Should I Pursue a PhD in Physics at 34?

[mrgo]

Hi all,

My question has been asked several times I suppose, nevertheless I am going to ask it once more hoping not to bore you to much.

My background in short: I have completed an Degree in Physics ( theoretical physics in Germany, deg. Diplom (equal to MS + 1 year research according to my former faculty) ), and hit a fairly good job with a little mathematics and programming involved plus career apportunities. Oh, and I am 34 years old

However, I miss physics and am wondering whether I should pursue the Phd. The usual constraints as bad payment, competing with much younger people and probably pretty bad prospects afterwards are quite keeping me away from the idea, so I would just like to hear someon else's opinion on that. I would appreciate every input, as the issue is really keeping me going, so to say.

Thanks a lot in advance & kind regards

 

[Vanadium 50]

You're going to be 40 eventually. You will have to decide whether you want to be 40 with or without a PhD.

That said, I think most people likely to have a successful career in the sciences would, if they thought a question had been asked before, search the forum to read the replies.

 

[ych22]

Hi all,

My question has been asked several times I suppose, nevertheless I am going to ask it once more hoping not to bore you to much.

My background in short: I have completed an Degree in Physics ( theoretical physics in Germany, deg. Diplom (equal to MS + 1 year research according to my former faculty) ), and hit a fairly good job with a little mathematics and programming involved plus career apportunities. Oh, and I am 34 years old

However, I miss physics and am wondering whether I should pursue the Phd. The usual constraints as bad payment, competing with much younger people and probably pretty bad prospects afterwards are quite keeping me away from the idea, so I would just like to hear someon else's opinion on that. I would appreciate every input, as the issue is really keeping me going, so to say.

Thanks a lot in advance & kind regards

Hi mrgo,

these issues do seem to crop up again and again in threads here- whether a Phd in physics is advisable. I think some relevant points are:

-although everyone is justified to do a Phd for their own reasons, one should never do a phd for the sake of earning "big money" or for the aim of getting a tenured faculty position because it is considered a long shot

-The demand for physics Phds would come from research and non-research industry (banks?), so you will not worry about getting a job unless you are targeting academia specifically.

-no one will deny that a Phd is always incredibly tough. Some people have found that an older age have helped them cope with postgraduate studies, others found the converse.

By the way, could you describe your job more in detail? I am an engineering student who is on the verge of making a decision to study a MS/Phd or go to work. A job with programming, mathematics and fairly good opportunities sounds like a dream job for me.

 

[mrgo]

Thanks so far for the answers.
And Especially to Vanadium50: even though I didn't ask for refreshing sarcasm, I got some. How nice of you!
By the way, concerning my post: the devil is in the detail as you surely know. For there was no question exactly matching mine, I posted it.

To Ych22: Yes, I too think one major question for me is wether coping with the postgraduate for me grew easier with my age. My driving motivation is knowledge, but maybe the price to pay for this is simply to high at my age. Thanks for your thoughts!
I think I will further consider the odds.

To your last point: I am working in capital markets, which involves maths and programming and is quite intersting, but not comparable to science in terms of exactness nor does it provide insight in any way at all.
In case you are interested in this field, I would recommend to have a look into stochastic processes, C++ and VBA (the latter is not really a programming language ;-), but the people use it very much here) and of course financial mathematics.

Best Wishes

 

[ych22]

Thanks so far for the answers.
And Especially to Vanadium50: even though I didn't ask for refreshing sarcasm, I got some. How nice of you!
By the way, concerning my post: the devil is in the detail as you surely know. For there was no question exactly matching mine, I posted it.

To Ych22: Yes, I too think one major question for me is wether coping with the postgraduate for me grew easier with my age. My driving motivation is knowledge, but maybe the price to pay for this is simply to high at my age. Thanks for your thoughts!
I think I will further consider the odds.

To your last point: I am working in capital markets, which involves maths and programming and is quite intersting, but not comparable to science in terms of exactness nor does it provide insight in any way at all.
In case you are interested in this field, I would recommend to have a look into stochastic processes, C++ and VBA (the latter is not really a programming language ;-), but the people use it very much here) and of course financial mathematics.

Best Wishes

I don't think Vanadium meant any offence. He just means that there is a wealth of information that you could discover in other similar threads (your situation is not rare...many forum-ers face the decision of quitting a job to study a Phd). So do take a look around. For starters, you could list concrete objectives and constraints, and the costs/benefits of the options available to you.

On another note, is your field considered "financial engineering"? I enjoyed my programming and stochastics classes, and would love to have a job that could employ a mix of them, statistics and optimisation techniques. However I have no background in financial mathematics except those areas which are overlapped by my engineering math and stats classes. Could you give me some general advice about how to get into your field, the technical prerequisites involved, and point me somewhere to look up in detail?

Sorry to hijack the thread!

[By the way, I am 2-4 years older than most of my friends at the university now because I served 2 years in the military. My first semester was my worst-performing semester because I had forgotten how to "learn" in my 2 years of service. I also envied my peers' younger ages. Subsequently, I did come to appreciate the advantages of being older- I think I was able to focus better in many ways]

 

[Vanadium 50]

I may have been a little snarky, but if this is too much for your ego, you should not pursue a career in science. You'll have to put up with a lot worse. And I think my point is still valid: you knew that there was useful information elsewhere here, but instead of looking for it, you asked us to spoon-feed it to you.

 

[mrgo]

Hi Vanadium. To bad you obviously missed the more subtle point of my reply, but don't worry I'll explain it to you slowly:
first, there was no post matching my age and degree. Second, I did not ask for information but for opinions, which as you don't seem to know, strongly depend on boundary conditions like for instance age and education (see for instance "stability" in your favorite ODE-book. In case you are a slow reader, there might be a version for dummys). In case you still don't get it, please do not hesitate to come back to me.

Hi ych22, don't worry about the hijack. To get a start into financial engineering, you could have a look into John Hull, "Futures, Options and Derivatives", and Wilmott "Quantitative finance" for the detailed mathematics (of interest rates, which is a very broad field I am currently involved in, I am working as quant developer, which belongs to financial engineering), take Brigo and Mercurio, "Interest Rate Models". Any Literature on numerical solvers / optimizers and Literature on martingale theory would be a good Idea, too.
Of course, you don't have to study all those in depth, but you'll get broad overview with the opportunity to go significantly deeper into the detail wherever desired.
To get started in the job market, just apply at financial institutions. People with quantitative background ( Informatics, mathematics, engineering, pyhsics and similar ) have good chances!

Best Regards