[HN Gopher] Physicist, 98, honoured with doctorate 75 years afte...
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Physicist, 98, honoured with doctorate 75 years after
groundbreaking discovery
Author : defrost
Score : 157 points
Date : 2024-07-22 11:29 UTC (11 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.theguardian.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.theguardian.com)
| cb321 wrote:
| A perhaps relevant Sabine Hossenfelder video:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKiBlGDfRU8
|
| Although Sabine's video is more about today's academia
| money/paper mill incentives, she mentions the more eternal
| work/family-life balance for women that also seems to have been
| determinative for Rosemary Fowler (the subject of the article).
| aaronsung wrote:
| Well deserved.
| shusaku wrote:
| > The year after the discovery, Fowler left university having
| published her discovery in three academic papers.
|
| Back in the days where two papers in nature wasn't enough to to
| instantly get you a PhD I guess! Hopefully she was kept in the
| loop by her husband (fellow physicist) so she could feel rewarded
| even in real time.
| lupire wrote:
| In the US a PhD has many pantronizing requirements, but in the
| UK, where Fowler is, is much more mature, usually only
| requiring a thesis. But with the war and kids and life, Fowler
| may have felt there was no need to get a PhD since she didn't
| plan to return to work as a professional physicist.
|
| Degrees only matter if external pressure demands it.
| teeheelol wrote:
| Every person I know with a PhD now in their 40s and 50s (7
| people) doesn't have a family and wished they did and didn't have
| a PhD. I'd love to see a study on that.
|
| I'm never bothered because it looked like too much effort for
| little money.
| checker659 wrote:
| You mean divorced or never married?
| bombcar wrote:
| Most of the people with the PhD I know that have a family
| either abandoned the "line of work" (e.g, mathematics PhD but
| did computer programming) or was a teacher/professor.
| vkazanov wrote:
| I know a PhD specialising in applying ml algorithms to
| different markets, mostly energy-related.
|
| Married, 3 kids, good position In a fund, same focus as his
| phd.
|
| He was very, very lucky, without even realising it to this
| day. His wife took most of the hit, with him permanently
| working, or teaching, or something, and her taking care of
| thr rest of their life, kids included.
|
| On the specialisation side. He never went the "pursue a dream
| even with no money" way. It was more about picking things he
| was good at, and also making sure the choice included
| sellable skills.
| bombcar wrote:
| The number of these you'll find, especially in teaching, is
| amazingly high.
|
| The "absent-minded professor backed by his down-to-earth
| wife" is a trope but a common one (and, to be fair, it's
| not always a man who's absent minded!).
| Calavar wrote:
| Do all seven work at the same place? The PhDs I know mostly
| work a M-W/9-5 schedule with the occasional late night or
| weekend day when it's crunch time for a conference deadline.
| Plenty of time left for family, and they all have families. But
| that's dependent on departmental culture, and there can be a
| lot of variance.
| lumost wrote:
| I suspect that this also depends on field. CS has been hot
| for a long time now, it's also not extremely expensive to
| make a dent - or particularly unlikely. In Physics, we
| graduate an order of magnitude more Phds than there are posts
| for Phds. There are few remunerative fields which hire Phd
| physicists.
| tivert wrote:
| > In Physics, we graduate an order of magnitude more Phds
| than there are posts for Phds. There are few remunerative
| fields which hire Phd physicists.
|
| IIRC, that's even worse in the humanities in both regards.
|
| I'd kind of think doing a career change would be easier for
| a Phd physicist, because they could benefit from
| stereotypes especially if they switch into some kind of
| quantitative or math-y field.
| dotnet00 wrote:
| My understanding is that, as you say, Physics PhDs tend
| to have pretty decent paths into computing or math stuff.
| It's hard to be a physicist these days without being able
| to write some code in at least a scripting language, so
| fields like data science can fit them well.
|
| The challenge is probably in finding pure physics
| research positions in a specific specialization.
| seanhunter wrote:
| High paying jobs in finance are stuffed with physics phds.
| aleph_minus_one wrote:
| Many good physicists with PhD degrees don't have the
| character traits that are necessary to be hired and/or to
| be successful in finance.
| seanhunter wrote:
| Sure, but I was just giving a counterexample from my
| personal experience for the claim that their aren't many
| good paying jobs for Physics PhDs. In my career I have
| come across a weirdly large number of physics phds in
| very lucrative roles and that covers various fields,
| finance, in the software/tech industry (especially in
| data analysis type roles) and other places.
| gcheong wrote:
| I knew a lot of physics (and other) PhD's when I worked
| in finance but I always wondered if they would have
| chosen to go into that field if they knew that's where
| they'd most likely end up.
| markusde wrote:
| I've also heard quite a few people saying that their PhD was
| one of the best times of their life, because of how free they
| were to pursue things they found interesting (many of them have
| also settled down with a family, as well). Different strokes
| for different folks, I guess.
| dexwiz wrote:
| Grass is always greener.
| nadermx wrote:
| That's completely dependent on which side you're watering
| glitchc wrote:
| This is the danger of anecdotes, they can lead to bias. I have
| a PhD and I had my first child at 28. Almost all of my
| colleagues have families and children, except for the one
| person who was unable to attract a suitable mate (and not for
| lack of trying). Sometimes very bright people have trouble
| attracting an equivalent person. The pool is that much smaller
| and other factors (socioeconomic, culture) still play a role as
| per other relationships.
| dsugarman wrote:
| If everyone had a requirement for marriage that you marry
| someone as smart as you, exactly no one would be married.
| zamadatix wrote:
| I think it's implied that there is some fuzziness in the
| matching, not precision to the 7th decimal of some
| objective test or something. That said I agree it certainly
| isn't a requirement to be similar in specific attributes to
| get married. Perhaps somewhat common though.
| glitchc wrote:
| I left it ambiguous on purpose, as equivalent could mean
| many things, someone at least as accomplished, at least as
| wealthy, or at least as considerate... the list it goes on.
| It all depends on what that person is looking for. Seems
| silly to judge which attributes are important for what is a
| deeply personal choice with serious life implications.
| dsugarman wrote:
| that makes sense but it still seems like there is an
| imbalance on expectations.
|
| It reads as they're great and there's not a lot of people
| as great as they are when in reality it's probably more
| like the overlap between the set of people they desire
| and the set of people that desires them is impossibly
| narrow. This sounds like a tough personal problem that
| they can 100% work through by looking in the mirror and
| working on themselves.
|
| I'm too great to ever find someone as great as me is
| frankly a piss poor attitude and outlook on life and I
| feel really bad for them to be stuck like that.
| behnamoh wrote:
| > This is the danger of anecdotes, they can lead to bias.
|
| Your own story is also a dangerous anecdote. Without the
| context, it's pointless to talk about how amazing your Ph.D.
| experience was. Study engineering or quantitative marketing?
| Most likely miserable. Study humanities? Probably happier.
| latexr wrote:
| > Your own story is also a dangerous anecdote.
|
| I don't think the person you're replying to is implying
| _their_ anecdotes are more valid, but that all anecdotes
| can be contradicted by opposing anecdotes and thus aren't
| enough to make sweeping statements.
| glitchc wrote:
| It's as latexr said, my counterfactual anecdote holds as
| much water as the OP's. That's the point. Neither forms a
| verifiable statement of fact.
|
| Regarding happiness or a Ph.D. being an amazing experience,
| I didn't say a word about any of that. Those seem to be
| some very strong assumptions around marriage/kids =
| happiness or engineering/marketing = misery that you're
| making.
| mlhpdx wrote:
| What's your wisened prognosis on studying Geophysics or
| Genetic Immunology?
| fngjdflmdflg wrote:
| >I'd love to see a study on that.
|
| Seems like the relevant quote here.
| AlecSchueler wrote:
| To be fair the person above recognised the short comings of
| anecdotes and said " I'd love to see a study on that."
|
| I'm not sure your own single point anecdote is enough to
| counter their own experience and indeed comes with all the
| same "danger" that you warn about.
| adolph wrote:
| > Sometimes very bright people have trouble attracting an
| equivalent person.
|
| That does not sound very bright. Valuing equivalence over
| other attributes makes the math work against success.
| 331c8c71 wrote:
| Seems like these folks are in academia or have been in academia
| until very recently? Academic lifestyle tends to take its toll,
| especially if you move every n years. But even then your sample
| seems a bit extreme...
|
| Its hard to see how people who switch to industry relatively
| soon can be penalized so much (and there are a lot of people
| like that).
| gcheong wrote:
| I (M 57) don't have children nor a PhD, I don't regret not
| having children but do wonder if I missed out on something not
| having a PhD.
| lupire wrote:
| Where are you meeting these people? Selection bias?
| KeplerBoy wrote:
| I don't see how going for a PhD limits one's family life.
|
| Sure one could earn more money for less work in the industry,
| but being a PhD student is still a rather cushy job earning
| decent money compared to a lot of physical jobs out there. Also
| nobody cares at which time of the day/week you do your work,
| which is nice in times where other jobs might prefer to have
| your ass in an office.
| behnamoh wrote:
| > I don't see how going for a PhD limits one's family life.
|
| Only one way to find out! It limits your
| family/friends/sex/fun life because the work load is a lot,
| there are no official "work hours" (so you end up working on
| weekends, at nights, when others are sleeping, when others go
| to parties, etc.), you get paid less than people who work in
| industry even though your work is as difficult (if not more)
| than theirs (think about the ML stuff Ph.D.s do vs. engineers
| in companies), you still have to deal with shitty politics in
| the department, etc.
| KeplerBoy wrote:
| yeah, I'm on the verge of finding out. Got an offer, but
| damn it's a big decision to make.
|
| Having supporting parents around to help with childcare (no
| kids yet, but 4 years is a long time) and financials is a
| big plus. Also being in Europe where the job market looks
| dire and industry only pay like 20% more is a major draw
| towards the PhD.
| behnamoh wrote:
| As someone who's almost done with his Ph.D., I wouldn't
| recommend it. Although I did mine in the US. European
| universities are different in some ways (e.g., I've heard
| they don't require Ph.D.s to do TA work, which is nice).
| KeplerBoy wrote:
| I wouldn't say TA work is not required. It all depends
| where the funding for the position is coming from. If the
| university is funding it without any extra grants or
| cooperations, TA work is definitely a huge part of being
| a PhD-student.
| bosch_mind wrote:
| My wife got a PhD by age 28 with over 20 science publications,
| didn't stress at all during the time really.
|
| She traveled the world during that time and we live a pretty
| chill life. Met lots of friends during that time too. Don't
| purely listen to anecdotes.
| behnamoh wrote:
| From the number of published articles, it seems your wife was
| in STEM? Engineering Ph.D.s publish a lot of papers but they
| contribute little to each, because there are often tens of
| co-authors. Not to downplay your wife's achievement, but
| pointing out #papers is not that informative.
| n4r9 wrote:
| Come on! 20 publications in STEM by age 28 is massively
| impressive regardless of field. Admittedly it's not the US,
| but I've found one study that suggests a publication rate
| of 0.52 article equivalents per year for women PhD students
| in engineering and technology: https://www.sciencedirect.co
| m/science/article/pii/S175115771...
| bosch_mind wrote:
| First author publications. She's an Ivy grad. Obviously I
| am biased, but she isn't really slacking mate.
| latexr wrote:
| > I'm never bothered because it looked like too much effort for
| little money.
|
| Having a PhD or a family? Because I could see that applied to
| either. Money and effort are not the only metrics that matter.
| kgwgk wrote:
| The family would be too much effort for negative money.
| latexr wrote:
| Unless you marry someone rich, I guess.
| IncRnd wrote:
| As the saying goes, "the grass is always greener on the other
| side of the fence."
|
| If those people had not gotten their PhDs, but families
| instead, they very well might today desire PhDs.
| evoloution wrote:
| There is a joke among scientists that choosing the career path
| will cost you your firstborn. It would be nice to quantify this
| but it is hard to. Anecdotally, main issue is financial
| stability so people with wealthy backgrounds or supportive (by
| time investment) families have a much easier time navigating
| this. I would be surprised if someone did the study and didn't
| find a delay till first-born child born when compared to
| similar people (SES background, abilities, etc) that went down
| the business/finance route. Edit:typo
| dekhn wrote:
| This doesn't match my observations. Both when I was in academia
| and now in industry, I see lots and lots of PhDs with kids
| (often dual-PhD families). It would have been a lot more
| challenging if I'd stayed in academia (I live in the pricey Bay
| Area).
| rsynnott wrote:
| Fairly small sample group; if we're doing anecdata, I think
| more of my be-phd-d friends have kids than the non-phd ones.
| simplicio wrote:
| FWIW, I finished a physics PhD 15 or so years ago, and 2/3rds
| or so of the people in the program with me have are married,
| and most of those couples have children.
|
| There are certainly challenges to having a family while pursing
| a PhD, but they're not prohibitive, and there are advantages as
| well (flexible work schedule, Universities often have a lot of
| programs for employees with children).
| dotnet00 wrote:
| Most of the people with PhDs in that age group I know are
| married and often talk excitedly about what activities they
| recently did with their kids. Many are married to other people
| with PhDs, and their kids also seem to intend to go for PhDs.
|
| The early 30s postdocs seem to mostly be single though, so
| maybe they'll face that in their 40s and 50s.
| 2o3jriw3jril wrote:
| The majority of the people I know who have PhDs have families
| with children by 30-35.
|
| My experience in grad school is that there are two different
| classes of people pursuing PhDs:
|
| - people whose parents have MSs or PhDs, who had guidance from
| a very early age, who have been advised the entire way through
| and are able to complete their PhDs by age 25-28
|
| - people whose parents don't have advanced degrees, who are at
| a pretty severe disadvantage, who don't know how to start
| preparing for grad school applications during sophomore year of
| undergrad, who don't know how to pick a decent advisor, who
| don't know how to organize their own funding which provides
| some level of research independence and the ability to focus on
| completing their degree instead of worshipping their advisor,
| and these people are much more likely to take 6,7,8+ years to
| complete their PhD if they complete it at all
|
| But that's not really relevant to this story. This is an
| article about a woman who dropped out of her PhD program to
| have kids, and was given an honorary degree decades later
| because the work she did complete was groundbreaking.
| BeFlatXIII wrote:
| > who don't know how to start preparing for grad school
| applications during sophomore year of undergrad
|
| That was me. I always assumed I'd go to grad school because
| that's just what was done; I never realized that my parents'
| meeting in grad school meant they worked normal people jobs
| for the better part of a decade before continuing their
| educations.
| denhaus wrote:
| More than half of the PhDs I know (in technical fields) have
| families. Actually, almost all of them.
| mlhpdx wrote:
| About half the PhDs I know have families and are happy with
| their career choice (challenging and rewarding work). You're
| casting unfounded judgement IMHO.
| gwbas1c wrote:
| My wife has a PhD, just turned 40, and we have three kids.
|
| Towards the end of her program, she decided she didn't want a
| research career.
| LtWorf wrote:
| I know multiple people with phd and kids.
| WalterBright wrote:
| I didn't pursue graduate work because I didn't think the
| payback was there for the years of study. I haven't regretted
| it.
| margalabargala wrote:
| I'm friends with a bunch (15+) of people with PhDs. Many of
| them have partners and children.
|
| That said, several of them joke with me that the fact that they
| have a PhD and I have a Masters is an indication I am smarter
| than they are.
| achrono wrote:
| Interesting that The Guardian is leading the way in _finally_
| having non-gendered headlines, i.e. not saying "Female physicist
| recognized 75 years after discovery" or "Rosemary Fowler, 98-year
| old physicist, recognized 75 years after discovery".
|
| This will hopefully pave the way for truer equality in that the
| most common reaction reading this headline would probably be "oh
| no, why has this physicist not gotten the recognition" rather
| than the latter, which is more polarising -- it leads to either
| "outrageous, look here is one more neglected woman!" or "here we
| go, one more feminist complaint".
| ChrisArchitect wrote:
| Nah, probably wasn't them as there was a Press Association
| headline being syndicated around for a few days with the same
| format (so good on Press Association for that)
| DoneWithAllThat wrote:
| They didn't have to "gender" it, it's the Guardian. They don't
| write uplifting feel good stories about straight white men.
| rsynnott wrote:
| I mean, I knew university bureaucracy could move slowly, but this
| seems excessive :)
| odyssey7 wrote:
| Consider how much more research and researchers we could have if
| we abolished the whole PhD thing.
| aleph_minus_one wrote:
| > Consider how much more research and researchers we could have
| if we abolished the whole PhD thing.
|
| We would have even more research and researchers if we
| abolished the whole university/academia thing.
|
| ;-) ;-) ;-)
| wslh wrote:
| I read that she received an honorary PhD but surely she fully
| deserve just a "PhD". Is this a UK thing? Could you in the US or
| elsewhere have a PhD on the merits of your work (a thesis, a
| discovery, etc) without spending time in the courses?
| dimatura wrote:
| I can't speak for every institution (and every department
| within), but at least in mine (in the US), there were pretty
| specific rules and requirements around awarding a PhD,
| involving coursework, qualifiers, proposals, the thesis and its
| defense. Seems unlikely that this could be easily circumvented
| for this type of situation.
| TwoNineFive wrote:
| > "I haven't done anything since to deserve special respect."
|
| She's right.
|
| She left an exploitative disgraceful system who only now grasps
| for relevancy and respect by seeking to associate itself with
| those who did the work.
| pvaldes wrote:
| It helps to round up the yearly number of doctorates at the end
| of the Academy calendar.
|
| Maybe the thesis production was getting a little slow for them
| this year.
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