Many people I know complain that they will propose an exciting experiment to their advisor, only to have it shot down summarily. Then a few days later, the advisor comes by and says, "Hey, I had this great idea for an experiment...." and proceeds to detail their own proposal.
I've never had this happen. In fact, both of my advisors have been generous with intellectual credit almost to a fault. And yesterday my Advisor managed to provide almost the reverse scenario as what others complain about:
One month ago
Advisor: Yes, these will be tricky experiments. Let's see, here are a few possible ways you might get around the problem....X, Y, Z, Q, R, S.
Jekyll: Yeah, I'll see what I can do.
Yesterday
Jekyll: Hey, Advisor, you know I've been having trouble with X, Y, Z, and Q, so today I figured I would try R, and you know what? I think it might work for us.
Advisor: Wait, so you mean you could use R to get around this experimental problem? Why that's completely brilliant! That is a wonderful idea indeed!
[pause]
Jekyll: Uh, Advisor, I think you actually suggested it a while ago.
Advisor: Really? I had totally forgotten.
I suppose I could have kept my mouth shut and improved the next rec letter Advisor writes for me, but it hardly seemed worth it. Advisor was clearly happy, if embarrassed to have forgotten his own suggestion, and pleased that it might work.
Besides, I think his rec letter is pretty damn nice anyhow.
15 years ago
6 comments:
It is a false dichotomy that an idea is "yours" or "your mentor's", and it means absofuckinglutely nothing which of you "came up with it".
Similar things happens to me occasionally, though perhaps without the word brilliant... Maybe my boss is just thrilled when I remember his suggestions.
I think it probably doesn't matter that it was his idea because you 1) remembered it and 2) thought about how it would work, if it applied, etc, etc.
I think it would matter if only one person came up with ideas (and I'm thinking about a situation in which the mentor planned everything, clearly). But in a situation with a good back and forth, it probably doesn't.
I've had this happen to me, too! And I would feel bad letting my advisor think it was my idea when really, it was his. I guess I don't understand where CPP is coming from when he says that whose idea it was means nothing. I'm in a situation where there's a "good back and forth," as Southern Grad Girl put it. And while I don't think that whose idea it was is the most important thing, I think it's important to give credit where credit is due.
If he suggested 50 things, and you picked the one that's worth trying, he correctly doesn't remember that it was his idea.
That's a funny story. Similar things happened to me that illustrate the personalities of my two advisors:
My main advisor several times found the ideas I presented him with "great" when they in fact came from him originally. On the other hand he tended to like my ideas less, so I think there was definitely some recognition memory at work, even though he couldn't identify the ideas as his. Anyhow, he is a creative guy and wasn't to worried about attributing originality.
My second advisor on the other hand was a bit slower, so it happened to me several times that I would try to get something across to him and he wouldn't get it until one day he came to me with his "brilliant new idea".
Comrade -- you must be a boring uncreative fucker to react so strongly to this story.
CPP is wrong.
And I think you get points for listening to your advisor, so it will probably HELP your rec letter, not hurt it.
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