Research- the razzmatazz and all that jazz...
Ahhh...I am slightly better off today...it's only 1:30 AM :). But considering that I have a class at 10 in the morning, I am still pretty late. :((
So, no time for small talk, my dear pensieve, let's cut to the chase....
Today's topic is one that is close to the heart of every graduate student.
Except me, of course.
Which is rather bad news for my department, which pays me a fair bit of money and a huge amount of tuition fee in the hope that I am going to do something useful for them and bring them everlasting glory or something.
Don't know where these people get these crazy ideas. I can sort of picture all these old,wise Prof.s waiting with bated breath for me to come up with some brilliant idea that no has one thought of before. Err...folks....sorry to disappoint you and all, but I doubt that's going to happen. I mean, there are all these people who have spent all their lives sitting and thinking about the problem I've been asked to work on. If there was anything more to be done about it, I'm sure they would have thought of it. I realise that my intellect may be far superior to theirs(please, I said, no sniggering allowed about anything I say on this blog) , but still, I think that since they have spent a gazillion times more time than I have on this stuff, they must have thought about anything worth thinking of.
I keep wondering what these people see in me which makes them think I can do "research". By the way, what the hell does that word mean anyway? Seems to me like it means to search for something which many people have searched for already, which sounds like a big waste of time.
Anyway, lemme look it up. Ahh...here it is... "Scholarly or scientific investigation or inquiry"
Hmm....I'm not quite sure what that means. Anyway,forget it, doesn't really matter. So, I was saying that the way they evaluate the "chemical potential" of people is rather weird. (Hehe...that was quite a witty use of the term "chemical potential",wasn't it? What? Do I hear a lot of nay's? Ahhh...well,perhaps the joke is lost on a bunch like you who don't even have basic chemical engg. knowledge) They look at which instt. I am from, my grades in my undergrad and my GRE score and stuff like that. Dudes and dudettes!! You need better criteria!! I can tell you how to do well in all those parameters without having the faintest idea of how to do research.
To put it succinctly-to get into IIT, clear one exam by mugging everything in sight for 2 yrs...
to get decent grades, mug up all assignments the day before the exam and yes, take a lot of humanities courses :P...to ace GRE, mug up that stupid Barron's word list from cover to cover in a week. That's about it. Do all that and these people somehow conclude that you have tremendous potential for research.
Let me tell you how I am going about trying to do research. I have been asked to find a equation to describe the behavior of viscolelastic fluids, which are a special case of Non-Newtonian fluids. (It doesn't matter what all those terms means). What I have done is checked out about 15 books from our incomparable library with the title "Non-Newtonian fluid behavior". Every morning, I go and open the index of a book and see where they talk about viscoelastic fluids. It typically turns out to be in chapter 10 or something. So, I open that chapter and try to understand it.
I fail miserably. Since it's still early in the day, I am still enthu and happily proceed to chapter 9, thinking that I'll surely understand that and can then proceed to chapter 10. I fail equally miserably. Well, still not losing hope, I proceed to chapter 8. Futile. By this time, it's about my lunchtime and I think that I'll go and eat my lunch and start again with a fresh mind after it.
I go and have lunch and come back and this time start the book from chapter one. I read the first page very enthusiastically and understand everything. Moving on to the second page, I start to realise that all this is stuff I already know and start skimming through the pages. Chapter 1 flies by really fast. I start chapter 2 and it again turns out to be stuff I already know. Same with chapter 3 and I am beginning to get really bored. I now decide to give chapter 8 a shot. There, I find that I still can't understand anything. I look at the time and see that it nearly five. I decide to give up on this book and plan to try a new book the next day. Output for the day-zilch. Awesome. Great. Wonderful.
Now this has been happening for the past 15 days and I am beginning to get really sick of it.
Obviously, I know that the sensible way to go about it would be too pick one book, read it from chapter one to ten and be done with it. But it is the hope of finding a shortcut that keeps me from adopting that obvious procedure. I am now waiting for the day when I get some sense knocked into my head and stop looking for shortcuts.
Anyway,that's about all I have to say for today. Reading thorugh this stuff, I realise that today's blog is rather too boring. Sorry about that,folks, but have to go to sleep now, no time to change it.
The song for today. Hmm...considering that the title of this blog is "My Conversations With Solitude" , I think that my favorite song for when I am lonely deserves a place really high up in this blog. So, here goes-
A winter's day
In a deep and dark December;
I am alone,
Gazing from my window to the streets below
On a freshly fallen silent shroud of snow.
I am a rock,
I am an island.
I've built walls,
A fortress deep and mighty,
That none may penetrate.
I have no need of friendship; friendship causes pain.
It's laughter and it's loving I disdain.
I am a rock,
I am an island.
Don't talk of love,
But I've heard the words before;
It's sleeping in my memory.
I won't disturb the slumber of feelings that have died.
If I never loved I never would have cried.
I am a rock,
I am an island.
I have my books
And my poetry to protect me;
I am shielded in my armor,
Hiding in my room, safe within my womb.
I touch no one and no one touches me.
I am a rock,
I am an island.
And a rock feels no pain;
And an island never cries.
- Paul Simon
Ok, I'll also put a question tonight.
In 1998,which Indian movie did time magazine rate as one of "the seven terrific films you'll never see"?
As is standard practice, you can leave your answer as a comment.
Answer in my next posting.
Have a good day,people.
Ahhh...I am slightly better off today...it's only 1:30 AM :). But considering that I have a class at 10 in the morning, I am still pretty late. :((
So, no time for small talk, my dear pensieve, let's cut to the chase....
Today's topic is one that is close to the heart of every graduate student.
Except me, of course.
Which is rather bad news for my department, which pays me a fair bit of money and a huge amount of tuition fee in the hope that I am going to do something useful for them and bring them everlasting glory or something.
Don't know where these people get these crazy ideas. I can sort of picture all these old,wise Prof.s waiting with bated breath for me to come up with some brilliant idea that no has one thought of before. Err...folks....sorry to disappoint you and all, but I doubt that's going to happen. I mean, there are all these people who have spent all their lives sitting and thinking about the problem I've been asked to work on. If there was anything more to be done about it, I'm sure they would have thought of it. I realise that my intellect may be far superior to theirs(please, I said, no sniggering allowed about anything I say on this blog) , but still, I think that since they have spent a gazillion times more time than I have on this stuff, they must have thought about anything worth thinking of.
I keep wondering what these people see in me which makes them think I can do "research". By the way, what the hell does that word mean anyway? Seems to me like it means to search for something which many people have searched for already, which sounds like a big waste of time.
Anyway, lemme look it up. Ahh...here it is... "Scholarly or scientific investigation or inquiry"
Hmm....I'm not quite sure what that means. Anyway,forget it, doesn't really matter. So, I was saying that the way they evaluate the "chemical potential" of people is rather weird. (Hehe...that was quite a witty use of the term "chemical potential",wasn't it? What? Do I hear a lot of nay's? Ahhh...well,perhaps the joke is lost on a bunch like you who don't even have basic chemical engg. knowledge) They look at which instt. I am from, my grades in my undergrad and my GRE score and stuff like that. Dudes and dudettes!! You need better criteria!! I can tell you how to do well in all those parameters without having the faintest idea of how to do research.
To put it succinctly-to get into IIT, clear one exam by mugging everything in sight for 2 yrs...
to get decent grades, mug up all assignments the day before the exam and yes, take a lot of humanities courses :P...to ace GRE, mug up that stupid Barron's word list from cover to cover in a week. That's about it. Do all that and these people somehow conclude that you have tremendous potential for research.
I fail miserably. Since it's still early in the day, I am still enthu and happily proceed to chapter 9, thinking that I'll surely understand that and can then proceed to chapter 10. I fail equally miserably. Well, still not losing hope, I proceed to chapter 8. Futile. By this time, it's about my lunchtime and I think that I'll go and eat my lunch and start again with a fresh mind after it.
I go and have lunch and come back and this time start the book from chapter one. I read the first page very enthusiastically and understand everything. Moving on to the second page, I start to realise that all this is stuff I already know and start skimming through the pages. Chapter 1 flies by really fast. I start chapter 2 and it again turns out to be stuff I already know. Same with chapter 3 and I am beginning to get really bored. I now decide to give chapter 8 a shot. There, I find that I still can't understand anything. I look at the time and see that it nearly five. I decide to give up on this book and plan to try a new book the next day. Output for the day-zilch. Awesome. Great. Wonderful.
Now this has been happening for the past 15 days and I am beginning to get really sick of it.
Obviously, I know that the sensible way to go about it would be too pick one book, read it from chapter one to ten and be done with it. But it is the hope of finding a shortcut that keeps me from adopting that obvious procedure. I am now waiting for the day when I get some sense knocked into my head and stop looking for shortcuts.
Anyway,that's about all I have to say for today. Reading thorugh this stuff, I realise that today's blog is rather too boring. Sorry about that,folks, but have to go to sleep now, no time to change it.
The song for today. Hmm...considering that the title of this blog is "My Conversations With Solitude" , I think that my favorite song for when I am lonely deserves a place really high up in this blog. So, here goes-
A winter's day
In a deep and dark December;
I am alone,
Gazing from my window to the streets below
On a freshly fallen silent shroud of snow.
I am a rock,
I am an island.
I've built walls,
A fortress deep and mighty,
That none may penetrate.
I have no need of friendship; friendship causes pain.
It's laughter and it's loving I disdain.
I am a rock,
I am an island.
Don't talk of love,
But I've heard the words before;
It's sleeping in my memory.
I won't disturb the slumber of feelings that have died.
If I never loved I never would have cried.
I am a rock,
I am an island.
I have my books
And my poetry to protect me;
I am shielded in my armor,
Hiding in my room, safe within my womb.
I touch no one and no one touches me.
I am a rock,
I am an island.
And a rock feels no pain;
And an island never cries.
- Paul Simon
Ok, I'll also put a question tonight.
In 1998,which Indian movie did time magazine rate as one of "the seven terrific films you'll never see"?
As is standard practice, you can leave your answer as a comment.
Answer in my next posting.
Have a good day,people.
posted by Akshat Jain at 10:32 PM
3 Comments:
The movie is Nayagan starring Kamal Hassan, directed by Maniratnam.. wat an awesome movie!
Very well expressed thoughts and facts. I really enjoyed reading your yesterday's blog about research. Though you are very far(physically) my son, I felt as if you are sitting near to me and telling me about your feelings. Do not worry about research, I suppose most of the people who have done research or doing must have felt the same way(At least I did). I know you have something very special in you and one day you will make us even more proud. Really enjoyed, keep writing.
I love reading these blogs. What a hilarious way of expressing your feelings. Do not worry dude, almost 90% of the researchers feel the same way … or at least they started the same way. But as already pointed out by someone you should not disclose the secret of our success. Keep scribbling.
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