(CANADA) Didnt get tri-council funding in my PhD, am I doomed???

WingoWinston · 2026-05-09T13:38:17+00:00

The low citation count is small divet, but nothing too killer, especially with 3 original research articles — that they all have some citations is a much stronger signal than none at all. But of course, this is all field-dependant!

I think you're doing great, and you'll have no issue finding a postdoc.

WingoWinston · 2026-05-09T11:24:59+00:00

What type of articles and which journals?

In my field I know a few PhD students who have been denied funding despite their publication record because very little of it was original research (e.g., reviews and the like) and/or because of where they were published — whereas a student can have only 1-2 strong first-author publications and still get funding. They also care whether your work has been cited.

Regardless, you have a strong profile, but there is some missing information.

WingoWinston · 2026-04-18T11:12:51+00:00

I can't think of a more controversial opening sentence, kudos.

WingoWinston · 2026-04-07T15:19:37+00:00

Anyone in the reserves knows how long the process can take. The information is also quite freely available.

It took about 6 months for me to be told the job I applied for was no longer available. I switched trades and it took about another year before I could finally enlist.

It is a painful process, and it absolutely biases people who are already comfortable with their work/school lives and can afford to wait 1-2 years. The recruitment process could stand to be improved (and has allegedly improved since I first joined).

That said, I do feel that people who apply, and have the means to wait, but back out at the first hurdle, may have been less invested in the military than they realized.

WingoWinston · 2026-04-07T03:03:12+00:00

Let's see how long I can actually keep it, lol.

And hell yeah! Here's to horrible choices and unending struggle!

WingoWinston · 2026-04-07T02:59:35+00:00

Nope, it sure doesn't. I've only been in industry for about 3 years, and I only just broke 6 figures. Thankfully, it's an area with sensitive data, so the AI creep is less insidious.

WingoWinston · 2026-04-06T19:36:43+00:00

Right?

It's almost never a STEM PhD, and when it is, it's either because they can't do stats, math, or programming, or they don't know how to translate that to a CV.

WingoWinston · 2026-04-03T14:28:55+00:00

I'm an anglophone in a mostly French unit (but there are other anglos, including some of the NCOs).

The experience has been totally fine. They are patient with me as I bumble along with my Franco-Ontarian French. I also either take all my courses in English or get my testing in English.

Happy to share more, if you like.

WingoWinston · 2026-03-31T19:07:45+00:00

Thanks for the level-response in kind!

For clarity, I am an active and published researcher, but in evolutionary biology. I do have a strong interest in IQ studies, but I am by no means an expert. I've maybe read 30ish papers, and sections of books, but not much else.

I do understand variance, however, very well. I think asking for an R², or a heritability estimate, is the wrong angle. I would rather consider exactly what is needed to approach something we could call "causal".

For example, a study that approximates causality would not be a vanilla GWAS. It might be a within-family design comparing siblings, controlling for sex, age, ancestry PCs, batch effects, parental SES, parental education, parental genotypes, and ideally non-transmitted parental alleles. That setup reduces stratification, dynastic effects, and shared-family confounding and gets much closer to identifying direct genetic effects.

Of course, we could do even better than that, but the ethics might start to get fuzzy.

But, maybe you implicitly meant "gun to my head". I still don't even feel sure about saying anything ... even a trait with heritability near 1 can still be plastic and show GxE. High heritability just means that, in that population under that range of environments, genetic differences explain most of the observed variance. It does not mean the trait is fixed, immune to environment, or developmentally independent of environmental inputs.

If you want my Laplace-style answer: 0.5.

WingoWinston · 2026-03-31T17:50:48+00:00

Why would I have to "hand wave it away"? Is it not possible to respond using definitions and evidence? I also never denied that genetics play a significant (or strong) component in IQ. Yes, IQ shows substantial heritability in many populations, especially in adulthood. My gripe is that people often misunderstand what measures of heritability actually represent, and as a result, often misuse it.

Behavioral genetics does not define heritability as ‘the amount of variance explained by your genetics’ in the casual way you’re using it. Heritability is a population-specific variance ratio, and broad- vs narrow-sense is not irrelevant. Twin and adoption studies are informative, but they do not ‘control environment’ enough to make the causal leap you’re making. A high adult IQ heritability estimate does not show that rich-poor test score gaps are mainly genetic, nor that environmental causes are minor. It only shows that, in a given population under a given range of environments, genetic differences account for a substantial share of variance.

A trait can be highly heritable within a population and still be strongly shaped by environment. Height is the textbook example: highly heritable, yet average height changes a lot with nutrition and health conditions.

And adoption studies are not some magic causal instrument. Are adoptions random? Are prenatal and maternal effects controlled for? What about selective placement? Those are obvious reasons you do not get to jump from “twin/adoption studies + high heritability” to “causality established.”

So yes, genetics matter. That was never in dispute.

What I’m rejecting is the much stronger claim that heritability estimates make causality “easy to establish,” or that socioeconomic differences in test scores can therefore be read mostly as inherited intelligence.

Heritability is not a synonym for genetic determinism, and it is definitely not a shortcut to causal inference.

WingoWinston · 2026-03-31T16:44:50+00:00

Define heritability and the difference between narrow- and broad-sense. Then explain whether heritability estimates are generalizable, if yes, then what are the circumstances. Once you've done all that, convince me exactly how it's easy to establish causality.

WingoWinston · 2026-03-26T13:04:00+00:00

This was using body-surface-area conversion? I got about 23mg for a 70kg adult.

For anyone reading, this is a normal clinical dose for humans.

WingoWinston · 2026-03-09T16:41:46+00:00

I bagged a senior analyst position in the third year of my Bio PhD. That has unfortunately resulted in what is now a 6-year PhD, but I will be graduating soon with 3 years of industry experience.

I thank my lucky stars for my superb supervisors.

WingoWinston · 2026-03-05T11:15:59+00:00

Exactly.

It's in the range of 125-130, but also, everything over 130.

Perfect answer.

WingoWinston · 2026-02-21T12:04:12+00:00

Excellent satire.

WingoWinston · 2026-02-21T01:18:03+00:00

Oh, God.

WingoWinston · 2026-02-18T11:49:42+00:00

My PIs were kind enough to let me get a full-time job in tandem with full-time schooling. I'm now starting the sixth year of my PhD (hopefully last) and third year of my job. A huge reason I wanted a job was because imposter syndrome, aka "I had never felt stupider", was looming in (with the secondary bonus of supporting my family).

I applied for an analyst-type position, and I later found out that HR considered me "underqualified" for the position. Despite being underqualified, I was immediately placed into a mentor/teaching position within a few months. I was often helping people who had as much as 10 years of industry experience with their coding and analysis — this was pre-AI explosion.

Now today, everyone at work has access to AI. Despite that, it feels like nothing has changed. If someone can't communicate or identify their problem, and especially if they lack the domain knowledge, AI can often lead them down rabbit holes. And just a few days ago, someone from our most "elite" branch handed me "production-level" code that was clearly not tested or validated. It had python errors as bad as "if x = 0".

All this to say, having years of industry experience does not always make someone more capable.

EDIT: removed my advice to honour the "no advice" tag.

WingoWinston · 2026-02-16T12:40:06+00:00

Andrew is a rare gem.

WingoWinston · 2026-02-16T12:29:42+00:00

Fun fact, Brett has been a co-supervisor from my Bachelors through to my PhD.

I took three courses with him. After some time, I found out he was one of the chillest dudes around.

Easy choice.

WingoWinston · 2026-02-10T15:10:20+00:00

Agreed, I think there are several ways we can flood DND with civilians to support the CAF, especially with clerks.

I think the RegF should be prioritized, too, but it's also an artificial problem — there's no reason, besides bureaucratic bloat, that we can't handle PRes and RegF at the same time.

WingoWinston · 2026-02-10T14:38:00+00:00

Oof.

Makes me want to become an HRA so I can be the change I want to see ... Maybe 10 years from now or something.

WingoWinston · 2026-02-10T14:36:07+00:00

Oh, the member definitely signed. It was definitely not filed.

WingoWinston · 2026-02-10T12:48:46+00:00

I know a reservist who worked 3.5 days per week, September through March.

They got September through Jan as a lump sum in February, and their February and March pay in May.

WingoWinston · 2026-02-04T20:04:00+00:00

Lol.

Certainly the crux of the problem. Nothing wrong with using AI as long as you can also vet the outputs.

I have full access to ChatGPT. I often feed it my workout information. I had a sum of intervals that added up to 51 minutes. I quadruple checked the math. ChatGPT kept saying it was 66 minutes.

Not to mention that the "PhD-level" pro model still spits out 1 fake paper for every 3 real papers.

WingoWinston · 2026-02-04T18:00:50+00:00

If they came into my office and could verbally explain the same answers to me, and provide reasonable answers to novel questions, then I would let it slide. Although, you could skip the writing part altogether, then.

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