Are top CS theorists nice people? Would they even talk with you? (comment 25)

http://blog.computationalcomplexity.org/2009/09/why-you-shouldn-not-go-to-focs.html

by amichail • 17 years ago

30 48 17 years ago

blog.computationalcomplexity.org

amichail4• 17 years ago

If it is indeed the case that many of them are dismissive to those who are not likely to be useful to them in research, is this logical behavior?

CS theory requires the highest IQ of any subfield of CS to succeed at the highest levels, so perhaps this behavior is reasonable.

mustpax• 17 years ago

You are making several big assumptions here: 1. Grad students from non-Ivy PhD programs are useless as research collaborators. 2. People doing CS theory need to be smarter than the average CS PhD. 3. People who go to non-Ivy schools are dumber.

These all strike me as ego-driven and unfounded statements.

(Not to mention the giant question mark around IQ as a valid measurement of general intellectual aptitude.)

unalone2• 17 years ago

I spent a month at Princeton this summer, working alongside current Princeton students and a handful of the people that work at Princeton.

Princeton people are usually very bright. Not all of them are—many of them are capable of regurgitating academically and not much more—but overall it's a community of smart people. It is not, however, particularly brighter than a handful of other communities. Perhaps there's less riffraff, so you only have people above average there, but there's this perception that you have to be a genius to be Ivy and that's simply not true.

Until my stint at Princeton, I was a "Princeton child". I grew up loving Princeton, I wanted to have a Princeton degree on my resume and live in the enormous castles that Princeton calls dorms. After staying there, I came away with the perception that Princeton's a great college, but it's not head-and-shoulders above any number of other great colleges, and there's nothing special about the people that go there. (They also put up fake ivy on new buildings, which I consider false advertising.)

Another way of putting it: The smartest group of people I've ever worked with was a group of twelve writers who I met when I was sixteen. They were all pretty remarkable people. Of that group, two went to Princeton, one went to Brown, a handful went to schools like Vassar and NYU, and a few went to shitty NJ public schools like I did for a year. So when you're talking to people from shitty public schools, remember that there're people there who could put half of Princeton to shame. Not everybody there's going to be brilliant, but not everybody at Princeton's brilliant either.

yalurker2• 17 years ago

Wow, I had the luck of meeting Aaron a few years ago. I have actually referenced him as when I learned the limit of my own intelligence - I had a 4.0 gpa as a CS major and thought myself quite bright, until I was simply blown away by the orders of magnitude greater ability to think about complex problems that he possessed.

It's incredibly disheartening to read that post. It seems tragic that someone like Aaron would be shut out due to not attending the right school.

me2i814• 17 years ago

Complaining about "Ivies" in the context of CS theory is a bit goofy. Princeton is in the top echelon for theory, but I'm not sure the other Ivies would crack the top 5.

kobs4• 17 years ago

'Ivies' is used (erroneously)* as a blanket term to descibe a number of elite institutions (think Stanford, MIT, Caltech, Berkeley, top LACs, etc.)

... connotation.

me2i814• 17 years ago

Sometimes people include top-ranked private universities like Stanford, but never for public universities, and never to refer to top schools in a particular field where the rest of the Ivies are notably weak.

carterschonwald• 17 years ago

the correct term is "top tier" or "tier 1" schools. The "ivies" are a sports league of schools that all happen to be good at academics: dartmouth, harvard, brown, columbia, yale, princeton, upenn, cornell.

coliveira• 17 years ago

I do research in an area that is tangent to CS theory. My experience with meeting some of these people is exactly this: they will not pay attention to you if you are not from their clique.

Also, every time I visit this blog I see comments on the same theme: that theory-oriented conferences are managed by a clique, that others don't feel welcome... So, my general feeling is that they have deep problems in their community (and I don't mean theoretical problems).

gdp9• 17 years ago

That's actually true of computer science in general. Ever turned up to a web conference? Or an OO conference? or a Java conference? I guarantee you that I feel as out of place and excluded in any of those forums as I'm sure you do in a theory conference.

The thing about any "community" that is well-defined enough to justify having its own conferences is that it has its own set of foundational assumptions and jargon, and conventions. If you don't know these things, you're going to have trouble participating at a high level.

I don't think it's so much that people will not "pay attention" to you - it's probably just that what you are saying isn't very interesting. The thing about non-theory CS people interacting with theoretical CS people is that they usually present exactly the same arguments/problems/ideas that everyone else does. Believe me, you get _really_ bored by the seventeenth time you have to address the question "but what if the theorem prover has bugs in it?!", pronounced with the swagger of someone who believes they have just hit upon a novel idea.

I imagine that if I turned up to a gathering of high-energy particle physicists, I don't think they would pay much attention to my thoughts on the subject either.

It's not dismissive behaviour, either. It's actually just a common mistake within CS to believe that you can turn your hand to any part of CS - you're essentially participating in a very high-level discussion.

To answer the original question, I've found people in the top echelons of theoretical CS to be extremely patient and friendly.

I asked some really silly questions of top researchers (in one-on-one or small group situations) as an undergraduate that probably deserved to be answered with disdain - I still cringe in retrospect. The most biting retort I ever got was "Oh, that's covered in <such-and-such-a-paper>, which is worth reading if you're interested in this". Hardly a telling-off. For the most part, people have always taken the time to explain things from first principles, or re-state them in ways that I could understand.

The idea of the ivory tower is a bit of a misconception. You're talking about very, very smart people who are usually more than accommodating when it comes to answering genuine questions or just engaging in discussions. I would jump at the chance to talk to them about anything and everything - it'll be interesting to say the least, and they are some of the nicest people you'll meet in CS.

yalurker2• 17 years ago

Clarifying point - although coliveira's comment was as something of a true outsider, the original comment in the linked article was from a published phD student in theory who felt snubbed based on his response to "What school do you go to?"

dagw• 17 years ago

This isn't unique to CS. All academic fields suffer more or less the same problem to a greater or lesser extent.

stcredzero• 17 years ago

When I was going to the University of South Carolina, I had the good fortune of having Karel Čulík as one of my professors. In addition to generally being a happy person and obviously enthusiastic about automata theory, I also found that he could talk about computer science in a largely egoless fashion. If someone at a talk said something a bit clueless, or even hugely idiotic, he would simply find the most intelligent interpretation possible of what they said, then just see what the implications were according to theory. No bullying or dominance games needed, just a simple joy in doing computer science.

I wish more science/tech folks were like this. To me, this is what it means to have intellectual integrity. Too many techies and academics feel that they have a tenuous hold on status in their community, which tends to make them petty.

andreyf• 17 years ago

I notice this pattern among my smarter friends, as well - when someone says something vague or badly defined, they try to understand the person's mindset, and clarify their ideas, instead of rejecting the faulty semantics they used to express them. One can always find semantics to argue about, and petty people usually do.

davidw• 17 years ago

I met Simon Peyton-Jones at a dinner once, and he came across as a really nice guy. He seemed interested in what I was doing, even though it's leagues away from what he does, and not nearly so 'interesting'. Highly recommended.

amichail4• 17 years ago

He is not a member of this community.

oconnor02• 17 years ago

SPJ's not a member of the top CS theorists?

me2i814• 17 years ago

It's important to understand that when you're young, it can be difficult to tell the difference between elitism and social awkwardness.

sketerpot• 17 years ago

That still doesn't explain why conferences in other CS fields felt so much more welcoming to the OP.

psyklic• 17 years ago

Much of this is likely psychological -- in casual conversation at conferences, I definitely ask people about what school they go to rather than what their research project is. Whenever I ask someone about their research project, they launch into an often lengthy synopsis which typically requires ten minutes of clarifying questions to even understand. Then, they may offer to forward me their paper which I must accept or feel callous.

derefr• 17 years ago

How about "what are you working on, in ten words or less?" it sounds mean, but it really is what you want from the other person, isn't it?

endtime• 17 years ago

Rajeev Motwani was a very nice guy and would certainly talk to you. He's the only top CS theorist I've met.

Are top CS theorists nice people? Would they even talk with you? (comment 25)

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