I think I just found my field of study!

[Calax]

http://kotaku.com/5695144/does-cosmic-back...re-the-big-bang

 

The basics of it are:

There was probably a universe before this one

It collapsed and removed the entropy (disorder) from the universe

Expanded and added entropy.

 

 

YAY! I always liked this theory and now would have a valid reason to study it as I progress in my classwork!

[Monte Carlo]

Calax, stick with plumbing or electrical stuff, there is always work in these fields and there is a world recession on. Undertaking and anything to do with tax avoidance are also safe bets. Esoteric, where-did-we-come-from studies ain't going to pay the rent.

[Wrath of Dagon]

He could always do what most physics majors do, become a programmer. Or he could invent the next Xbox.

[Calax]

Or teach. I don't necessairly care that I am not gonna be the most successful son of a gun, but I do want to learn and work in a field that interests me rather than slog through life doing something I hate.... if I wanted that I would just stay at McD's and be a restaurant manager

[I want teh kotor 3]

Nice. And this comes from Penrose no less...

[Orogun01]

Or he could develop the unifying theory of everything

 

Sorry I couldn't help myself; at any rate I always hold scientist in high regard, right on brother!

 

@Monte Carlo: scientist is actually a good paying job in America right now since we have so few scientists, even less that are national. It's actually a good career choice.

[Humodour]

Hey guys (especially kotor and Calax) check this BBC documentary out (you can find it online if all else fails): http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00vdkmj

 

It's called 'BBC Horizon - What Happened Before the Big Bang' and if it does nothing else, it will surely get you thinking for the next week! The best bit about it is that it interviews dozens of top-notch physicists, including Penrose.

[Meshugger]

Calax, stick with plumbing or electrical stuff, there is always work in these fields and there is a world recession on. Undertaking and anything to do with tax avoidance are also safe bets. Esoteric, where-did-we-come-from studies ain't going to pay the rent.

 

Sure they do, working in academia is actually very well paid

[Humodour]

I dunno about other countries but scientists find jobs reasonably easily here, and certainly not just in academia.

 

But not always related to their field, either - banks, IT firms, etc are as happy to hire many of them as the universities, research groups, and CSIRO are.

[Meshugger]

Just to clarify, while i do make more money working as an engineer in the private sector, i do miss the times from working within academia. People at work only talk about building houses, kids, the rent and more kids. At the university, we would during a coffee break speculate about what would happen in the gravitational singularity in a black hole.

[Walsingham]

I work with all sorts. The problem is as you say that business people work very hard at doing crap, and academics work incredibly slowly on eternal truths. I'm working on a solution whichinbolves taping a n operations manager to a large stick and prodding academics with it. But it's in the early testing stages.

[Tigranes]

You should form a research committee towards that initiative, and they can get together to discuss putting forward a motion regarding a workshop to make initial suggestions regarding the development of the said solution.

[Humodour]

Exactly that kind of bureaucracy exists at the uni I work at Tig (so much so I laughed at the adjectives you chose, as meetings and groups are actually named like that), but we get things done very rapidly (weeks or months) because a) the people involved are all managers and executives with real power to implement whatever is discussed, and b) said managers and executives are very fast-moving people who like consensus-building/compromise but have a distaste for procrastination and delay, or excessive talking.

 

So, you know, bureaucracy can be quite potent in the right hands.

 

The other thing that is key at a university is constantly considering change. So you don't meet once or twice a year (or every two years), you meet once or twice a month, or as needed to discuss whatever anybody brings up as an issue.

 

Granted, I work on the admin/operations side of things, not academia, although the committees involve IT, academics, student leaders, learning support, etc. The variety of roles represented is really refreshing. Eh anyway not sure what the purpose of this post was but I certainly enjoy working at a university which constantly seeks to improve itself and involves all its stakeholders in doing so.

[Walsingham]

You should form a research committee towards that initiative, and they can get together to discuss putting forward a motion regarding a workshop to make initial suggestions regarding the development of the said solution.

 

Absolutely. plus we shouldn't move until we've got at least three papers published in peer reviewed journals. This will mean getting a commercial accountant to approve of an activity which earns no money directly They will of course insist that it does, and we willneed to spend five years just trying to assign a cash value to an artcile in the Journal of Instructive Latherings.