Anyway I dunno. I probably am coming off more bitter about this than I really am because I really just don't like thinking about this kind of thing. It's not something that like... Actively bothers me day to day rather than a personal opinion.
And I didn't know Vector was gonna teach. I missed that or something. I respect teachers more than anyone, well at least the good ones. If any ONE field needs more love, respect, and APPLICANTS it's teachers! Because deep down it's education that makes the world go round. For all fields of work.
In that case I feel sorry if I brought you down Vector. I didn't know that at all and I thought you were gonna somehow make being a mathematician into a day job or however that works...
... How does that work? Can someone explain it to me? Because I have no idea how someone makes a living out of that and that only.
No, don't worry. I just wanted to make sure I wasn't hurting your feelings by accident, or something, because you sounded pretty sad.
Anyway, as far as how one becomes a mathematician...
After you've gotten into a bachelor's program, you study 14 hours a day for four years from professors who basically spend every day telling you how stupid you are (if you've gotten the good ones. The bad ones just smile, drink more coffee, and make obvious computational errors). Then you apply for a PhD program, when you continue to study similar hours, while teaching college students basic calculus and linear algebra. During this time, you have an advisor and are expected to do original research. The competition is brutal and you continue to be told how stupid you are. You have qualifying oral examinations before a panel of three professors and are tested in your knowledge of at least two foreign languages. Students have been known to faint during the exam due to lack of sleep and nutrition. Later, you have your thesis--your first major original work, which must again be defended and argued for before another panel of judges.
Then you apply for your first job, hopefully at a reputable university, where you pray that you can get tenure-track employment (so that you don't have horrible hours, pay, and job stability for the rest of your life). It's said that people doing this come in young and come out old and crazy--they age 20 years in two due to the pressure. "Publish or perish" is the saying. Once you've gotten tenure, you work until the age of eighty or so, teaching boring courses to undergraduates in applied sciences, slightly-more-interesting weeder courses to math students (because every math class is a weeder class), and graduate courses to graduate students (better, but still disappointing), all while continuing to do mathematical research and trying to be "inspiring" (whatever that should happen to mean to you). You receive bad evaluation after bad evaluation from students who "just don't get it," and are the butt of jokes in many other departments whenever anyone needs someone to feel less awkward than. Furthermore, you have to watch your students for signs of mental illness and greatness, which often go hand in hand.
The math department has the highest suicide and mental illness frequencies, hands down.
During this, you're naturally writing papers, fighting for grants, trying to squeeze out time for your "life's work" (whatever that is) and trying to patiently talk student after student through logical quantifiers and the full definition of continuous functions. At the same time, you have to find the gems in among the rough and press them, press them, press them until they nearly break--because that's how you make mathematicians. Once you've destroyed their mind for all practical purposes, then it can be rebuilt to do all sorts of interesting and crazy things, and everyone will be happy.
Then you die, and hope it was worth it.
(Upside: conferences in Hawaii, anyone? Eh? Eh?)
As far as mathematicians who don't teach--who are really just research mathematicians--there aren't that many of them nowadays. Generally, they get the PhD, then go into working for companies on whatever problems the company tells them need to be solved. This is generally considered the route for the guys who just couldn't cut academia.
Edit: And the atmosphere was already here. People were laughing at XCD or whatever the fuck it is before you were here Vector. As long as I'm here I'm going to feel like an Idiot surrounded by people who are gonna be the kind to order me around should I get a job.
Good, that makes me feel a lot better. Uh. Not that you feel like an idiot, but that I'm not directly responsible for making you feel bad. I hope we can work out some way to make everyone feel welcome here.
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Topic: Things that made you sad today thread. (Read 9703707 times)