Is Pursuing Multiple Ph.D.s a Viable Option for a Career in Theoretical Physics?

[causalset]

Why do you think no one understands your work unless you explain it to them in person for 3-4 hours (and even then it's only your former advisor)? i.e. what is the limiting factor

Edit -- I mean more specifically than "communication problems".

At least part of the problem is how detailed I am at explaining concepts, which involves two opposite issues:

1. Because I have thought about a certain concept for very long time I grew in taking it for granted so I don't explain it enough

2. Because I know that what I do is unconventional I try to explain every step of the way and I do it too much, leading to pages and pages of explanation that people can't follow.

Usually it is a combination of both. Some people tell me that I skip over important things while spend hours explaining something minuscule, and this is what results in people not knowing what the paper is about anyway.

But the issue is that the amount of explaining is not just a function of importance of a given topic; it is also a function of how easy or how hard it is to understand. And that is where the problem comes in: I can't assess what is easier for others to understand and what is harder -- some things look easy for me but not so easy for others while other things people immediately catch right away even though to me they don't look particularly easy. And the fact that it is both "too much" and "too little" explaining is precisely what makes it difficult to fix, since I can't use a simple formulae such as "be more brief" or "be more detailed". Thus I depend on people like Bombelli who would tell me exactly where I should be more brief and where more detailed.

Maybe part of the problem is that I haven't spent much time communicating with other scientists and so I am used to my own thinking style and don't really know how they think. Perhaps if I were to spend more time attending conferences and so forth I would grow to learn about the latter, even if I am talking about their work rather than my own? But that's just a theory.

 

[causalset]

Okay thanks for the clarifications causalset.
That's rather sad to depend on someone to "translate" your highly complicated thoughts into a text that physicists can understand. It wouldn't be fair for Bombelli to spend that much time to understand what you meant and then take another load of time to rewrite your papers. That guy must be busy for sure. Even if he agreed after all, if I were you I wouldn't feel really happy to depend on someone that much, that would make me feel as if I was back into childhood.

Unfortunately this is precisely what I have been doing. And this is part of what slows me down since Bombelli doesn't have time to do that so I spend a long time waiting for him.

There are 2 options I would consider in your case:
1)If I really want to finish the post doc and "fight" against myself rewriting my papers: I'd try to do it on my own. The work final work certainly won't be perfect but if a few people could understand it then that's already a huge improvement.
2)Find a job related to physics in some way. You already have a Ph.D., I think it would be definitely worth the try to seek for a physics related job first in the country you'd like and then in any other country. The pressure to publish and the huge trouble to express complicated thoughts would be gone, hopefully, if you had found a job that doesn't challenges this problem of you.

I would go with Option 1. My goal since childhood was research in theoretical physics, that's why I don't give it up so easily. It is what I was defining myself to be since I was 9.

Regarding "pressure to publish", every job has some kind of pressure to do SOMETHING. So in either case I have to learn something I didn't know before. So I might as well try and learn how to write clearly -- especially since learning physics is supposed to be a lot harder and I done that part; so it would be pity to throw it away simply because I didn't bother to do the rest of the work, including learning to write.

 

[Vanadium 50]

This thread has gone on in circles for two years. It's clear that you don't really want other people's opinion or advice, and are here for validation.

My goal since childhood was research in theoretical physics, that's why I don't give it up so easily. It is what I was defining myself to be since I was 9.

This is not a healthy attitude. Counseling might help you change it.

Thread closed.