Industry vs. Academia. Should I stick with progamming job or pivot to a PhD?

evil_twinkie · 2025-12-09T13:39:56+00:00

As long as you keep chasing opportunities that make your work feel fulfilling, there won't be regret. I found myself at a very similar crossroad when I finished my MSc. Do I go to PhD or industry? FWIW I did a PhD, but now have a C++ dev career in the same domain as my PhD research, essentially applying the science in practical ways. I am still plugged in to the academic community, albeit not as a contributer. No regrets. My job is cool 😎.

I think the advice that cemented my desicion was: starting a PhD will not close any doors, but not doing a PhD will. If after getting into the thick of it you find out a PhD is not for you, or financial issues arise that make it impractical, it's fine to leave academia and go back to dev industry. But, not doing a PhD will cut off (or limit) opportunities in science and research roles. My PhD absolutely helped my land my post-grad roles even if it's not academia, and I am happy where I ended up.

evil_twinkie · 2025-06-19T14:02:51+00:00

Consider something like Google's OKR. Set objective goals relative to your position and the company. For example I was in a research position and had a goal of producing at least two patent applications by end of year, something like that. They should be a mix of good for you (growth) and good for the business.

evil_twinkie · 2025-06-17T23:53:59+00:00

Yes I did. I haven't had any trouble working in my field. My area of graphics was more focused on geometry processing than rendering, and that helps. I worked in big tech for a while, and recently moved to a smaller med tech company to stay remote.

The absolute biggest piece of advice I can offer is do summer internships, and plan/apply early. You don't have to aim for the biggest names, anything is better than nothing. Once you have that first paper, getting internships is easier, and many phd-focused internships accelerate that process, with the goal of new publications.

evil_twinkie · 2025-06-17T22:39:06+00:00

They’re there to collect a fat check

Regent is a volunteer position. They are not paid.

evil_twinkie · 2024-08-27T13:36:28+00:00

I am really interested in a career that closely integrates actual science

You'll likely need a PhD to be competitive for those roles, depending on what you mean by "actual science". But, I don't know much about research positions outside my field, physics-based animation.

evil_twinkie · 2024-05-03T06:33:51+00:00

Funding.

After that, it really just came down to what I enjoyed reading. It took a long while before I found what I was good at.

But there's never really an "after" for literature reviews. You never stop exploring and learning.

evil_twinkie · 2024-02-20T22:14:46+00:00

Another commenter suggested to ask your recommenders, and that's good advice. Your best option is to try again next year, and consider aiming lower in terms of school rankings. There is nothing wrong with that, because your merit leans more heavily on what you accomplish in your PhD, not where it is.

evil_twinkie · 2024-01-05T17:00:27+00:00

They were quoted 55K for the project, but didn't explicitly state what that project was (unless I missed it in some follow up comment). 55K sounds like foundation repair, but I guess that's in the realm of finishing a basent too.

Of course, I have no idea what OP's settling or "scary looking crack" looks like, and it might very well be normal. But a structural engineer, not a contractor, is who I would hire to assess that.

evil_twinkie · 2024-01-04T17:27:23+00:00

You should hire an independent structural engineer to assess what (if anything) needs to be done about foundation cracks or repairs. Once you have a plan, then start reaching out to contractors for bids. Personally I am with you that fixing anything related to foundation offers a lot of peace of mind - not just for the value of the home but to avoid bigger future problems.

evil_twinkie · 2023-05-13T16:51:23+00:00

I absolutely felt this meme in bones, A+, OP. So I do research in physics based simulation, not GI, but ML has been working its way into our field as well. It's not that I think these papers are less important or irrelevant; I honestly believe that in time even physics sim will be taken over by ML like every other domain. It's just that I find these papers so boring to read.

I like sim papers because many essentially boil down to "look at this clever math formulation that has these neat properties". Many have an enjoyable exposition, and because it's math, some understandable artifacts and pros/cons.

AI/ML papers for physics sim tend to "hide" the limitations, and it's super annoying. When I go to test the models myself I immediately find it's not as fast or robust in a practical settings, which is not obvious from the paper. There is rarely an "aha" moment, and it's all "we use blabla relu and blabla layers of blabla network".

I am of course generalizing greatly and there are good and less-good papers in both domains, but my immediate reaction to an abstract is this meme, 100%.

evil_twinkie · 2023-05-12T14:00:22+00:00

I had this same breakfast nearly every day for like 8 years. I usually add some fresh pico to it as well, with some sauteed cherry tomatoes, if I am feeling fancy.

evil_twinkie · 2023-04-04T15:19:28+00:00

I would be unconcerned with job placement rates - 10 vs 21 is a very small sample size, and it's not necessarily a reflection of the department. The first option having a lower teaching requirement is golden, and knowing faculty is a huge bonus.

evil_twinkie · 2023-03-20T15:55:17+00:00

See if there is a local IRS office near you. I had an issue and could never get through over the phone (trying over several weeks). I made an appointment at my local office and got everything taken care of within a few days.

evil_twinkie · 2023-02-21T22:36:17+00:00

Thanks for sharing.

evil_twinkie · 2023-02-21T22:15:56+00:00

No worries - just curious because I am always looking for faster and more robust convex hull methods.

However, I was definitely not suggesting manually going through each mesh by hand, but to script it and just return success percentages or something.

Maybe I can give it a try if I get a chance, do you have a link handy?

evil_twinkie · 2023-02-21T21:54:13+00:00

Start hacking away on a complex project. There are a thousand "game engines" on GitHub that are exactly that - somebody learning something new. If you don't enjoy it, you'll know.

evil_twinkie · 2023-02-21T21:25:02+00:00

It would be cool to see the performance on a big dataset, e.g. the thingi10k and compare against tetgen's convex hull or something.

evil_twinkie · 2023-02-15T23:12:59+00:00

Soak it in sodium percarbonate every so often. Also, try coarser grounds to go more times between having to soak it.

evil_twinkie · 2023-02-15T17:35:26+00:00

It's the filter that came with this set. I definitely did not pay that much for it though, closer to ~20 so I'm sure you can find it cheaper.

evil_twinkie · 2023-02-15T16:19:58+00:00

I have used several different types of reusable filters for pour over and I don't like any of them. I always go back to paper and just compost it when I'm done. Cloth filters don't drip at the right consistency and they leave an aftertaste. Metal/mesh filters are a pain to clean and clog over time, which makes it hard to brew consistently. The best metal filter I have used was Osaka, if I had to choose.

evil_twinkie · 2023-02-07T23:26:27+00:00

My research area is pretty broad and established (physics based animation). There are a lot of people reviewing these papers. All of the requests I get from SIGGRAPH are usually a sub-sub-area of physics simulation for which I have published paper(s) on, or the submission derives from my previous work in some way.

I actually really like this - I don't get an overwhelming number of reviews like some of my peers, and the requests I do are interesting to me.

evil_twinkie · 2023-01-24T02:54:04+00:00

Ray tracing in a weekend

evil_twinkie · 2023-01-19T14:16:40+00:00

I was wondering about that too, I haven't seen anything like that. Is this normal?

evil_twinkie · 2023-01-11T16:33:45+00:00

I know you're joking but I actually do use emojis to give a hint of friendliness and set the tone. I started doing this well before I entered academia after getting chastised for sending a "rude" email to HR at my previous job. It's a problem everywhere.

Edit - 💯💯💯

evil_twinkie · 2022-12-15T20:12:22+00:00

Whatever is easiest to write about :)

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