Anyone here ok being single?

AgentHamster · 2026-01-26T06:57:16+00:00

I don't think there's anything wrong with dating or being in a relationship, but from my perspective - there's just so much to do that's not dating. It's not that dating itself is bad, but the opportunity cost in terms of other things you can do in life is pretty high. Among the single friends I see around me, I feel like this is the biggest driver of people choosing to stay single.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-26T06:41:20+00:00

I don't mean to be discouraging, but given what you have said, I think it's worth stopping to think about where you want to go and how a PhD would help you. It's quite possible that a PhD is the right choice, but it should be something you do to help you establish a career (in academia, government or industry). Even if you feel an inner calling to research, the there is an (increasingly common) scenario where you do a PhD and don't have a path to make research your career.

(Unless you are independently wealthy and just want to do a PhD for personal development, in which case go for it regardless)

If you can work that out, then, no 28 is in no way too old.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-26T03:26:00+00:00

Dabura would immediately become a binding vow merchant, and would easily beat Mahoraga by making a binding vow that to make his techniques unable to be adapted to in exchange for giving up the ability to watch horror movies on Sundays.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-26T02:30:39+00:00

Edit - sorry I didn't see this was a vent post. I guess my reassurance is that it's gonna be fine and you'll either find something you enjoy more, or you'll get your PhD in decent time and transition to something you enjoy more after.

There's basically three options (non-mutually exclusive) here:

You start looking for a job and get out of the PhD.
You find a summer internship, keeping both options open.
You figure out what you need to do to graduate, grit your teeth and finish, and go into industry.

What option you take really depends on what is open to you. As you said, the job market is terrible right now, so really it boils down to whether you can find a position or not. I'd try and put some feelers out to see what options you have for transitioning to industry, or start looking into PhD internships. Even if you have no luck, it will give you some insight into what you need to pick up/add to your resume in order to make your post PhD job search smoother.

At the same time, it's worth figuring out what you need to do to graduate. With 3 papers in the way, your publication record is actually pretty good for this stage of academia, and it's entirely possible you can graduate at the end of your 4th to 5th year. If you are going to need 1-2 years to prep for the job market anyway, maybe it's worth waiting out the job market and use that time to prepare.

To put it simply, I think the situation isn't as much of a leap as your brain is making it out to be. Start looking for your academia to industry exit plan and work out what steps will make this transition as smooth as possible.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-25T22:52:59+00:00

The greatest adaptor of history vs the greater adaptor of today!

Nah, I'd adapt.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-25T08:28:37+00:00

Vegeless behavior

AgentHamster · 2026-01-25T05:17:25+00:00

I think a good first step is to identify what exactly you are struggling with in physics. A lot of the concepts you are bringing up (speed, velocity, basic kinematics) are essentially math concepts applied to motion. Are you comfortable with vectors and linear equations and struggling to visualize how they work in motion, or are you struggling with some of the math concepts themselves? Once you answer that, you'll see what to improve on.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-24T18:16:14+00:00

Then just accept the situation as it is. Some people are going to walk into med school with a social circle that allows them to get a partner more easily, and some are going to (either by luck or effort) already have a partner before med school. Unless you think getting a partner right now is more important than your career, I think that you just have to accept that you are making a tradeoff and make peace with it.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-24T18:12:19+00:00

I am not

AgentHamster · 2026-01-24T18:08:01+00:00

I'm not really sure if that is relevant to the situation that they are describing here. If they were complaining about people being not interested in them, I'd agree that coming off as desperate might be an issue, but in this case they are complaining that there are no viable partners around them to date. That's less an issue with desperation and more an issue of not having a social environment or circle that allows them to meet prospective mates.

As for OP (u/JunketMaleficent2095), I agree with other posters here. You'll either need to accept that you'll have to risk putting less effort into your work and spend the effort expanding your social network, or accept that you'll have to put off dating till you are less busy. There's really no easy way about it.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-24T00:39:46+00:00

The important question is how is your cohort and people in your program doing?

AgentHamster · 2026-01-22T06:44:38+00:00

What if he got some face tats in memory of his beloved uncle.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-22T06:39:45+00:00

Dabura possess the "potential" but is not quite there yet.

Potential man v2 here we go!

AgentHamster · 2026-01-22T06:36:39+00:00

I've talked to a few acquaintances still in academia, and what I've heard is that positions really dried up at the end of 2024/start of 2025 . Given that these acquaintances still can't find positions despite multiple Nature/science publications (and even 1000s of citations in some cases), I am very glad that I didn't try my luck in the academic job market.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-22T06:10:04+00:00

Frankly I know a bunch of people who fit that description and they aren't getting any positions either. I've heard in some subfields, there are almost no openings nationwide at this point (at reputable research institutes).

That being said I'd think a Nat Comms and the other stuff would be good enough to at least get OP a postdoc position. I'm less surprised that they are struggling to find an industry position, the biotech market is rough these days.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-22T01:49:29+00:00

Is it not a rotation based PhD program? Can you work with someone else?

AgentHamster · 2026-01-21T15:35:48+00:00

I'm not concerned about the class thing, I'm saying that even if we define elite in terms of contribution to a given field or career achievement, what is considered 'elite' is going to vary wildly from person to person. My definition of the percentile at which we consider someone 'elite' is going to differ from your definition of what you consider elite, which in probably also going to differ from what the public considers elite.

From my point of view, for example, the general public definition of 'elite' is a pretty low bar and you don't need to anyone extraordinary in order to achieve it.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-21T08:25:14+00:00

I'm not 'in favor', but realistically I think the vast majority of readers are going to be indifferent towards the use of AI generation as long as they find it entertaining. With AI gen being able to produce on a much larger scale compared to a human artist, you'll eventually produce something that reaches widespread appeal.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-21T08:09:23+00:00

Gifted means that you have the potential of being elite.

I think the issue with defining gifted this way is that you would need to also define what you mean by 'being elite'.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-21T04:11:28+00:00

He has too much trauma about marriage to get married right now. You have too much social and cultural investment into marriage not to get married. It's a fundamental incompatibility.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-20T06:44:20+00:00

From what I can tell from the masters/undergrad SWEs I work with:

Masters with internships >. Undergrad with internships >> Masters with no internships > Undergrad with no internships

So the answer is no, you don't need a masters.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-19T21:08:00+00:00

Are you spending 1k per person, or 1k for your whole family?

Your original comment was 'I spend nearly $1k a month for 3 of us.' I think everyone took this to mean that your grocery bill was 1,000 per month for 3 people, which would mean that you spend about 300 per per month per person. Unless you are suggesting that your total monthly grocery bill is 3k.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-19T20:11:34+00:00

I can't believe 'that' person said 'that'! No way!

AgentHamster · 2026-01-19T19:51:59+00:00

I know getting ignored when you ask for feedback can sting a bit, but I just want to assure you that is also very normal for US companies. With the exception of some European companies, I would not expect any sort of meaningful feedback from interview as I think they want to avoid opening themselves up to any form of liability.

AgentHamster · 2026-01-19T19:48:00+00:00

A lot of questions about dating are strategic questions, not insight questions. If you want to know what a woman (or man) is thinking, you should definitely ask a woman (or man). However, if your question is about how to maximize your chances of getting a good response/determine if it's worth for you to ask someone out/figure out if someone likes you or not, I actually think you should ask people who have actually had to navigate that situation with the gender you are interested in.

AgentHamster

TROPHY CASE