINATION being practiced. I know scientists who were once productive, with small research groups working on interesting topics, who no longer get research funding. Why does funding suddenly dry up? It’s certainly not a gradual change; rather it is an abrupt one. Why do good scientists who once got decent funding, no longer get any funding whatsoever? One possible reason is that they are now middle-aged (late forties/early fifties for most of us; but in Norway, you are old at 53, and I can find many articles that corroborate this). These middle-aged scientists no longer get any financial support whatsoever, not from external granting agencies nor from their universities or research institutes. They get their salaries and that’s it. It borders on idiocy. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: if you don’t get funded, you don’t get students. Without students, you have zero chance of getting substantial research done. Without research data, there are no publications, and without publications, you have a snowball’s chance in hell of getting a grant award. After several years of this vicious circle, management steps in and tells you that it’s your fault you don’t get money, when in reality it’s not. In many cases it is age discrimination, albeit subtle. It could never be overt; think of the lawsuits. You simply reached the magic age at which point you are old and no longer ‘worth funding’. The problem of course is that you cannot retire with a good pension at 53 years of age. So you hang around your workplace hoping your luck will change. Everyone involved knows it won’t. It goes from bad to worse. Years go by with the same results; there are no publications and now management wants to know why there has been no progression in your work. What can you say? It’s merely survival of the fittest; you’ve seen the nature programs where the young males attack the old ones for control of the tribe or the harems. The same occurs in academia; once you’re labeled as old, you’re finished. You are punished for growing old.

Thirdly, if you are not designated as the absolute BEST OF THE BEST, CREAM OF THE CROP, you are finished in research these days before you even get started. Academic research science is beyond elitist at this point; it’s more like trying to make it through the proverbial eye of the needle. Almost no one manages that. Young people do their PhDs and then move on to something else; few to none are offered a post-doc position in any given research organization (http://www.theguardian.com/higher-education-network/blog/2014/may/23/so-many-phd-students-so-few-jobs). One or two may end up as the 'chosen ones', the ones that management deems worthy enough to bet on. The reason given is that they are the brightest of the bunch, but often it’s nepotism in action—those that move upward are often simply those who are management’s favorites. They are the ones who are granted the academic career opportunities. They join the networks that management has laid out for them; all involved know that this is the key to gaining grant funding, since colleagues in those networks often work in positions that have enough clout to ensure that those networks get funding. They may not review the actual grant applications, but they have a say in the final prioritization of grant applications that have been recommended for funding by external reviewers. 

  

Finally, many universities now take on far too many PhD students, knowing full well that there are no careers for them in academic science, and knowing full well that they cannot offer them any sort of job future. It’s irresponsible behavior. But there’s money involved, so that makes it ok in the eyes of the universities. PhD students come with a specific sum of money for consumables and small expenses, and additionally, if you are the primary adviser, you get a tidy sum of money for having been an adviser, once the student is finished. Additionally, more students means more hands in the lab to do the research work. Who is going to turn that down? And who is going to be honest enough about the lack of academic career opportunities to tell potential PhD students to consider another profession because there are no jobs for them once they're finished? I do it as a senior researcher, but very few others do. I've said it before but it bears repeating; there are better, healthier and yes, nobler ways of earning a living and making yourself useful to society. Find them. 

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P.S. This is the email that Stefan Grimm wrote to his colleagues before he committed suicide, including the link to the article that published it. 

http://www.dcscience.net/2014/12/01/publish-and-perish-at-imperial-college-london-the-death-of-stefan-grimm/

Begin forwarded message:

From: Stefan Grimm <professorstefangrimm@gmail.com>

Date: 21 October 2014 23:41:03 BST

To:

Subject: How Professors are treated at Imperial College

Dear all,

If anyone is interested how Professors are treated at Imperial College: Here is my story.

On May 30th ’13 my boss, Prof Martin Wilkins, came into my office together with his PA and ask me what grants I had. After I enumerated them I was told that this was not enough and that I had to leave the College within one year – “max” as he said. He made it clear that he was acting on behalf of Prof Gavin Screaton, the then head of the Department of Medicine, and told me that I would have a meeting with him soon to be sacked. Without any further comment he left my office. It was only then that I realized that he did not even have the courtesy to close the door of my office when he delivered this message. When I turned around the corner I saw a student who seems to have overheard the conversation looking at me in utter horror.

Prof Wilkins had nothing better to do than immediately inform my colleagues in the Section that he had just sacked me.

Why does a Professor have to be treated like that?

All my grant writing stopped afterwards, as I was waiting for the meeting to get sacked by Prof Screaton. This meeting, however, never took place.

In March ’14 I then received the ultimatum email below. 200,000 pounds research income every year is required. Very interesting. I was never informed about this before and cannot remember that this is part of my contract with the College. Especially interesting is the fact that the required 200,000.- pounds could potentially also be covered by smaller grants but in my case a programme grant was expected.

Our 135,000.- pounds from the University of Dammam? Doesn’t count. I have to say that it was a lovely situation to submit grant applications for your own survival with such a deadline. We all know what a lottery grant applications are.

There was talk that the Department had accepted to be in dept for some time and would compensate this through more teaching. So I thought that I would survive. But the email below indicates otherwise. I got this after the student for whom I “have plans” received the official admission to the College as a PhD student. He waited so long to work in our group and I will never be able to tell him that this should now not happen. What these guys don’t know is that they destroy lives. Well, they certainly destroyed mine.

The reality is that these career scientists up in the hierarchy of this organization only look at figures to judge their colleagues, be it impact factors or grant income. After all, how can you convince your Department head that you are working on something exciting if he not even attends the regular Departmental seminars? The aim is only to keep up the finances of their Departments for their own career advancement.

These formidable leaders are playing an interesting game: They hire scientists from other countries to submit the work that they did abroad under completely different conditions for the Research Assessment that is supposed to gauge the performance of British universities. Afterwards they leave them alone to either perform with grants or being kicked out. Even if your work is submitted to this Research Assessment and brings in money for the university, you are targeted if your grant income is deemed insufficient. Those submitted to the research assessment hence support those colleagues who are unproductive but have grants. Grant income is all that counts here, not scientific output.

We had four papers with original data this year so far, in Cell Death and Differentiation, Oncogene, Journal of Cell Science and, as I informed Prof Wilkins this week, one accepted with the EMBO Journal. I was also the editor of a book and wrote two reviews. Doesn’t count.

This leads to a interesting spin to the old saying “publish or perish”. Here it is “publish and perish”.

Did I regret coming to this place? I enormously enjoyed interacting with my science colleagues here, but like many of them, I fell into the trap of confusing the reputation of science here with the present reality. This is not a university anymore but a business with very few up in the hierarchy, like our formidable duo, profiteering and the rest of us are milked for money, be it professors for their grant income or students who pay 100.- pounds just to extend their write-up status.

If anyone believes that I feel what my excellent coworkers and I have accomplished here over the years is inferior to other work, is wrong. With our apoptosis genes and the concept of Anticancer Genes we have developed something that is probably much more exciting than most other projects, including those that are heavily supported by grants.

Was I perhaps too lazy? My boss smugly told me that I was actually the one professor on the whole campus who had submitted the highest number of grant applications. Well, they were probably simply not good enough.

I am by far not the only one who is targeted by those formidable guys. These colleagues only keep quiet out of shame about their situation. Which is wrong. As we all know hitting the sweet spot in bioscience is simply a matter of luck, both for grant applications and publications.

Why does a Professor have to be treated like that?

One of my colleagues here at the College whom I told my story looked at me, there was a silence, and then said: “Yes, they treat us like sh*t”.

Best regards,

Stefan Grimm

What I did before my summer vacation (one hectic month in the life of an academic researcher)

Academia is an unpredictable profession at best; for the most part, one never knows from year to year how much funding one will have to design and implement research projects, how many students one will have responsibility for, how many grant proposals one will write, or even how many papers one will write and send for publication. The unpredictability of the profession stems from the unpredictability associated with grant funding: is a researcher’s proposal good enough; will it get into the top ten percent; will it get funded, and if so, how much will the researcher get; will he or she get support for students and lab consumables or just consumables; and what happens if he or she doesn’t get funding. The list of worries is potentially a long one.

December and June are always busy and hectic months in academia, mostly because researchers rush to finish experiments and to send out their articles before the Christmas holidays and summer vacation, respectively. They are stressful months that have to be confronted and tackled before one can take vacation in good conscience. The odd thing is that the pace of academia is so erratic; during the other months, there are often lulls when one wishes one was busier. Personally, I would prefer if the pace was more even and thus less stressful during the entire academic year, such that the amount of work was spread out more evenly.

So what did I do from mid-May until now, before my summer vacation? I am co-adviser for a PhD student who has to deliver her thesis by the end of July, plus send her last article for publication so that she can write in her thesis that it has been submitted for publication. I am senior author on that paper, so I have read through and edited the paper several times during the month of June. Additionally, I have read through and edited her thesis for both scientific and grammatical accuracy several times. Most Norwegian students write their theses in English. I believe it is now a requirement, whereas their defense can be in Norwegian, although many choose to defend in English. Most Norwegians speak English well, especially the younger ones who have grown up watching American TV programs and movies, surfing the internet/social media, and listening to music. So it is not a major problem to edit a thesis for correct English usage; it just takes time. But this is what a senior scientist does—it’s part of the job. 

I also wrote a grant proposal that I submitted to the Cancer Society in early June. I spent more than a month reading background articles and writing the proposal, which had to do with treating gastrointestinal cancers with drugs that drive them into a senescent (non-proliferating) state. I was a peer reviewer for an article about treating colorectal cancer with a combination of natural compounds that led to effective tumor kill without killing normal cells, a win-win situation for patients. I was also an external grant reviewer for another country; this is often done—that granting agencies send out grant proposals for external review outside their own country. In this case, I learned a lot about treatment of colorectal cancer with adoptive cell transfer using tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes. This is a field I knew only a bit about, but about which I know quite a lot more at this point after having read the proposal and a number of review articles that helped me to understand it so that I could review it properly. I also read and edited an article written by two of my colleagues who asked me to check their review article for correct English usage and grammar. I also read some background articles about ionizing radiation and how it is used in cancer treatment; this was information I found on the American Cancer Society website. I am impressed with the information that is available there to patients and their families, and impressed with the writers who create these articles and brochures. Finally, I printed out a number of review articles about mass spectrometry imaging of tissue samples; this is a cutting-edge technology that has a bright future not only in cancer research, but in pathology generally, as well as in disease treatment, pharmacology and toxicology. I need to learn as much about it as possible in case I travel to visit a medical center in the States that uses this technology successfully in their research projects.

It occurred to me today that I could work as an editor of a scientific journal, as a senior adviser for any number of scientific/political organizations, and as a scientific writer. I do all these things in my job as an academic research scientist, in addition to planning research projects and figuring out how to implement them. One must also figure out how to do all these things on a limited budget if such is the case. Academia is really a creative profession, in more ways than one. 

Third-graders and their questions about science

A few posts ago, I talked about the third-graders at a Long Island grammar school who had written letters to me asking me about my work and life as a scientist. I received sixteen hand-printed letters in the mail right before Easter vacation, and read through them all. Their teacher (my good friend) helped them formulate some of the questions. Many of them were insightful, many were cute, a few were out there, but all of them were indicative of a group of youngsters who are thinking about their daily life and surroundings. That is a good thing and should be encouraged at all costs, especially if we want the younger generation to choose science and math when they get to high school and college.

Here are some of their questions that I am busy answering these days:

1.       What do I know about cancer and are we coming close to a cure?

2.       How is my research on cancer going?

3.       What would I do to stop cancer?

4.       Do I know the cure for cancer?

5.       Do a lot of unhealthy foods give you cancer?

6.       Did any members of my family get cancer?

7.       Do I like to study cancer?

8.       Do I study just cancer?

9.       Does a cell get destroyed from cancer?

10.   How many kinds of cancer are there?

11.   Will a sickness go away if you take care of it by yourself?

12.   What have I researched in the past and what am I researching now?

13.   Is it hard work to be a scientist?

14.   Do I have any helpers in the lab?

15.   How did I become a researcher?

16.   What does a research biologist do?

17.   Do I have my own cool lab?

18.   Is it fun to be a scientist?

19.   How come I am not writing a book about science, and have I written science

       books or regular books?

20.   Is Norway a hot place to live?

21.   How is it to live in Norway?

22.   How are the fjords in Norway?

23.   Have I ever studied the human heart?

24.   Do all rabbits eat grass only?

25.   Is it ok to eat the bananas that have brown dots on them and that the fruit flies fly around?

26.   Do I make potions?

Another day in the life of a scientist

Long day in the lab yesterday. One of those days that leave you dead-tired, so that when you get home you just want to find the couch, turn the TV on and just do nothing. Got my morning coffee first. Workday started off with me doing a procedure called western blotting—104 cell samples loaded manually (by me) onto four plastic-like gels and pushed through them by electricity. Point of procedure? To separate proteins in the samples according to their molecular weights. Just the sample loading took over an hour. Have to pay attention--very easy to make a mistake and load the wrong sample in the wrong place. Made buffers after that. Found all the accessories needed to complete the procedure. Lunchtime in my office. Knock on my office door. Impromptu visit from the big boss. Shoveled in my salad while talking about my future—lab frock on and thoroughly harried. Thought about that. In my younger days I wouldn’t have eaten a bite while talking to the boss. Would have been too nervous. Now I do. No longer nervous. Getting used to all these conversations. Back in the lab. Two more hours of finishing up this gel procedure. Nice results. A reward for the hard work and long hours. Not always that way. A quick coffee break. Meeting with my student--discussed results. Hers and mine—she does the same procedure to get data so we can discuss what’s happening in her cells. Interesting project. She will get her thesis done. Hope there will be an article out of it. Cannot predict that when you first start the work. Do all this work for several months and suddenly a dead-end. That’s research. Used to disappointments—makes success all the more enjoyable. Scanned in some data, transferred it to the computer, sent it on to my student. Finished up paperwork before heading for home. Bought a grilled chicken, fried up some mushrooms, made broccoli—voila—dinner on my own. Hubby out with his lab group for dinner. TV night for once—not often that happens! The King’s Speech, Game of Thrones, The Way We Were—well-worth the watching time. Monday starts another week, more long days in the lab. Wonder how I did this when I was younger—long long hours in the lab, sometimes twelve per day. Dead-tired a lot of the time. Like being in the lab though. Will probably be doing that till I retire--white frock on, in front of the lab bench, alone. Not a bad way to work given the new workplace propensity for long unsatisfying meetings these days. Would rather be in the lab, all things considered. 

A day in the life of a scientist

Dead tired this morning, but made it to work by the usual time. Started the day by walking to the main cafeteria to buy a cup of (regular) coffee. Can’t live without my coffee. Already had my espresso at home before we left for work. Latest research shows—coffee is good for you—three or four cups a day—perfect. Opened Outlook—checked my emails. One of them was a thank-you email from a granting agency in Singapore thanking me for reviewing two of their grant applications. I do that now—I get paid for it. Got started on answering my emails early, and got them out of the way. Trying to figure out the best way to formulate emails these days can take several hours for just a couple of them. Made a few phone calls. Arranged an examiner for my Master’s student who will have her exam in June—took all of about half an hour. Ecstatic! Wasn’t as easy three years ago when I had to find opponents for my PhD student. Frustrating then. Went and talked to one of the women in the pathology department who is the administrative leader for the technicians there. Talked about the logistics of a project that needs technical help from the department. One of my jobs now—to coordinate external and internal research projects that require routine technical help. Went online to get price information for two items that needed to be ordered. Went to the secretary who enters the orders into the computer. Chatted for a while. Have decided that nice is the way to be; everything goes more smoothly when you treat others well. Don’t care if the rest of the world thinks it’s not efficient. Can honestly say that I've been nice to others most of the time. Worked through lunch doing my consulting job. On Twitter checking out all the updates. What would I do without it? Better than Facebook in so many ways. So much info on social media, so little time. 

Started working after lunch on analyzing some statistical data for my student’s project—realized I had made so many mistakes the first time I filled in the data tables. Why? I was dead tired and when you are dead tired you shouldn’t be working at the computer filling in data tables. Couldn’t understand why the graphs looked so odd afterwards—huge standard errors. Now I know. Solved that problem. Moving right along. Did a literature search on microRNAs—they’re what’s hot now besides stem cells. Feeling the pressure to conform again. Maybe I’ll get more grant support that way. Can I do like the others? We’ll see at grant time in May when I start writing them. Printed out four review articles on microRNAs. Went back to working on the statistical data. Playing around with grouping the data in different ways to produce different plots. Saw some interesting differences between untreated and treated samples—there might be a story after all. Ecstatic again! It’s not often that happens. Most of the time—balloons get punctured. Started dreaming about the experiments I want to do. Usually do this whenever lab work goes well. When it goes badly, I want to go home, crawl into bed and pull the covers over my head. Saved the statistical tables in one file, emailed a copy of it to my home email, and decided that for once I will look at it during the weekend. But right now, glad it’s Friday. Monday it starts all over again……..

Musings about science and scientists, and the weather

I’ve been at a scientific conference (dealing with the cell cycle and regulators of cell proliferation) most of the week; it started on Monday night and ended this morning. I wasn’t able to attend all the sessions each day, but I managed to be present for some really top-notch lectures delivered by Nobel prize winners and international experts in their respective fields. That’s always an encouraging and inspiring experience; it reminds me of why I chose this profession—a scientific research career, when I hear top speakers talk about their work. Many of the top speakers were older men who more or less summed up their research careers in their lectures. I have more appreciation for that type of lecture now—maybe because I’ve been in research a long time myself. I know the ins and outs and ups and downs of this business, and I appreciate hearing the opinions advanced by these speakers, because they know what they’re talking about. So when a few of them talk about the importance of small research groups as opposed to large ones, I’m suddenly all ears. I agree with them. Small groups are the places where innovative ideas are born. We should not be getting rid of small research groups. We should not be discouraging younger people from pursuing academic careers. But the granting powers that be are doing so. By not funding scientists who lead small research groups, they ensure that younger scientists cannot continue because they will never get the chance to start their own small groups. By not encouraging younger scientists to fly free rather than clipping their wings which happens all the time now, we are eliminating the pool of future scientists that each society so absolutely requires. Younger scientists are leaving academia. There is no place for most of them. There are no jobs for them and there is no real future for them. This is confirmed for me at most conferences. Younger scientists in this country (post-doc level and above) are little more than slaves for their group leaders. They are doing two and three post-doc periods and finding themselves without any prospects after they finish. They are not being offered staff scientist positions or group leader status. They’re rather told that they’re too aggressive or too independent. And they are, of course. Who wouldn’t be after three post-doc periods? That’s the point of post-doc periods—to create independence and self-sufficiency in intelligent and enthusiastic scientists. But their wings are being clipped in huge numbers, and the granting situation for the future will ensure that there will eventually be no post-doc or staff scientist positions at all. But there will be a lot of PhD student positions. God knows what this country will do with all the new PhD recipients. There aren’t jobs for them. And little is being done to create new jobs for them. Many of them will end up as salespeople or will leave the profession for greener pastures. The only reason there are currently so many PhD positions is because the principal investigators who run research groups need slaves and lots of hands to do their work for them while they are busy writing grants and networking with their fellow group leaders. They know there is no real research future for the PhDs they’re turning out, either in academia or in industry. And industry is not really stepping up to the plate to meet the future needs either.  

The meeting was held at the Holmenkollen Park Rica Hotel at the top of the city of Oslo, literally. On a clear day, there is an amazing view of the fjord and of the city from this vantage point. But of course, the weather this past week was not cooperative, so the hilltop and hotel were mostly shrouded in fog, and when there wasn’t fog, it was raining. I cannot remember a summer like this one—it has rained steadily, if not daily, at least several times per week. The non-Norwegians at the meeting were asking me if the weather was always like this. It isn’t. Today was a perfect example. The last day of the meeting is of course when the sun chose to reappear and blue skies took over--just perfect for walking. So I walked to work from the top of the city to my hospital. It took me about an hour door to door. Relaxing and enjoyable to walk downhill for the most part, take in the nature around me, and just enjoy being outdoors in the sunshine. It was a sharp contrast to Tuesday night, when the entire meeting was treated to a boat trip on the fjord. It happened to take place on exactly the one night of the summer when a storm (remnants of Hurricane Irene in fact) blew into Oslo, causing flooding and all sorts of other problems. We did sail out on the fjord though—the trip was not cancelled. We stayed more or less on the inner fjord, so the waves were not very high. The boat was quite large so it was actually not a problem to be out on the water. But the wind whipped the sails about and the rain was unrelenting, so we were forced into the boat’s innards where dinner awaited, and that was cozy. People had a good time and that was the most important thing. I know that the foreigners at the meeting will remember this particular trip. It’s not often you get to sail on a boat during a fairly intense storm.

It was heartening to meet a lot of the scientists who were at this conference. For some reason, most of the top scientists who attended were actually quite down-to-earth people—friendly, interested in others, and interesting to talk to. It made me wonder about the correlation between real intelligence and humility. If you are really intelligent, perhaps you don’t need to flaunt it or to treat other people poorly. So perhaps this is one explanation for what I see in my workplace—several rude people who think they are intelligent (but who really are not), and who need to be arrogant and rude to others because they are insecure about their intelligence. They need to make others feel inferior in order for them to feel superior. Kind of makes sense to me now. This has been reinforced for me by some of the lecturers I have had the privilege of listening to at the Science library at the University of Oslo. They have been given by some really incredible human beings, people you’d be proud to know. This gives me hope for the future of science generally.