Today I had a Skype interview regarding a universities Ph.D program for physics. I talk about what questions were asked, as well as some of my answers!
G-Man Bond 007 That’s the point of Kurt Godel’s Theorem of incompleteness as well as Heisenberg’s uncertainty. The mysteries of this universe is like the small particles as well as the formal mathematical logic. We will never find the absolute truth, but we can explore more mysteries from a mystery. As a astrophysicist, I declare: String theory will be forgotten, and theory of everything will never be unified. *giggles* *giggles*
what's great is it could even be with like, basic stuff. Like i did an upper highschool research project (with support from a scientist and all of that) and it was literally how water rate alone (so volume was consistant) changed erosion. I ended up with a negative and very strong, significant correlation. It was so baffling and i have no clue why this happened, but now if i go into undergrad research or anything like that i want to test to see what will happen if i fix the kinks and manipulate the rate a bit more. So many questions!
I completely get that feeling of not learning enough. That's why I'm slightly less stressed about college right now, because it's the only logical next step for me: I'm not satisfied with my education so far. Good luck to all of us! :)) -Research in a sentence-Research is asking questions about the world to the most qualified entity: the world itself.
Hey Andrew, it’s pretty exciting to hear about all the opportunities that arise as you go on in your physics carreer. It’s pretty great to see someone talk about it as he goes in. I live in Colombia, and started college studying mechanical engineering, but have always loved physics and math, and finally next semester I might finally start to study physics at uni while I keep my mech eng degree going. However I was thinking of doing something very akin to what you do and try to male videos about what it is that you actually do as a student of a STEM field, but for the people who speak spanish.
I totally agree with you on the point in regards to the separation of astronomy and physics. It is frustrating choosing a path before you even have a beyond surface-level understanding of the field. One of the main reasons I decided to apply to my college is because they offer astrophysics as a bachelors degree, which I found to be unique and quite awesome - even though I plan on continuing through grad school. Astrophysics is my main focus and where I'm wanting to specialize. Being open to other fields of physics is also important and can be interesting, even if it ties in a little to your main interest. Their question about atmospheric physics would be of interest to me (at least as an internship, or research thing but not my specialization) with regards to other planets in our solar system. In one sentence define what research means to me?(having no experience in research) To me, research means applying your unique and imaginative way of thinking to help expand the knowledge of science, making sure your claims are falsifiable in the process.
Research can be described as anything that helps us learning more about universe around us in a way that enhances our knowledge as a species even though we as individual maybe wrong.
Thanks a lot for the information... And for me I don't think I'm the kind who answer this kind of questions in one sentence lol But well :for the definition of research I can say it's maybe collecting of information abt a particular subject or the investigation and examination aimed at the discovery of facts ,revision of accepted theories in the light of new facts !
So you enjoy Astro but applied for nuclear theory? Well same for me, partially cause at first I thought my quantum classes might be a waste but it turns out that we also have high energy astrophysics (and theoretical). For me I love general relativity bc it works numerically, and it can explain the motions of the particles as well if we can prove that outside this universe there exists another massive dimension that pull and cause their interactions
"Research is the action, while discovery is the result. You discover something because you research it. Research is the "process" and "discovery" is the product."
Research to me is developing a theory, collecting data, trying to make finesse mathematical relationships out of your collected data, and ending with more questions than you began to answer.
Andrew I have a question. I'm in highschool and have been following you since I have the goal of astrophysics. Are you doing a master's degree before your PhD? or straight to PhD? I'm not sure how it works entirely. Do you need a master's to go into astrophysics?
most graduate schools for physics and astrophysics have you apply to the PhD programs directly. Along the way you would technically fufill the requirements for a masters at some point, likely within 2 years of starting. There are certain programs you can apply for as well at other universities which are only masters degrees.
You definitely can do a master's before starting a PhD and it is not totally uncommon for some people to do it before moving on to a PhD, but it is a bit more uncommon in physics due to the fact that a master's in physics is perhaps one of the most useless graduate degrees on its own. The vast majority of people who consider physics graduate school either do not go at all or continue all the way for a PhD for this reason, therefore most will enter a PhD graduate program and pick up a master's by default after fulfilling whatever criteria for the completion of it, which is usually passing the required number of courses and qualifiers.
Another issue is that when doing a PhD, the university will generally wave tuition for you and pay you a livable salary for doing a combination of either research or TA-ing. Master's only programs are more often than not self-funded, so there is no benefit to applying only to one if you want to go on for a PhD anyway, unless you fall under the category of being a person who wants to continue to a PhD program and weren't so strong in undergrad and want to bolster your chance of being accepted to a good school by completing a master's first, which is what many who enter master's only programs are doing. It is not worth it, at least in physics, to pay so much tuition just to complete a master's in physics if you are not fully intending to continue down the path towards a PhD. That is about the only reason a person could possibly have to do a master's only in physics. Unless you gain significant experience in the two years or less of completing a master's degree in some area which is useful for industry jobs, the master's in physics has almost zero benefit when it comes to jobs since the courses teach fundamental physics information and not applied information that can be used, like in a master's in engineering or computer science or something similar, which is a much different case and actually can have a significant amount of value career-wise when looking for jobs.
First of all I would like to thank you for doing this. I am planning to study master program in physics (particles and Astroparticle physics). They have invited me for interview so I need to know how to answer this question "What difference would you bring if you are admitted to the program and study it successfully?" Can you please give me some brilliant answer to this question. Thank you.
The reason why you want to pursue graduate school might be either you want to learn more in depth or preserve mankind. Pretty cool reasons to study physics.
research, the act of starting something to find an answer, and end up leaving with more questions.
G-Man Bond 007 That’s the point of Kurt Godel’s Theorem of incompleteness as well as Heisenberg’s uncertainty. The mysteries of this universe is like the small particles as well as the formal mathematical logic. We will never find the absolute truth, but we can explore more mysteries from a mystery.
As a astrophysicist, I declare: String theory will be forgotten, and theory of everything will never be unified.
*giggles* *giggles*
Neyde Spears uncertainty principle is established by the non-commutability of linear operators.
what's great is it could even be with like, basic stuff. Like i did an upper highschool research project (with support from a scientist and all of that) and it was literally how water rate alone (so volume was consistant) changed erosion. I ended up with a negative and very strong, significant correlation. It was so baffling and i have no clue why this happened, but now if i go into undergrad research or anything like that i want to test to see what will happen if i fix the kinks and manipulate the rate a bit more. So many questions!
I completely get that feeling of not learning enough. That's why I'm slightly less stressed about college right now, because it's the only logical next step for me: I'm not satisfied with my education so far. Good luck to all of us! :))
-Research in a sentence-Research is asking questions about the world to the most qualified entity: the world itself.
Hey Andrew, it’s pretty exciting to hear about all the opportunities that arise as you go on in your physics carreer. It’s pretty great to see someone talk about it as he goes in. I live in Colombia, and started college studying mechanical engineering, but have always loved physics and math, and finally next semester I might finally start to study physics at uni while I keep my mech eng degree going. However I was thinking of doing something very akin to what you do and try to male videos about what it is that you actually do as a student of a STEM field, but for the people who speak spanish.
I totally agree with you on the point in regards to the separation of astronomy and physics. It is frustrating choosing a path before you even have a beyond surface-level understanding of the field. One of the main reasons I decided to apply to my college is because they offer astrophysics as a bachelors degree, which I found to be unique and quite awesome - even though I plan on continuing through grad school. Astrophysics is my main focus and where I'm wanting to specialize.
Being open to other fields of physics is also important and can be interesting, even if it ties in a little to your main interest. Their question about atmospheric physics would be of interest to me (at least as an internship, or research thing but not my specialization) with regards to other planets in our solar system.
In one sentence define what research means to me?(having no experience in research)
To me, research means applying your unique and imaginative way of thinking to help expand the knowledge of science, making sure your claims are falsifiable in the process.
Wow the astrophysics bachelors is unique. Also agree with your research definition!
Proud subscriber!! Hope you find one you’re happy to attend!
Andrew your attitude is inspiring :)
Good luck with your PhD application, personally I think you would be great in theoretical physics research :)
I like this one: Research is the process of trying your damn hardest to find the truth-value of a proposition.
Honestly, good for you. I sincerely hope you get to go where you want to go. You've worked pretty damn hard for it, after all!
Really nice of you! Thanks
Research can be described as anything that helps us learning more about universe around us in a way that enhances our knowledge as a species even though we as individual maybe wrong.
Thanks a lot for the information... And for me I don't think I'm the kind who answer this kind of questions in one sentence lol
But well :for the definition of research I can say it's maybe collecting of information abt a particular subject or the investigation and examination aimed at the discovery of facts ,revision of accepted theories in the light of new facts !
Reaching consensus on what the evidence is and on its proper handling by collecting new data and developing methodologies.
So you enjoy Astro but applied for nuclear theory? Well same for me, partially cause at first I thought my quantum classes might be a waste but it turns out that we also have high energy astrophysics (and theoretical).
For me I love general relativity bc it works numerically, and it can explain the motions of the particles as well if we can prove that outside this universe there exists another massive dimension that pull and cause their interactions
The opportunity to advance mankind's understanding of the univers even by the slightest bit.
"Research is the action, while discovery is the result. You discover something because you research it. Research is the "process" and "discovery" is the product."
Research, the act of expanding the surface of the knowledge bubble bit by bit
Research to me is developing a theory, collecting data, trying to make finesse mathematical relationships out of your collected data, and ending with more questions than you began to answer.
Hope you get it!
Research is searching youtube and finding andrew dotson as the most entertaining physics youtuber.
Andrew I have a question. I'm in highschool and have been following you since I have the goal of astrophysics. Are you doing a master's degree before your PhD? or straight to PhD? I'm not sure how it works entirely. Do you need a master's to go into astrophysics?
most graduate schools for physics and astrophysics have you apply to the PhD programs directly. Along the way you would technically fufill the requirements for a masters at some point, likely within 2 years of starting. There are certain programs you can apply for as well at other universities which are only masters degrees.
Chris Allen Thanks !
You definitely can do a master's before starting a PhD and it is not totally uncommon for some people to do it before moving on to a PhD, but it is a bit more uncommon in physics due to the fact that a master's in physics is perhaps one of the most useless graduate degrees on its own. The vast majority of people who consider physics graduate school either do not go at all or continue all the way for a PhD for this reason, therefore most will enter a PhD graduate program and pick up a master's by default after fulfilling whatever criteria for the completion of it, which is usually passing the required number of courses and qualifiers.
Another issue is that when doing a PhD, the university will generally wave tuition for you and pay you a livable salary for doing a combination of either research or TA-ing. Master's only programs are more often than not self-funded, so there is no benefit to applying only to one if you want to go on for a PhD anyway, unless you fall under the category of being a person who wants to continue to a PhD program and weren't so strong in undergrad and want to bolster your chance of being accepted to a good school by completing a master's first, which is what many who enter master's only programs are doing. It is not worth it, at least in physics, to pay so much tuition just to complete a master's in physics if you are not fully intending to continue down the path towards a PhD. That is about the only reason a person could possibly have to do a master's only in physics. Unless you gain significant experience in the two years or less of completing a master's degree in some area which is useful for industry jobs, the master's in physics has almost zero benefit when it comes to jobs since the courses teach fundamental physics information and not applied information that can be used, like in a master's in engineering or computer science or something similar, which is a much different case and actually can have a significant amount of value career-wise when looking for jobs.
Research is life.
Research... Seeking answers to finally get them with more questions
Good luck 😊
Thank you!
First of all I would like to thank you for doing this. I am planning to study master program in physics (particles and Astroparticle physics). They have invited me for interview so I need to know how to answer this question "What difference would you bring if you are admitted to the program and study it successfully?"
Can you please give me some brilliant answer to this question.
Thank you.
Define research: Finding out exactly what the answer almost is
General relativity !!!!!!!!! :D
Kevin Somenzi (GR)owl
The reason why you want to pursue graduate school might be either you want to learn more in depth or preserve mankind. Pretty cool reasons to study physics.
Was this at the school that you ended up getting attending for graduate school?
Q:Define research? A: the quest for truth!
Research, sth humas do to explore the unknown hoping they get lost.
I have an interview in 2 days!! So much panic
UC Santa Cruz!
Hey, are you currently doing a masters degree?
Finishing my Bachelors
You are out of focus.