stimulant

G: I love the money! I love looking at it!

***** is thinking about a PhD in economics. SAIS has made her terrified of applying for a job.

Note that more advanced education has made someone more wary of the job market.

The perceived need for an advanced degree to remain competitive is a growing problem. The fact that a diploma is a commodity means that the spiral of credentials’ devaluation will only increase until the feedback loop between skills acquired and jobs available is closed by something more useful than a piece of paper.

More later on the long history of people’s attempts to wrangle the “PhD glut” (since 1982!).

Big science is like religion, you just gotta do what the people before you did.

G: Well I mean, it wasn’t like I was at all productive during my summer. I should have been here [at MIT] you know, doing shit.

In response to a question “on subject” but “off-topic” (that is, it wasn’t directly related to the problem set being discussed):

G No guys, let’s not go there. This is one of the only classes I’m getting an ‘A’ in, I’m not going to fuck it up.

On the craziness feeling guilty about not doing homework:

B: I think I can get paid [by MIT, via scholarship] $2000 per semester to feel guilty.

Grades take on undue precedence:

G: You told me a few specific things [I could improve about my paper], but like, I wasn’t sure if like, if those things would make the difference between a ‘B’ and an ‘A’.

G: I can’t even calculate the probability of like a roll of the die. I’m just praying I didn’t fail.

B: I’m not as efficient as I used to be, and it’s killing me.

Is that for a good reason? Is it annoying, to you guys? If so, let me know.

Until then, all posts beginning with “comment:” will be exactly that: comments I’ve posted elsewhere, linked and recorded. It’ll even have its own category, along with a newly created category for all those “overheard” posts.