I've been musing lately about critical thinking in science. (Duh, it's totally important.) What interests me is the friction between open-mindedness and realistic thinking.
If a trainee shows up in your office brandishing a humorously unlikely hypothesis, what should you do? Do you exert your critical thinking skills and explain calmly how patently implausible this idea is? Guide the trainee down that same path? Or do you entertain it seriously for a while, long enough to see if maybe your reflexive "no way" was too hidebound, too rigid, too establishment?
I've actually been thinking about this because of the reverse situation: GradAdvisor proposed, to another grad student, an experiment that I found laughably naive and uninformative. The idea was dropped. Six months later, I find myself suggesting the exact same experiment. Better framework, new interpretation, but still--the same experiment.
I can't decide if I was wrong to shrug off GradAdvisor's original suggestion. I think I was wrong to dismiss it so quickly. Still, at the time the rationale for the experiment was piss-poor, and consisted largely of "Whaddya think would happen if we looked at this other pathway?" My rationale for renewing the idea was much better defined ("This experiment would tap into the bigger question of whether these two pathways are really different"). But I doubt I would have come up with this experiment if GradAdvisor hadn't suggested it in the first place. So: if I had taken this idea more seriously six months ago, maybe we'd have hashed out the rationale then and there'd already be data.
It's difficult to keep an open mind about experiments when you're simultaneously trying to prioritize among several plausible lines of research--who wants to think about the implausible routes? Put another way, how do you filter out the useless off-the-wall approaches without also filtering out the useful off-the-wall approaches?
Probably another reason why it's good to be sharing your data with smart folks on a regular basis--it's sometimes easier to think creatively about a project you're not emotionally invested in....
15 years ago
5 comments:
that is the CONSTANT dilemma many students face. My advisor likes to propose off the wall ideas, which are based sometimes based on sketchy data. He has been successful with some stuff not others. The problem is that that grad students are sent on wild goose chases, such that 2 students have disconnected theses (1 of which is a VERY smart, intelligent women who will be an amazing PI), 1 has no theses after ~4 years, 1 has a very tight thesis and will graduate within 5 years and 1 had a very tight thesis finished in 4 years. Then there is me, who is starting out?
Professionals who study the process of creativity all state that it is very important to separate the process of brainstorming--coming up with new ideas--from the process of deciding what ideas to follow up on.
I take all suggestions the way physioprof says. The ideas are always useful to think about. Gethunken (sp?) experiments are always free!
Actually doing the experiment depends on how much it costs, how long it takes, and how interpretable it will be.
my equations look something like this:
fast + cheap + easy = ALWAYS DO
fast + easy + expensive = DEPENDS ON WHAT OTHER EXPENSIVE THINGS YOU NEED TO DO
slow + easy + cheap = ALWAYS DO
slow + easy + expensive = DEPENDS ON HOW SLOW
if
(fast + cheap + hard)x(# of times it takes to get it to be interpretable) < slow + easy + expensive
then
do
fast/cheap/hard x (# of times to get it to work)
otherwise
do
slow/easy/expensive
well you get the idea. there are formulas, and most of them depend on your budget, patience, and deadlines. that includes graduation deadlines, job application deadlines, grant deadlines...
when in doubt, use a calendar. plan ahead.
an open mind usually = progress.
what physioprof said. Learning to filter your PI's ideas (and your own) is one of the most important skills you learn in grad school.
every GS and postdoc should have at least 2 side projects going (erm, at least chemists), one of which is generally related to what you are doing and the other be vaguely related to what you are doing (at most). The brain works in weird ways and more than once I've dovetailed a weirdo idea/side project into an ongoing project to overcome a significant problem.
At worst you end up second author when a new person comes in and finishes up something cool that you started. . .
I like your equations, Ms PhD!
I understand trying to keep brainstorming separate from judging, but on a day-to-day basis there are frequently ideas tossed out, batted around for a while, and then pursued, or not. Usually the judging comes quickly. Maybe just slowing down the time it takes to arrive at a judgment would help?
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