I was making small talk with someone at a party who asked what my research was about. I gave my one-paragraph spiel to which this person replied, "but we must already know all that." The person was also a scientist, but in a field very different from mine. I tried to explain that, no, we really don't know all the important things there are to know about the subject, and I described some of the outstanding questions. The conversation was interrupted and the person remained skeptical.
I find it rather arrogant to assume you know enough to determine that a whole field of research is stupid.
25 comments:
Oh god, this is absolutely one of my biggest pet peeves - I get this all. the. time. about my research area. It's absolutely infuriating on a bad day and mildly disgusting on a good day.
Gross. Damn the man.
I've gotten a comment along the lines "it has to be boring to be in your sub-field. My sub-field, on the other hand, is super exciting!" Snobs. And, ditto.
As someone who has talked to you about your work, it is far from dumb. I'm irritated that this person seemed incapable of listening.
People like this are arrogant and retarded. The appropriate response would have been, "Fuck off, dumbass!" Ha. There will always be people out there who think they know more than the experts in the field.
This is a huge pet peeve of mine as well, although most people aren't as overt with their arrogance as this person was to you! It is almost inevitable that when I tell non-scientists my major (Zoology), they smile, cock their head, and say "How interesting, but what are you going to do with that?" But even worse is if they ask if I'm going to be a zookeeper when I graduate...
Anyway, sorry you had that encounter. I think it would be pretty sad and boring to have so little interest in learning about the work being done in other fields.
You're right, that is extremely arrogant. What a jerk.
I get this a good amount about my sub-field. I got this recently from a student rotating in another lab. I was sorely tempted to return, "So, going to cure cancer by the time you're done, huh?" It really, really annoys me.
Definitely an arrogant jerk.
What an ass.
I can relate all too well, try being a psychologist... EVERYONE knows all there is to know about that field of study. :)
I get this about my subfield all the time. People think my subfield was resolved about 20 years ago because they learned the basics in intro Bio. It's really frustrating.
This is just an adult version of the student whine, "When are we ever gonna have to use this?" It's just inconceivable to many people- even educated people- that because they know nothing about a subject, that subject might still be important.
Wow, looks like I hit a nerve! And that just about everyone has experienced this to some degree. I think we should all vow to give everyone else the benefit of the doubt with respect to the coolness of research.
I'm with Psych Post Doc - in psychology every joe schmo thinks they have the answer to your research.
"OH THANKS Joe Schmoe! All this time I spent getting my Ph.D. and doing all this work, I should have just asked you!"
EcoGeoFemme
I happened onto your blog as I am currently searching for a post-doc. But I'm wondering- the lighthouse photo on your blog looks familiar. Is it from Down Under?
Loren
Even the basics are no longer basics. When I first took intro biology way way back, introns were thought to be junk DNA...just saying.
I'm with Candid Engineer on this one (and everyone else!). Makes me wonder whether the person who said it actually knows anything about anything! I mean, why ask a question like that, and then respond with what is practically a conversation stopper? Hopefully, it's someone you can avoid.
I'm also assuming it was a man, but you didn't actually say.
1. Print off the previous 7 days of phdcomics.
2. Roll up.
3. Pop the ignorant ass on the head.
Just sent an email to your ecogeofemme gmail address with regards to a project I'd love for you to be involved in - thought I'd mention it here in case you don't check your mails that much. Cheers!
I've gotten this comment before, but not in a long time.
In my case, I had to learn how to talk about the really novel parts of my work so that other people would agree the evidence is surprising and paradoxical, and therefore leads to some very important unanswered questions. But it took me a while to learn how to do this.
However, I still sometimes run into the people who can't shut up long enough to hear my 2 sentences about what I do, or who are only impressed with me when I ask them about their work. Welcome to science. Can't get away from them, can't wait for them to run out of funding.
This means that you are doing a shitty job of explaining what you study.
Yet more examples from you all that make me think this happens to the best of us.
Loren, the lighthouse is a bit of a landmark. I'd rather not have its location be a search term for this blog, but if you email me I'll tell you where it is.
SF, I avoided saying the person's gender on purpose. But you are right, it was a man.
Ms.PhD, I have to do the opposite. I have to show how my work is generally relevant/interesting before anyone cares about the most novel parts. Regular people only get hooked after I explain the stuff we learned 50 years ago.
CPP, clearly my one-paragraph summary didn't work. I don't have this problem all that often, so I like to think if the conversation hadn't been interrupted, I could have convinced him how cool my work is.
Or CPP some people are just asshats and will always be that way no matter what you say.
Yeah, TJ, I think I agree after encountering a royal asshat last week. I entered a research contest, and one of my judges started the conversation by saying, "My background is way different from yours and I"m not interested in your work at all. Can you just tell me about your poster so I can judge it?" She constantly interrupted me with strange questions, didn't listen to my answers, and at the end patted my shoulder and said, "well, I'm glad someone is interested in this." Nice.
I told my father in law all about my lab and what we're doing, and then closed by saying how much fun we're having.
His response: "But you aren't just supposed to be having fun, are you? Aren't you supposed to be DOING something?"
EcoGeoFemme,
Yep, that certainly sounds like a royal asshat to me too.
Sounds like a typical scientist to me. What can I say? Get used to it.
If you're planning to stay in this field, our choices are basically to
a) figure out how to please the asshats
b) quit academia (if that's an option for your field) and avoid the asshats
c) get fucked over when the asshats decide they don't like you.
Most people go with a or b when they start to realize that c is really not worth dealing with for the rest of your career.
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