I gave up astronomy for data science 7 years ago, and now I regret it

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"It's been seven years now, and it's time to admit: I deeply regret leaving academia."

"This is just my opinion, after all, many people are glad to leave academia..."

This is the voice of Marcel Haas , a former PhD in astrophysics , after working in data science for 7 years.

He said that it was not because his work was not going well. On the contrary, he was doing well in his current data science work.

There are actually other reasons why I regret leaving academia.

Seven years ago vs now

The story begins seven years ago.

When Marcel first left academia and began his career in data science, he said that the uncertainty in astronomy was too great.

He said that if he could not rank among the top, he would have to be assigned to a place with talent demand to do research (which might be very remote, such as a research institute with an astronomical telescope) . Compared to being away from relatives and friends, he hopes to accompany his daughter to grow up.

Moreover, compared with academic research, data science work is also very interesting . This work belongs to the financial services industry, such as doing intelligent medical history testing to prevent insurance companies from being defrauded of money.

Even the work is similar: writing code (Python) , understanding the problem or making related software. However, now the problem and software have changed from astronomy to financial services.

He believes that this work is as challenging as astronomical problems and receives more attention .

As for astronomy, he plans to keep it as a hobby and occasionally participate in small projects.

It sounds like a rational consideration, and Marcel also said that he still agrees with most of his original views.

So, why regret it?

I miss motivation, research, academic atmosphere, and sense of achievement…

Although I am still writing code, the satisfaction I feel has decreased. Compared to solving academic problems, using code to make a commercial product does not require much technical depth and understanding.

Although you can still research new technologies, your freedom is limited. Compared to academic research, which allows you to explore and learn freely, new technological breakthroughs in a business environment are restricted in many ways, which makes it less suitable for people with creativity and research awareness.

Although his life was stable, the academic atmosphere was gone. When doing academic research, the inner drive and atmosphere of the people around him had a great influence on Marcel. He is still teaching now, but he still misses that pure research motivation.

Although he still had time for amateur research, Marcel no longer had the time . Astronomy remained a hobby for him, but he found that his job didn't allow him the time to do enough important research and be proud of it.

Marcel remained rational: There are many disadvantages in being an academic, such as unhealthy competitive pressure, unequal academic environment... The pros and cons of any path are different for everyone.

But after thinking about it, he still felt that giving up was a wrong decision. Although it might be too late to re-enter the academic world, Marcel still tried to maintain his relationship with the academic world and hoped for a turnaround.

“People in the besieged city want to get out”

Should you give up your ideals and work as a programmer for the sake of living?

After Marcel expressed his opinion, many netizens also expressed their views.

Among them, some feel the same way but convince themselves to continue working, while others have returned to academia.

“Once you leave academia, your work doesn’t have to dictate your life.”

Chiara Tonini, a netizen who had a similar experience to Marcel, said that she also left academia in 2017 and now misses the time of academic research. However, the pressure of this job has become less and no longer dominates life, which is also the reason for her choice.

“It’s always good to master one more skill.”

Netizen Konstantin Anthony believes that data science can also help astronomy, and there may be cross-applications. It is always a good thing to master more than one technology.

“It feels good to be back in academia after retirement.”

Simon is over 60 years old and once left particle physics for his family. He has just retired and has become a part-time university physics teacher. Maybe it's because he no longer has to worry about life, and now he feels great even if he does some part-time work.

“Academia is like a besieged city. People outside the city want to get in, and people inside the city want to get out.”

Netizen bumby said that this reminded him of a disappointing view of the academic world he saw a few days ago. So, even though "people in the besieged city want to get out", wouldn't it be better if there was a more balanced career development path?

In fact, "ideals" and "life" have always been a difficult decision to make.

So, will you choose programmer as your career like Marcel? Will you regret it after making this choice?

Reference link:
http://www.marcelhaas.com/index.php/2020/12/16/i-regret-quitting-astrophysics/
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25444069