What do you do?

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Sat Jun 25, 2016 3:58 am

Ah, right. Like Einstein. Might I ask how you got into that line of work?

Lord Golbez · Post by **Lord Golbez** » Sat Jun 25, 2016 4:20 am

Sure. I went to grad school for PhD in physics, but I had long since decided I didn't want to continue with research after getting the degree. I already knew people from the physics program in my school who had gone on to the patent office, so I considered it among places to apply to. There are still at least a few people with PhDs (or who left without one) from my grad school working there. There also have been several others who left. All you need for the US patent office is a degree in a technical/science area (physics, engineering, chemistry, etc.) There are a number of examiners with PhDs (more in my area than most, because it's a broad area that involves significant math), but most just have a BS. I think I've heard in Europe all/most have PhDs, but I don't know about that.

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Sat Jun 25, 2016 2:38 pm

Ah ok, interesting. Before I leave and forget all physics (it's already been happening since the switch from undergrad to grad school, where you suddenly mostly just need to know a narrow range of physics), what was your thesis work on?

Lord Golbez · Post by **Lord Golbez** » Sat Jun 25, 2016 4:37 pm

Experimental particle physics stuff. Spin polarization observables of nucleon resonances to help better determine the quark structure of nucleons. At least in theory, but the data was too junk to avoid substantial error bars and I only get a piece of the project so there's very little to conclude except comparing against some models for the polarization observables that are definitely wrong anyway and always get tweaked to incorporate new data. You can maybe see why I would get tired of this?

Fei Ayanami · Post by **Fei Ayanami** » Sun Jun 26, 2016 4:09 am

Yeah I definitely can. This sounds a bit similar to the experience a friend of mine from undergrad is having working on neutrino detection experiments as a PhD student.

It's a bummer, I really liked learning physics, but research is so very different from textbooks and lectures (and to be fair, some projects end up being a lot less fun than others).

Vibing_V · Post by **Vibing_V** » Fri Jul 01, 2016 12:51 pm

I just finished my last few credits for my BA (finally) and now I have to figure out how to adult. Somebody please give me a job.

Am also searching for an urban viking and/or sugar daddy. This is probably the more lengthy project of the two.

Calbrena · Post by **Calbrena** » Fri Jul 01, 2016 3:25 pm

Well done with your BA!