Personal philosophy | grouperlab

July 28, 2023

Paying for It

It is completely without irony or sarcasm that I choose to use a deliberatively (and, in some ways, disingenuously) provocative title for this entry. In fact, the very existence of this writing (and its visibility as a blog entry) is part of an evolution in my experience as an academic. Before I go any further, however, let me assure you that there is no mention of any behavior representing exchanging items of value for erotic services[1].

This entry, and other related writings, have been sitting in my to-do list for several days (or is it weeks?) now. I was very pleased and excited to find a stimulus for this writing while drinking fantastic coffee and eating delightful cherries and locally baked bread while reading the recent issues from two of my regular print subscriptions: Fast Company and Scientific American (which I don’t visit online, except to provide links to others, as I am doing here). I got to enjoy delightful interviews with scholars and actors; I learned about creative research far outside of my normal field. Should I have been upset, or simply wary, when noting that at the bottom of the page of an article on an all-women team looking at cardiovascular care are the words, “created by fastco works content studio and commissioned by Shockwave”? How about the difference between an article about ground-breaking researchers in collective neuroscience, and an article by a ground-breaking researcher in insect behavior and ecology?

A few items in my history may be of particular importance here. When I was a new assistant professor, there was still a considerable debate (as evidenced by some of the advice given to me by senior faculty) about whether junior faculty in engineering should “spend their time” traveling to (and presenting their work at) professional conferences with published proceedings, rather than devoting the effort to additional journal paper and research grant submissions. It was considered even more questionable to work with journalists and marketing people (even the university’s own “communications and marketing” offices) to help create non-technical summaries of one’s work for alumni magazines or college promotional publications. However, at the same time, I was also advised to have my work as public and visible as possible, in case—as an underrepresented minority scholar with a trailblazer status at multiple universities—a negatively biased evaluation of my case would result in a denial of promotion and tenure. (That tenure decision came, with a positive outcome over 25 years ago, in the 1990s. Whether I “earned” or “received” tenure is a debate for another time; I simply note the timing to indicate that I would be considered an established and senior professor from a prior generation to the current life of scholars who grew up with the web and smartphones.)

Perhaps it is this conflict that gives me a distinct viewpoint on current discussions of social media promotion of one’s research, or the determination and characterizations of “alt metrics” to describe a scholar’s net impact on a broader community rather than (or beyond) counting citations of scholarly journal articles by other researchers. (Perhaps it is also because my father was a car salesman, and I spent much of the first 30 years of my life relieved that I was not in sales, before I realized that journal and conference papers, and grant proposals, are type of sales pitches for the startup / small business world of the research intensive faculty member and their lab.). I have served on library faculty and primary committees evaluating both the service practice and scholarship of the university library staff; this gave me a front-row seat at both the growing tension between journal subscription costs from major publishers and the need to provide comprehensive services to the campus research community. Librarians also introduced me to the challenge of understanding what counted as a suitable “alt metric” in a rapidly evolving online world.

Let me be very clear here: I am not engaged in some wistful reminiscence of some prior and mythical golden age. (Discussions of nostalgia, and the distinctions between positive and negative views of memories and past experiences, has been of some interest in recent popular media as well as research studies. Whether or not you gravitate to this article from a mental health site in the UK, or this article in the Atlantic, or this publication from Elsevier, or this piece in Vox, or this paper in the National Library of Medicine’s PubMed database, all from 2023, actually undergirds some of the thesis of this entry.). I am also not complaining about some evil group of bloodthirsty folks leeching off the honest work of others and expecting exorbitant incomes from it. I am, of course, a university professor, and I have been accused of such leeching myself. For years, I had shunned the concept of “lowering myself” to submitting articles to journals that required “page charges” for publication of accepted papers. Conversely, I had to explain to non-academic friends that academics generally did not receive royalties for our journal papers, and in fact, often had to pay for publication. And of course, I recognized that paying conference registration fees to attend a professional society meeting (and obtain the published proceedings), let alone the travel expenses for such meetings, were an important and necessary element of the public visibility and professional networking in my field that was essential to grad student recruitment, nominations for national awards and service to the organization, profession, and broader society. Success as a faculty member meant that I had plenty of grant money to go to multiple conferences without asking my department for travel allowances… even though the net cost was much higher than page charges, I enjoyed the effort and expense more.

So much has changed in the past 7-8 years… after living and working outside academia for a year (providing service to the US government based on a highly competitive national fellowship), I began to think a lot more intensively, and differently, about public communications of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) to the vast majority of the population who do not have degrees, fluency, or understanding of STEM topics or research processes. During the COVID-19 pandemic, many researchers were forced to reassess how we promote and highlight our research without the ability to present our work publicly. As I also learned from discussions with my children (who both use digital technologies extensively, but consider themselves firmly in the realm of arts and humanities—my son as musician, DJ and music recorder / promoter; my daughter as humanist scholar of computer game cultures), the world of social media and networks have thrown many job categories and established market forces into maelstrom. Gig economies, streaming services, password access sharing, paywall backdoors… we demand that creative persons get paid their worth for their art and performance, but others don’t want to pay the costs for such support in a world without newsstand and subscription sales or page-size advertising revenues.

With some trepidation, I stepped into this new (for me) world of “commissioned content”. I would say that I’m pretty good at presenting material orally, and I’ve been told I have a great voice and style for people to listen to and watch for lecture material, panel presentations, or interviews. However, I’m not as fluent with the journalistic craft of hook and explanation and market connection for a general audience. So, was it evil for me to respond to an invitation for a commissioned piece regarding my involvement in STEM education and engagement, or an innovative multimodal style for presenting systems engineering material, or our prior work looking at chronic care systems for traumatic brain injury? All of these projects have been presented in conferences with published proceedings… but how many people see them? More importantly, where is the proper line drawn? Should my same trepidation extend to page charges for a requested open access paper on remote physiological monitoring? Should I be upset that my “commissioned articles” help pay for the animators, journalists, and voice actors to continue their jobs—in some cases, creating new forms of presentation that I would not have been able to do at all, or not within my time or energy or skills budget.

As a journal editor, I have had a tremendous and frustrating period of time trying to get reviewers to evaluate manuscript submissions. Conversely, authors are thrilled when I tell them that there are no charges to them for article publication. As a researcher, I evaluate the cost of conference registrations and hotel reservations for professional meetings that are at the core of my research, versus ones that might have great visibility for others. As a recognized and visible scholar in my field and at my university, I take note that an analytics firm ranked Purdue as #10 in the world on global university visibility in this evolving and complex online world… and wonder if my ventures into commissioned content may have contributed just a little bit? (No, there is no known relationship between myself, any member of my family, and the firm that published this ranking.). It’s probably more the basketball and football teams, but we take the visibility we can get, right?

Or is it that we get what we pay for?

[1] With the possible exception of exhibitionism, which could be associated with the thrill of having one’s name, image or likeness publicly presented in a media representation. This might include a reposting of a blog entry or sharing of a video link, as well as an authored publication in a high impact factor journal or magazine.

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July 14, 2020

Seats at the Table

As I continue to experience a uniquely quiet and thought-provoking summer, I find myself able to spend more time cooking, doing home stewardship, and engaging in other “domestic research”. Does this herb go with this meat, or this type of cheese? Which type of battery is best for my classic sports car? How can I get those stains out of the ceiling from where the roof leaked a few years ago? What is my best sleep schedule? Let’s set up some research, and collect some data!

Research, I often tell the students in the lab, is an act of communication and documentation. The more unique or non-standard the research, I explain, the more the burden falls on the researcher as writer (rather than the audience) to understand the context and implications (and even relevance) of the research. I sometimes hear complaints about that burden: “That’s not fair!” (I will not digress too much on my feelings about “fairness” in this sense. No, it’s not maximally convenient to the writer. Actually, it’s much harder, and sometimes relegates work to being ignored, or non-influential, or unappreciated, or even flat-out rejected. And sometimes, that is simply unjust. But pointing out that something is inconvenient, or inequitable, or unbalanced, or unjust doesn’t mean that it’s not true.)

Over the past few weeks, I have had lots of opportunities to think about professional colleagues of mine. It might be a LinkedIn update, or a work-related email, or a professional society web update, or any of the various ways that academics engage with their professional discipline and their personal or research networks. Of course, we’re all busy, so I don’t mean to say that I am in active, daily interactions with any of them, let alone all of them. However, that’s not the point. For any subset of them, there can be a variety of events or projects that cause me to interact with or at least consider “Hey, what’s xyz up to these days?” Some folks have been moving around, so it may take me a moment to find out about where they are right now, or what they might be working on in research or campus administration. So, I may do a search on Mark, or Gary, or Mike, or Alec, or Steve. I may remember a past research project or see a news story, so I want to follow up on Harriet, or Stephanie, or Tonya, or Pamela. Normally, those of us in the university world think nothing unusual for academics to do that sort of thing. If you include me in the list, that’s a group of 10 folks. Not even that hard for a dinner reservation at a restaurant (well, when we get back to having dinner at a restaurant, but that’s another discussion for another day), if you could get us all together in between our busy schedules. We’re not all in the same discipline, after all, nor are we limited in our work obligations. That’s what happens when one becomes a full professor in engineering.

By the way, the NSF likes to collect and analyze data, so when several close friends of mine (and my daughter, over some French toast during a visit in Madison) challenged me to do some thought experiments, it was easy to go to the Survey of Earned Doctorates. One of the original versions of the question involved how well most people know about the world of academic faculty, particularly at research universities. Well, most of the people I spend time with know… because that’s who I spend a lot of my time with, and besides, anyone who knows me hears about what I do. But that’s not really a representative sample of the world, is it? (In fact, that is exactly the sort of example I’d use to say, “that’s not systematic observation!” in a stats or human factors class.) But for the rest of the world, the idea is kind of abstract and remote, and outside of their experience. So, all 10 of us being full professors in engineering departments (when we’re not being department, college, or campus-level administrators) would make us part of a group of about 11,600 folks.

However, I am also intentionally telling this story in a particular way, to build up to a particular punch line for dramatic effect. (I admit: I like doing that.) Actually, there is nothing untrue, or misleading, or even tricky about the story. I’m not picking folks that I have only seen on TV or in a movie; I’ve interacted with some of these folks this year, either on Zoom or in email or in person. But if you did see us all in a restaurant, sitting and talking about research budgets, or faculty senate actions, or the challenges of supervising too many graduate students with too little time, those topics would not necessarily catch your attention first, or surprise you the most.

We’re all Black.

Why is that important? Of those 11,600 or so engineering full professors, maybe 250 of them are Black males. Only about 50 are Black females[1]. (A male-female faculty ratio of 5:1 is not actually that surprising in engineering, so having the table be close to gender parity would be a surprise if you knew it was engineering faculty.) That’s not very many people. And to be honest, if I were asked “what can these people do to increase STEM diversity?” my answer would be fairly simple.

Exist. Do your work.

(This is my own personal version. Others may reference a quote, such as “Do what you can, where you are”. Versions of this are attributed to Arthur Ashe, or Teddy Roosevelt (who attributed it to Bill Widener).

I admit that I am not the sort of person who grabs a bullhorn to lead a crowd in an activist demonstration on any topic. (The only times I’ve used a megaphone or mic to stir up a group would be as a coxswain for a rowing team, or as a host / MC for a STEM-related research conference or public outreach event.) But I have come to a growing recognition over the years that just standing there and speaking in my own voice, in front of a class or at the conference or as host of the event, can be a very powerful statement and surprising communication. As my daughter had pointed out, if I retired tomorrow, I would be able to say that I made a difference and have left a legacy. But I’m not likely to retire tomorrow. What is changing is the sense of what work I will choose to do, and on whose terms. That is actually fairly new for me, to decide to pick my own terms and communicate my own messages, in my own way, in my own time. I’m not even completely sure what messages I will be choosing to communicate (including this one). I do recognize that the burden is on me to make the message as clear and understandable as possible. However, I am no longer assuming that, when other people don’t get or believe the message, that it must be my fault. Just letting go of that may be a key to doing my best job in answering my own question. What is my work? Not for you, or him, or her. What am I best suited for as me, in the world that is, even if I wish to design for the world that is not?

Actually, that’s a good question for everyone to ask, and not be afraid of finding a new answer.

[1] (These numbers come from NSF Table 9-25, from 2017.)

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May 4, 2018

Origin Story

(This took a couple extra weeks to write and post. Hey, it’s a busy time of year.)

When I was young I thought of growing old,

And what my life would mean to me…

Would I have travelled down my chosen road,

Or only wished what I could be…

— “Kyrie,” Mr. Mister

This spring has been an interesting time of innovation and re-imagination, both locally and more broadly. Although I will not be taking a flight to Wakanda in the near future, I was obviously very intrigued by the Black Panther “origin story.” Living out one’s origin story is hard, in part, for one simple reason: no matter how seriously or strongly one feels one’s passion, the subject of the story has to live their lives forward in time. The movie scriptwriter and director can work backwards based on the story they want to tell (and the events they already know will be important for the story arc).

ATL_wakanda

Figure 1: Flight to Wakanda sign, Atlanta airport (credit: CNN)

Unexpectedly, I have had the chance to consider my own origin story over the past few weeks—not just because of the opportunity to reconnect with history, but the ability to see in the present how pieces of the story fit together to tie present and past (and maybe, to tie past and present to future).

Bring to mind, if you will, a moment from your childhood where many things were possible, and you felt that a hero or heroine was speaking directly to you and your imagination of what you “want to be when you grow up”. I remember begging my parents to let me stay up late on Christmas Eve when I was six years old-not to wait for Santa Claus, or listen for reindeer, but to listen to astronauts speak for the first time from the orbit of the moon. The following Christmas, one shouldn’t be surprised that I had an Apollo Saturn V model (like this one, shown below) waiting for me on Christmas morning.

REVELL SATURN V ORIGINAL BOX ART

Figure 2: Saturn rocket model, 1969: photo from http://fantastic-plastic.com/REVELL%20SATURN%20V%20PAGE.htm

It’s critical to recognize that things rarely work out this clearly or directly; I meet people my age and older who still ask the question of what they want to be. (Sometimes, that’s about the awareness that life takes us on different paths; sometimes, it’s an admission that even as our bodies get older, we don’t always feel like we’ve “grown up”. Wasn’t “grown up” supposed to mean that things made sense, or were more clear, or had resolved all the youthful uncertainty? Apparently not.) But, nonetheless, imagine such a moment. And now imagine that a chance to see and hear that hero appears in your email inbox, in the form of an invitation: come see a panel discussion by the crew of Apollo 8 for a book launch about their mission to the Moon. The opportunity sells out, as would be expected… but not before I have my tickets. I’m off to Chicago, to hear about the Earthrise photo and the Christmas Eve message and, and, and…

This is the event that made me, and gave me the life I live today. This is primary inspiration.

I arrive at the Museum of Science and Industry in time to work through the line, and find a seat, before the lights go down.

Figure 3: Barrett at the MSI, with NASA SG Jacket

The movie director and screenwriter in my head can create a scene for the event, but that’s not really how it works out. I’m not called out, or accidentally run into Frank Borman in the hallway, or finding myself shaking Bill Anders’ hand. (As it turns out, I’d already seen and Jim Lovell before, so what does that say about leading a fairly special existence?) However, is this really something that I can mark as a failure or disappointment? I am learning more of what it was to them to be an inspiration to the world, as well as the inspiration and impact they felt to see all of human existence out their window in a single frame, knowing that they were the first to do so. They are telling the story so that the director and screenwriter are stunned into silence. The crew describes the surprises, and serendipity, and nearly sacred experience, as they experienced it and as they remembered it: living their lives forward, rather than worrying about the director’s intention.

Figure 4: Apollo 8 crew

And what about me? Well, I am wearing my NASA Space Grant jacket, with the iconic “meatball” logo. Not surprisingly, that gets some attention: a few people ask if I work for NASA; I’m much better now at saying “yes”. After taking a look (and some picture) at the Apollo 8 Command Module (and a framed and signed version of Earthrise), I am approached by a woman with a clipboard. Would I mind being videotaped for the Museum about the Apollo 8 event? Of course. I’m excited: perhaps too excited to answer the questions smoothly or calmly, I try to express the excitement of being able to be reminded of my origin story…

If the director in my head were managing this story, I would probably have finished here. But surprisingly, there is more. The very next day, there was an awards dinner for Engineering faculty, and I was awarded the Engagement and Service Award. I did not expect or anticipate video testimonials describing my effect and impact, through Indiana Space Grant and the senior capstone projects. I am unable to refute the messages or their meaning; I see no reason to reject the story anymore. And a week later, I am back at the Indiana FIRST Robotics State Championships, watching the excitement and tension of the competition in one of Indiana’s historic high school gymnasiums. This is new history being made, of course: the students are vying for the chance to represent Indiana at the World Championships in Detroit, where the NFL draft has taken a backseat in an NFL city to the prior commitment of K-12 students and their robots. A total of 15 teams earn their opportunities that day, including brand new teams and teams of underdogs who have overcome negative assumptions and lowered expectations to win awards of excellence. It feels like a small thing, for INSGC to offer financial support to help them on their journey. Who knows which of them will remember this month as part of their origin story, and the events that set them on the path for a life beyond their imagination, and successes not yet dreamed.

Figure 5: Detroit FIRST Championships, Einstein Round Robin. There is an origin story being written out here.

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September 22, 2017

Crossing Paths

(Yes, this took a while to write and post… in part because of the path of transition from Washington, DC back to Lafayette, IN. That’s part of the story. Happy Equinox! –BSC)

As I return from the National Space Grant Directors meeting, I am reminded strongly of the total solar eclipse on August 21, as well as how unique events can change one’s perspective in ways that cannot be fully undone. I have gotten to explore this a great deal myself, but one of the insights of this week’s meeting was watching and talking to one of my colleagues who was the emotional and operational leader of the national Space Grant Eclipse effort. More about this after a bit of a dream sequence retrospective.

Four weeks ago, I wrote the below comments, not quite knowing how to finish the entry or find the right pictures.

What a transition this is turning out to be. On Friday, I was still in Washington, meeting with colleagues at the State Department, and the Embassy of Japan, on science and technology innovation topics and global health strategy. Some packing, some sleep, and then by Saturday evening, I was off. Driving at night, sleeping for a couple of hours in West Virginia, and then arriving at the Evansville Museum about 2:00 (Central time) Sunday afternoon. Very quickly, I could tell the shift in my interactions and response, talking with the student research balloon team from the University of Southern Indiana, or USI. (I continue to have great appreciation for Glen Kissel, who has become a fantastic advocate for NASA and student education in his role as Affiliate Director at USI.) After an early bedtime, I was up and at the Museum again this morning at 6:20, to get on the bus for the tour to the path of the total solar eclipse in Hopkinsville, KY. We could not have asked for a better day so far: light breezes, and only the highest and wispiest of clouds an hour before the start of the eclipse. I have some extra time to start this entry this morning before the eclipse start; more will come later, after it’s all done. In the meantime, a scientific, spiritual, transforming experience.

636389864341377597-KyEclipseMSC1

Figure 1. Image of totality from Hopkinsville, from local media.

I noticed that, whether it is about science, or about statecraft, my role as translator and ambassador continues. Wearing NASA-themed clothing is pretty much a guarantee of such interactions at an event like this, with the expectation that I will be able and willing to answer questions. This is what happened, with a media interview for a Nashville metro radio group, brief interactions with a variety of visitors and even members of the NASA family (children of William Wagner, a former NASA solar physics director, who used to chase total eclipses for work).

Figure 2. This is the experience I came for.

A truly unexpected surprise involved a conversation with another MIT Humanities alumnus, who asked me about Japan’s policies for energy generation. (No, I was unable to explain Japanese domestic political positions on this issue.) I was asked for career advice for an 11 year old who wants to be an astrophysicist. A particular major? Which subjects / courses to take? No, my answer, in a setting like this, is much easier – and yet, much more challenging:

“Don’t let anyone talk you out of curiosity and passion.”

As we drive back, just a census of the license plates points to what that means. Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, of course. Maryland, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania? Check. But at the event, the census was much broader: California; Czech Republic; Hong Kong; Switzerland. What would drive someone to travel the world to experience totality in a small Midwestern town? I met someone at the hotel last night, who started planning his family trip over five years ago; he made his hotel reservation well before the hotel was finished construction. If those are not the expressions of people transforming their passion into experience, I don’t know what is.

What was it to be in the path of totality? The need for sunglasses dissipates; the air cools, and then the breeze picks up. A couple of planets, bright lights in the nighttime sky, appear in their courses. Within a few seconds of the alignment, one begins to notice a “360 degree sunset” of red and purple, combined with the downward illumination of the clouds in the distance. (We were extremely fortunate, that the sun was not obscured by clouds during the entire eclipse.) I will not even try to describe my internal experience of totality. I can only say that I feel it a tremendous gift to actually be able to experience it, in the context of my life of research and education and engagement.

Figure 3. Being in the umbra: “sunset” everywhere

Tomorrow, I go to work again… back on campus, with lectures on defining and scoping systems for engineering solutions. New students, new project efforts, new experiences to consider and curiosity to pursue: what new paths are out there?

Back to September…

Not surprisingly, a lot of the Space Grant discussion highlighted the Eclipse event, and for good reason. It was a “Really Big Deal.” By several estimates, this was one of the most experienced digital events over this decade: the largest government and NASA digital event ever, and a total audience in the range of that for a Super Bowl… for a STEM activity. That is literally a national and international experience of space science in your life. The person who put Space Grant in the middle of this path was another Space Grant Director, Angela Des Jardins, a self-proclaimed introvert who became a primary face of the Great American Eclipse. The Space Grant meeting was really her moment, the culmination of five years of dreaming and doing, now done. I found my response to her moment enlightening as well. I could see how others demonstrated their appreciation, and their expression of being affected and influenced by her actions. I remember how she started on this event planning, never imagining what outcomes would result from a dream expressed and passion pursued. Do I really need my own eclipse? Well, one can make the point that this eclipse was not of Angela’s making, and by the time the film crews appeared, she was as much a product of the experience as a cause. There is nothing wrong with that, and even if the outcomes of my experience or presence is not always as tremendous or profound, there are outcomes that I do not see, and those outcomes can be important for any number of people. We all cross a number of paths, and I don’t always integrate the number of paths that I do traverse and tangent. These are great reminders.

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August 1, 2017

The Last Weekend, Part 2: Bumping into Bits of History

Now that the calendar has actually turned over to August, reality is starting to set in: last weekend’s relaxed enjoyment and exploration really is the final full weekend in Washington, DC of my tenure as a Jefferson Science Fellow. In some ways, it feels like the time at the end of a party: people are starting to say their good-byes, but no one has actually left yet. There is also the question of leaving early and maybe missing something, or staying until the very end with the hosts wondering, “When will this guy ever leave?” In the social media era, people seem to talk about this as FOMO, but there is another concern in play here.

One of the local public / community radio stations here in Washington is WPFW; they are one of my options for jazz music. (As I just mentioned in the blog a couple of days ago, I have a long personal history with jazz.) An interesting piece of spoken jazz was in fact a parable: imagine an insect (ant or beetle) navigating on one of the most beautifully designed, luxuriously tufted, exquisitely crafted Oriental rugs ever created. However, this insect has lived its entire life with the tufts and weaves of the rug, and only sees the tufts and knots as problems confronting it and degrading its existence. The insect has never had the chance, or thought, to raise up its perspective to look down on the beauty and wonder of the pattern of the rug, and so it laments as burden what we would see as splendor. Poor, foolish insect. However…

Things have been very hectic at work over the past few weeks. Offices at the State Department are used to turnover during the summer, where people head off to embassies and consulates across the world, and others return back from those locations to take up work here in Washington. Those rearrangements don’t always mesh smoothly; right now, we’re down a few folks. Combined with travel, it meant that there were only two of us around in my particular unit for a while, and one was tied up with logistics for a very high profile event. Last Thursday, that event came to fruition, with lots of last minute frenzy and scheduling nightmares and trying to navigate 100 people through a maze of hallways and elevators into a room that holds 80. What could possibly be worth all of this?

Figure 1. William F. Hagerty IV sworn in as US Ambassador to Japan by VPOTUS Pence.

Not surprisingly, the official naming of an Ambassador is a pretty significant historical event, especially when the Vice President of the United States (VPOTUS) does the swearing in ceremony. It takes a few moments of someone not yet jaded by the process (a foreign affairs intern) to put it in perspective: even with the challenges, “you’re experiencing history”. In the Old Executive Office Building (the Indian Treaty Room). With dignitaries.

Situations like this can be trivialized with the goal of trying to diminish their historic significance or my involvement in them, but over time, I have come to realize that this actually doesn’t have the effect that I had originally intended. Sometimes a moment ends up with more impact than is intended, such as a young boy from Arkansas meeting a US President. They can even be played up to fictional excess, such as Forrest Gump’s unintentional influence on history. But let’s dial that back a bit. The event was what it was. There were other people who felt this particular ceremony very important to attend, which of course makes it more special for those who were there…

Figure 2. L-R: Sen. Corker, Amb. Hagerty, VPOTUS Pence, Mrs. Hagerty, Sen. Alexander

Particularly, if you happen to be from Tennessee, as the Hagertys are (although the Ambassador’s mother still prefers U. Kentucky basketball, but thinks Gallatin is a better place to witness the Great American Eclipse than Hopkinsville), this is a pretty significant bit of history to experience.

On Sunday, I saw a person on the National Mall wearing a t-shirt, “I am Black History”. I can become easily overloaded by such a statement, even though I do actually have a t-shirt that says, “I am kind of a big deal” (thanks, Keena!). No, I could never wear such a shirt! I didn’t do this, or that, or whatever else… I’m not these people:

Katherine+G+Johnson+President+Obama+Presents+6K4sUCOPe3ll

Figure 3. NASA Legend Kathrine Johnson receives Medal of Freedom from POTUS Obama.

But, as Kathrine Johnson said, history is what each of us does, every day. I am reminded of this quote from meeting her daughters earlier this year:

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Figure 4. NASA Program Manager Allen, Kathrine Johnson’s Daughters Katherine and Joylette, BSC

Yes, there have been a number of such experiences—not just during this fellowship, but in my own past. Apparently, I keep bumping into bits of history in the rug. I should not minimize the value of getting a sense of perspective on them, or lament my interactions with them. From a different vantage, the beauty and value of the pattern is hard to ignore.

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June 7, 2017

Fishes and Ponds

Among academic metaphors, it is one of the more popular, even among people who don’t have a pervasive aquatic metaphor infusing their entire lab. This time of year, it’s considered often, among new grad students, new faculty, and established faculty considering a new position:

Do you want to be a big fish in a small pond, or a small fish in a big pond?

Figure 1. Koi experiencing a bit of Japan in Washington, DC

(Let me not leap to “big fish, big pond” territory right away.) In essence, this is a question about “fit”. Some places are major research institutions, where annual expenditures for the college of engineering or science may be measured in the tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars. Some places want to be such research institutions, but may have additional emphasis on teaching, or lesser resources available, or just aren’t as committed to the task. And other places are not research focused at all. Maybe it’s the lovely undergraduate-only institution where the entire student body and faculty and staff can fit in the lower bowl of the basketball arena of Enormous State University (which may or may not be a major research institution).

Unfortunately, this is also a question about ego, and aspiration, and social desirability. What’s a big fish? Apparently, someone who is successful at “the game” of having a large research portfolio, lots of publications, lots of students. If there’s a competition, that’s okay with them, since they’ll probably win. Maybe they thrive on competition. Maybe they like the acknowledgement of winning the award, or touting their h-index, or their success in amassing whatever it is that counts (as my friend reminded me recently) as the coin of that realm. As Depeche Mode would sing (as I was first learning that I liked this research thing), “Everything Counts in Large Amounts”.

But, let’s be clear. Not everyone wants that life, or that world, or that type of competition. That does not make them lesser creatures. I am considering the story I just heard about a successful research faculty who decided to shift to a small, undergraduate teaching institution. I am learning about the cultures of university departments where, for whatever reason, tenure is extremely difficult, or moderately straightforward, to achieve. On the other hand, some folks are learning that the constant pressure to compete for funding, for publications, for attention, is not something that feeds their soul or enhances their quality of life: the extra dollars and accolades are just not worth it.

I continue to be amazed, and a little disappointed, at how frequently this issue comes up in questions to me and to my students. Will I be upset if one of the GROUPERs goes into industry, or to a regional or teaching university, or ***shudder*** has to take a job in government? For lots of faculty at research institutions, there is only one valid career path… and it just so happens to look like the path they took, to be faculty at a research institution. I don’t believe in that assumption, and I have said so in some fairly public settings. Why? Well, it’s not sour grapes. I have come to realize, I sit in a fairly unique spot: I have spent my entire academic career at leading research institutions. But what do we mean by big, or small, and why does it count?

A pond, or a lake, or an ocean may be big or small only in comparison to other scales of reference. If you’re plankton or a piece of algae, does it really matter if you’re part of the water bloom in a tiny county park, or a county-sized bloom in an ocean? It may not influence much of your daily life in any significant way. More importantly, one of those may be outside of your range of survival conditions. If I’m a thermophile animal, what I care about is the hot spring vent, not how big the body of water is. And this leads me to the second dimension: the ways that different bodies of water differ on not just what are the components for survival, but the sorts of creatures that you might find yourself sharing the body of water with that would make one’s life better or worse.

Figure 2. Where are you, and what do you reflect?

One of the unexpected lessons of this year in Washington is that the question of fish and ponds is wrong on several major dimensions. I’m very well known in my professional society, the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, or so I’m told; it’s hard for me to spend a day at a conference without seeing 25 people I know from long experience. But we’re a “small society”. Obviously, the electrical engineers or the mechanical engineers really have it going. Except… maybe not. Most undergraduate-only teaching institutions don’t have any engineering departments at all… but if they have any STEM disciplines, it’s more likely to be physics or biology or chemistry. But, even then, and even in aggregate, that may not be the ecosystem that everyone wants to swim in.

I have spent a fair amount of time this week thinking about function allocation and expertise coordination and human-machine teaming… as I have done for much of my career. And I am in Washington. For many people, there is no bigger single pond. To paraphrase a colleague from this afternoon: I am swimming in the pond of the oldest Cabinet agency of the greatest superpower on the planet, so we should be able to have some resources at our disposal. But how much of those resources are actually from an ecosystem I recognize: folks who thrive on STEM food like I do? Several people I’ve met have pointed out the same thing: actually, there is relatively little science and technology expertise within the major “halls of power” in Washington. This is not a new thing. A recent article describes the general feeling for scientists and engineers from both Congress and the White House, at their respective locales on Pennsylvania Avenue, in these terms: “Officials in Washington don’t have a real taste for hard science, and only hire scientists when they must. ‘It’s like eating your spinach before your ice cream.’” (Note: this description doesn’t even distinguish science and engineering.) I would say that this is not very flattering, or very appealing. In one sense, most of what I spend my days thinking about, and most of the people I know of as famous, are not even at the level of side conversations for perhaps 85-90% of the people in my office building. Not great feeding, in other words.

So, am I a big fish, or a small one? In this pond, my level and type of expertise is fairly unique, and others would be hard pressed to duplicate it. In fact, this pond doesn’t even know what an h-index is, and doesn’t care to. Does that make it a small pond? If the documents we write and review this month affect the policies of 70% of the world’s economy over the next 10-15 years, I wouldn’t say that is a small pond (or an exaggeration of the impact of some of these emerging technologies on the world). I’m having an effect where I am, in ways that suit me. Overall, isn’t that the most we should ask of anyone, and the most we can hope to achieve for ourselves?

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May 5, 2017

Returning to Practice

I’ve been interviewing Millennials for work.

In one sense, that is no surprise at all. Many of the students applying for graduate programs stay in the same age range. I have, by contrast, gotten older. Incoming students who were approximately my age (or older) are now the age of my children (or younger). This is the nature of the cycle of life (cue the music from “The Lion King,” which is now considered “Classic Disney”). So, why was this experience different?

First, and most important, was that I was not interviewing people for work in the Lab. These were postdoctoral fellows applicants for Department of State positions. The vast majority of them are still just a few years from their PhD dissertation, experiencing a very different world and context than I did when I was interviewing for my first faculty position. Well, that suggests another difference: I interviewed for a faculty position, and never seriously considered a postdoc. I have spent months engaged with discussions of the role of scientists and engineers engaged in Science Diplomacy, and the interplay of innovation and policy—quite frankly, the education I had come to Washington to have in this very interesting and challenging period. These folks aren’t being recruited to work on my favorite projects, or to have exactly the sort of background I would like a GROUPER to have… but there was still a request from my unit chief for what sorts of people to identify in the stack of resumes and personal statements.

Signs of life.

I was starting to wonder about what that would look like in this context, and in fact, I was starting to question if my time away from the university had left me cynical or unable to see beyond my own narrow daily priorities. Maybe it was a broader sense of unease with the sudden transition from a snowstorm in late March to 90 degree days in late April. Where and how and when was I operating? (I had come to feel a certain sense of stress and negative anticipation regarding my transition back to Purdue, starting in late March when I was requested to provide new course syllabi for my Fall classes. There are new opportunities for next academic year, but after eight months here in Washington, I am neither ready to start right back in on the academic world, nor think in terms of another full annual cycle of activity here.)

And yet, my unit chief wanted me to not only be involved in the interviews, but to craft a few questions for them. It was, as I have said before, a bit different to operate in support of others, instead of being my own “Principal,” but that is part of my learning these days. I’ve also been learning a lot about the differences in cultures of science, and hearing about the distinct experiences of what I have come to call, “Millennial Scholars” (those who may be part of the generation born in 1985 or later, but also have completed their advanced STEM degree programs since 2010). I’ve even produced a few of those people myself, but I already knew enough not to look for people just like Ashley or Karim or Marissa or Jeff (or those who are in the lab now). The discussions in the AAAS meetings in Boston and Washington still had an immediacy and curiosity to me: I was meeting so many people interested in a concept, science policy, that I had long thought was an oxymoron. Why were they interested in this? What new was going on?

What are the challenges and opportunities, strengths and weaknesses, of these Millennial Scholars?

This is, in my experience with the lab, a “signs of life” question. Signs of life it had become a part of my thinking at a time where spring is definitely upon us in Washington. I’m walking much more around the city again, and over the past few weeks, I have been able to enjoy the cherry blossoms and new plants and warm weather. In other words, “signs of life returning” was part of my daily experience.

Figure 1. Signs of life: Tulips at the bus stop

The answers were also informative, as well as reminders of an earlier age. There were those who seemed to have trouble thinking about themselves, and their colleagues, in such a comparative context. However, this compared to several who actually commented about the relative lack of a sense of historical comparison as a weakness of Millennials. What was another weakness? There were several comments about the ease with which new information and new activities and experiences were available, leading to a sense of being dabblers in a variety of skills (“jacks / jills of all trades, masters of none”). In fact, that ease of collecting and novelty even extended to the strengths and weaknesses of networking. Although the world of embassies and interagency discussions and think tank receptions clearly indicates a value to the work of engaging with others… there is a difference between engaging in an effective, distributed knowledge network, and collecting friends and likes as a way of keeping score.

I found myself curiously replaying one conversation in my mind, about the concept that Millennials were more interested in finding ways to align their actions and employment with their passions. Now remember, I lived in Cambridge, MA and California during the 1980s startup crazes, where people were all about passion. I heard the Flower Children talking about living a life of meaning and service. And, most importantly, I have learned how much my career as a professor is actually well aligned with my passion for exploration and sharing what I found.

Figure 2. Albert sharing a sense of passion. Maybe science diplomacy was never so far from my thinking after all. (At the National Academies Keck Center, 500 E St NW)

Was this really different? And then I heard an interesting alternative take on this thought. “Well, if I can’t rely on a pension or Social Security to be around, there is no reason for me to trade boredom for security.” From that discussion, I was transported back to the first few times I taught the course Sociotechnical Systems at Wisconsin. I had known about two different models of work and income as “covenants”: income and status as a way of demonstrating success and favor, or work as a demonstration of one’s passion and artisan’s skills. It took discussion and debate in class for me to learn that there was a large population with a third approach: work was something one does to get enough income to spend the rest of one’s time doing what one really preferred to do. Apparently, lots of people live that way, whether they’re working second shift at the auto parts store, or vice president of global distribution for the auto parts company. I have not chosen to live that way, and I can’t really imagine doing something I hate just to have the income to do what I love, later. Is that what others were assuming we were all doing? Or were others doing this a lot more than I was ever aware?

I felt like I had come full circle in the discussion, and my awareness of my own experience as a young scholar. I am convinced that there are confusions in each generation, not sensing the range or intensity of experience from when prior generations were young and emerging, like new plants bursting into the sunlight and struggling against snow and wind and dangerous frost. I can appreciate it much more now, because I have been in both places, and I have come to feel them both. I am not yet done with the intensity of feeling and learning. And yes, I am still pleased to take a moment on a Spring day and feel the sensual joy of lamb’s ear as I walk from meeting to office or home. Because, even after a great enlightenment, a return to practice and repeat of small things still has value.

Figure 3. Lamb’s ear on 19th St NW. A good reminder of small lessons.

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January 7, 2017

Weekend Balance #2: Cassandra’s Postcards

Curiously, the concert that I left work to attend last night was something I discovered almost exactly one week earlier (even to the same clock time). The group I went to see was Black Violin, two classically trained violinists who are a) black, from Ft. Lauderdale; b) insistent on thinking outside of the box; and c) have a strong alternative vision of how the world can be different than it is, beyond existing stereotypes or interpretations. (Yes, the highlighted words and links are in fact the names of their albums. Go listen.) Last Friday, I was on the train to spend the New Year’s holiday in my hometown of Philadelphia with friends. I had put on the music just for some simple enjoyment, and found myself transformed and emotionally intense and resonant. (Yes, it’s also when I found out about their concern in Washington, DC last night.)

Black Violin, with the National Symphony Orchestra, Feb 6, 2017

One of my favorite descriptions of my approach to the world was provided by a GROUPER a couple of years ago, during a 1:1 meeting at a conference. (I can still see the design of the French patisserie / café in my memory.) The description was that I live part of my existence in the future, but the nice part is that I “send postcards”. This is a delightful image, but it hides a painful and problematic truth: not everyone can receive “postcards from the future,” or even know that they exist. I used to think this was a simple problem of better explanation, but I have had to come to the recognition that there is more at play. An alternative metaphor comes from my son, who once made a surprised and surprising revelation once when watching me dance to a piece of music to which I resonated very strongly. He admitted that he had thought that I simply didn’t have a very good sense of rhythm. Then, as he got older and started thinking more seriously about music composition and production as a career, he listened to more music, more often, at a deeper level. His statement at a friend’s house was with a type of confused awe: “You’re trying to dance to all of the notes, not just the normal beat.”

One of my favorite and most inspirational books of my life is called Cyteen, for a number of reasons (including some too complex to go into here). I am particularly taken by one of the descriptions of a major protagonist’s sense of their life’s work… that, if they are devoted and dedicated to their passion and their gifts and their uniqueness, because of and not simply despite their unique or alternative make-up, they may have the opportunity to someday speak their “Word,” their major contribution to history’s arc. While Speaking Words to History sounds pretty cool (at least for my sense of doing what I was built to do), it comes at a major, even profound cost. I am drawn most to the myth of Cassandra, who was cursed for defying the god Apollo (isn’t that usually how things like that turn out?) by being able to see and foretell the future, but being unable to alter it, and being doomed to have others not believe her when she told them. (I have to hand it to Apollo, though: that’s a pretty exquisite form of sadistic torture. But really, just because she turned you down for a date? I mean, you’re a god and all…)

Poor Cassandra. (From Wikipedia page, public domain image: Cassandra (metaphor)

It’s really hard to explain to GROUPERs the process of finding and sending postcards from the future, and more importantly, I don’t think it’s a proper thing for me to insist that they do so. For nearly all of the students I’ve met, it’s not the right lesson to be teaching, and there are certainly a wide range of valid and important jobs that one can take on without invoking divine curses. Having someone who can simply receive the postcard, and translate part of it, is worth a lot. For example, our current experiences of politics, local and national security, and even the nature of honest communication is based on elements of situational context, information cues, and media characteristics of different information and communication technology channels. We’re asking about tolerance and acceptance of new communications media in various organizations. That sounds like a really great research project, especially when combining new forms of social messaging as various types of an advanced, or evolved, model of email (written electronic communication), or other group interactions (with or without audio and video capabilities). It might still be considered a bit ahead of the curve, or timely, because we’re in the midst of it now. But consider a study of organizational acceptance of alternative media channels conducted in 1992, fully 25 years ago. That’s before there were any iPhones, or web browsers, or T1 lines (or many of my students). No graphical email or tweets with emojis. Do the questions even make sense? For most people, not really. (At least that’s the memory of reviewer comments for the Taha and Caldwell, 1992 submission to the Human Factors Society conference.)

Back to the train last Friday. Imagine me trying to dance to all of the notes as the train pulls into (and then out of) Philadelphia as I continue my journey. The lights of Philadelphia’s Boathouse row are still holiday festive. I am crying my resonance to the music playing in my ears. I finally feel like a type of homecoming has occurred, one that I had sought in vain for nearly 40 years. In the midst of this, an insight. Normally, I wouldn’t tell anyone, or I’d write it up piecewise in journal papers. Not this time. I’m going to show you the postcard here.

View #1: The Spectrogram

A few years ago, Jeremi London (not the actor) and I worked on a model of STEM education based on the concept that what we in fact try to teach engineers in order to be functional, productive engineers is not a single thing, but a large matrix of skills, habits, attributes, and techniques. Different courses supposedly load on different matrix elements, and different students have different strengths and weaknesses in those elements. I visualize this as a type of dynamic matrix of peaks and valleys, as you might get in a audio spectrogram. What we might think of as intelligence or skill or functionality is actually an aggregation of those peaks and valleys across that range of matrix elements: a person’s functionality is, generally, how well their peaks map onto the things they need to do on a daily basis. Zero functioning is actually hard to imagine, and if most of the population was in fact functioning at zero, we might not even see it as a relevant matrix attribute element to consider. (If someone had a peak there, would we even think about it as a peak? Consider the question of tetrachromats.) For the sake of analysis and comparison, it’s important to both retain the spectrogram as a matrix, and also consider a simplified representation of it. You could call it IQ or something. Let’s just describe it as the determinant of the functionality matrix.

View #2: The Bowl

Some of you know that I have a deep, longstanding, and personal interest in questions of neurodiversity: creating models of acceptance, encouragement, and tolerance for people with different sets of skills and forms of excellence. (This isn’t just a “feel good” about diversity and tolerance as a moral issue. This is about benefitting from excellence where it is found, including functionality peaks due to alternative wiring that represent “signs of life” not common in the general population. Well, if you’re training PhD students, that’s not a bad thing to look for: higher, and more distinct, functionality peaks than exist in the general population. After all, not that many folks get PhDs.)

So, the more your spectrogram pattern of peaks and valleys differs from the standard version (not just higher peaks, but peaks in different places), the less “standard” you are. (Standard, in this case, represents not just the population norm of the matrix determinants, but the modal matrix pattern.) In an extreme case, someone with a whole lot of peaks in places where standard people are close to zero, and very low functioning where standard people have peaks, would find it exceptionally hard or impossible to communicate with standard folks at all. (The concept of “communication” here might work as a multi-dimensional convolution integral, or a multiplication of functions against each other. You don’t worry about that just now, unless you really want to.) The more non-standard a person is, the further their pattern is from the standard pattern, and the more overall capability and functionality it might take to compensate for the mismatch, and be seen as equivalently functional as the modal, standard person. If we considered a function where the matrix determinant was the height, and the difference in pattern was a radius (different types of different patterns would be angles, so we’re in polar coordinates), the “bowl” would be a surface of “equivalent perceived functionality,” with an edge being at a place where someone, no matter how many peaks they had or how profoundly high those peaks are, could not interact with standard folks well enough to be seen as functional. (So, you can’t see in our standard visual spectrum? Well, we think you’re blind, even if you have a great visual experience of radio waves. Too bad if you can hear and sing the vibrations of the planet. We work in 200 – 4000 Hz, thank you, and if you can’t hear or produce in that range, we won’t hear what each other is saying. Literally.)

View #3: The Disk

Another of the elements we have been playing with in the lab gets the shorthand description of “The Six Dimensions of expertise,” with a corollary of “the disk”. As we described the matrix above, there are lots of different ways we could organize the elements of the matrix of ways people are good at different things. They may be socially skilled and charismatic; they may be great with tools and interfaces; they may enjoy structured rules and processes; they may enjoy mathematical analysis and quantitative exploration. There are other ways to slice skills up into different collections, but there’s been a lot of work recently into “four-quadrant” cognitive styles inventories that are used in organizational assessment. For the purposes of this discussion, all this tells us is where in the spectrogram the matrix elements of your peaks and valleys are likely to be found. Useful, if we want to do systematic comparisons of different patterns of functioning (and convolutions of functionality for communication or information alignment). Which is the “right” four-quadrant model? That’s not a proper question; it’s kind of like asking what is the “right” set of compass directions. We agree on one for the purposes of discussion, even though there isn’t even alignment between magnetic and geographic compass directions, and it’s even possible that we could have a situation where magnetic south points towards geographic north.

View #4 = Function (#1:#3)

What I’ve described for each of the views above is far from a standard description of how we consider psychological concepts of intelligence, personality, functionality, or cognitive diversity. Lots of researchers toil very intensely in intelligence assessment or engineering aptitude evaluations, or the genetic contributions to Asperger’s syndrome, or refinements of MMPI or Myers-Briggs inventories (to use examples of standard questions in each of the three views). Mathematically, however, what I have laid out can be combined (although it’s extremely hard to draw the picture in three dimensions). Imagine the spectrogram matrix (#1) of a “standard average person” (both in terms of normative / neurotypical wiring rather than autistic spectrum, and in terms of average intelligence), where the matrix is organized according to a four-quadrant disc model where different capabilities are ordered within quadrants with respect to their relative frequency and strength in the population. Take the determinant of that matrix (note that this result should be independent of how you order the matrix elements). We’ll now define that “value” of the bottom of the bowl as “standard normative functioning in the modal pattern”.

Whose Project is This?

Is this what the lab is currently working on? My goodness, no. I would NEVER assign this, in totality, as a project for a student thesis. It requires significant revisions of three or four major disciplines, as well as some advanced mathematics for the methodologies, and new forms of data collection on thousands or millions of persons on a set of variables we don’t even define well, let alone currently measure or collect. But, for the first time, I have been willing to describe a panoramic postcard of this type in a public venue. Why? For years, I was worried that lots of other people would understand, and jump on the problems, and start working on them, and that my best contributions would be left behind, meaningless and trivial. Then I started to think that this would be considered foolish and ridiculous, unless and until I took on myself the responsibility of being able to explain it better so that “most people” could get it. But, Words Spoken to History are not widely understood, even for years or decades, and the measure of the mark on the tree of knowledge is not how many people applaud when the mark is made. Galileo learned this lesson, as did Leonardo DaVinci, and Marie Curie, and Rachel Carson (and Ariane Emory). Am I comparing myself to them? No, not even close. I’m just trying to Speak my Words.

Thank you, C. J. Cherryh, for the concept of sets, and A-E, for the introduction.

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January 7, 2017

Weekend Balance #1: Learning the Right Things

Approximately 5:30 Friday (yesterday) evening, I told my unit chief that I was headed out for the evening and weekend. That was not only okay, it was expected; I’d been heading into work 11 hours earlier to work on a very active set of reports from the day’s activity in Japan, which I summarized and sent out to our colleagues. (Ah, the joy of nearly 24 hour coverage due to time zone differences: the Japanese Embassy in Tokyo starts to wind down about the same time that the first folks in Washington are getting on the Metro to start their work day.) He surprised me by encouraging me not to think about work for a couple of days as I went to a concert and planned for a quiet time at home. Well, those who know me will recognize an immediate disconnect: Barrett to not think about work for whole days at a time?

Well, that is a challenge these days, for multiple reasons. It’s actually something that we discussed in a couple of our (distributed, online) lab meetings last fall, about finding appropriate forms of balance and mechanisms for taking care of one’s internal resources. Now, it would have rung hollow if I were to take 3-4 hours on Christmas Day to write up a blog entry on work-life balance. (Don’t worry. I spent much of the day with a roaring fire, computer games, and lots of cookies.)

When I woke up this (Saturday) morning, I was looking forward to coming out to the kitchen to a waiting blanket of snow, to make some tea and settle in for a quiet day… of typing up notes and responding to Purdue emails and designing new projects. That is a day off? Well, it is a day away from reading media reports of Japan – Korea tensions or considering meeting preparations for trilateral engagement. But on the other hand, the truth is that I have somehow set myself to try to manage two full-time jobs. How does that really work?

McPherson Square, with the first snow of the season: a good day for learning.

One of the first recognitions is the difference between what I want and what is, and if there is a gap between the two, what do I want / choose to do about it? The truth is, I specifically chose the Jefferson Science Fellowship opportunity as a unique experience to expose me to activity and opportunity that I could not get in my past patterns at Purdue, with a few grad students and departmental responsibilities and a few obligations to the state of Indiana. Those aren’t bad things, but there was a gap that needed to be addressed. (When I return to Purdue, there will be another gap, because for me to return to exactly the set of activities I left this past August would be a waste of this experience, no matter how familiar, or comfortable, or well-prepared I am for them.)

I am seeing this recognition in another context when I think about the experiences of my students. To be here, in Washington DC, is more than anything an experience of learning. And sometimes, learning takes up all of my time: it is one of my primary job tasks. Learning is also a task that takes focus, and discipline, and patience. I’m not just talking about the process of collecting a bunch of facts for later regurgitation, which is what most students think of in the context of taking a class for a grade. I mean a deeper learning, about context and discernment and recognizing what aspect of this pattern is important, and real, and valuable for me to integrate into a larger whole.

Well, that can be a process of life discipline, which then applies to everything. Learning is about noticing how I balance on one leg during morning exercise, or how well I could run through the cold last night to catch the bus or rail, or… how I improve the management of the lab.

It’s often been suggested that I have a casual approach to managing the lab. Actually, this is not true. I could insist on clocked hours, minimum amounts of in-person time in the lab, weekly reports, and any number of other rules. Some people actually have de-selected the lab because I don’t have lots of those rules. As I experience this year as an immersion in this bureaucracy, I recognize that it’s not that students don’t learn anything if I impose such rules; however, it’s clear that they can easily learn the wrong things. Did you reflect on the task, or simply put in the time? Did you embrace the difficulty as a form of instruction, or simply as a burden? Do you examine the situation as a system with gaps in design or execution of objective functions, or just complain about how “they” don’t care about (fill in the blank with whatever you feel is important from your local perspective)? Do you even think about what the various objective functions are?

As a result, I now have a much deeper appreciation of what choices are being made when one of the members of the lab considers taking on a full time job at various stages of her/his graduate professional progression. These are not trivial decisions, and there are various reasons why someone may need to choose to work at a job during one’s graduate career. And I’m not casual in my feelings about this. But I need the student to learn the right lessons, and I have learned (with both students, and children, and other organizational participants) that the right lesson comes from a well-designed combination of the teacher, the student, and the lesson (there is an interesting book on this called The Seven Laws of Teaching, originally published in 1884. Read widely, question deeply.)

One of the lessons is that getting a PhD is about learning to think about questions, and developing answers, that others have not done so. If you can’t work your way all the way through your own dissertation topic and method and analysis and interpretation, you really don’t deserve the PhD. Yes, your advisor can help you, but if you need your advisor to give you all of the steps, then it’s not your PhD. (Thanks, I already have my own, and I don’t feel the need for another.) Another lesson is that very few people outside of academia, or those who do not have a PhD already, really understand what that first lesson is about. There is just a different way of thinking and working going on. Not bad, not good, just different. So, if you’re used to approaching the world with one set of priorities and tools, and you move to another place where people don’t approach the world that way, you’re going to have to shift back and forth… and most people don’t shift back and forth among ways of thinking that well.

On the other hand, given how much I think about rules and lessons and managing and studying humans for a living, if there is a rule or insight or lesson I try to share, it’s usually not just for the sake of the rule. (See above.) That’s not casual either. If there is a disagreement between myself and a student on a dissertation topic, or methodological approach, or insight available from a course, there is a possibility that the student is right and is operating based on information not available to me. (In other words, they are good and working in an alternative domain.) However, one observation of learning the right vs. wrong lesson is when I see students trying to fulfill the letter of a rule, but miss the spirit; or try to avoid the rule because it’s not ideal or fun or convenient (or “fair”?); or argue with me about how my accumulated experience is not relevant for a particular case. Again, there may be reasons why any of those is correct. But, to be honest, that’s not likely, and what concerns me more is, what lesson is the student learning or trying to execute?

So, as I move forward through 2017, there are lots more lessons to learn, and quite a few gaps to examine and determine how I might want to resolve them. I admit that I am nowhere near content with my resolution of how to perform both Purdue vs J Desk jobs ideally. (One lesson is, I really want to do this J Desk job really well, because that is the priority and opportunity available to, and surrounding, me now. I care about the Purdue version / job, but it’s hard for me to do that full time too, and still care for my health and sleep and eat properly. So it slips in priority right now… but I know that’s only for a year, not for an indefinite shift as a career. That’s a lesson also for the students.)

Lessons are, in fact, about resolving gaps—not just gaps of factual knowledge, but gaps of how experience can affect interaction with the world. I continue to explore how to find the right gaps, and resolve them in good and effective ways, to solve the right problems. That’s a fairly comforting and happy thought for me as an engineer. And although we didn’t get as much snow as I might have hoped, I can improve my recognition of what gaps were most important for me to close today.

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December 10, 2016

Icons and Orbits

Yesterday became a reminder of the special experience that this year has become. I didn’t really plan on it, but as they say, I was in the neighborhood. In the nature of adventures, that’s what made the exploration even more memorable and valuable.

On Friday morning, I had the opportunity to watch the launch of the Japanese H-II HTV-6 cargo transfer vehicle to the International Space Station from JAXA’s Washington DC Headquarters. Of course, this was a special privilege to be able to share the excitement with the U.S. office of JAXA; I was also honored that the staff was able to find a place for me to attend. I’m not sure they initially understood my enthusiasm for the launch as a rocket scientist, and not just a representative of the State Department, but after some discussions of orbital approach velocities and the functions of the GC, PAO, and PHALCON consoles in the ISS, I think my excitement was clearly interpreted as longstanding and real. Having completed that activity, and then walking over to my office at the State Dept., it was time for some research.

I’m supposed to finish a book chapter on aerospace human factors, and most of my references are back in Indiana. So, the thinking went, where’s the next best place? Although NASA Headquarters is also nearby, it was easy to pick up the bus to take me to the National Air & Space Museum (NASM), where I knew I could take some pictures and take some notes from one of the books in the museum shop. Upon entering the main hall, though, I was frozen in place. Even now, trying to write up this entry, my emotions threaten to get the best of me. The voices whispered to me from the ages and the vehicles:

Godspeed, John Glenn.

The children playing at the interactive wall couldn’t hear the voices. Maybe not yet.

Figure 1: Children at the Air and Space Museum interactive video wall

Of course, I couldn’t hear the voices either, the first time the words were spoken into the radio and broadcast. (I existed on February 20, 1962, but just barely. I wasn’t born until that September.) I remember learning them later, as part of the lesson of where bravery and commitment and ingenuity and perseverance could take us. One of the images on the wall was an iconic photo of Glenn with his Mercury capsule, where he would hear the voice and become the first American to orbit the earth. The New York Times had that iconic photo on its front page yesterday:

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Figure 2: John Glenn with Friendship 7, from New York Times story

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But the power of the moment came a few minutes later, as I realized: it’s here. Friendship 7, just a few paces away. Surprisingly, there were only a few people there, providing me more than enough time to feel the prick of tears, appreciate the bouquet of memorial flowers, and recognize the sacred touch to my core.

Figure 3: Friendship 7 at NASM, with bouquets.

For years, I had thought that I was supposed to be like John Glenn. I wanted to be an astronaut, no? And there he was, not a fictional creation, but a real person. That’s achievable, right? That’s the model of what an astronaut can and should be? Well, not quite. Even the other Mercury astronauts didn’t live up to the image of John Glenn, a story of love and good behavior as an icon that only pushes down further on the scales of history. That’s not what or who I am, though I deeply honor someone who could be so completely that person: even meeting him years later, well after being Senator Glenn and the crew member responsible for the Space Shuttle moniker “Discovery 7”, I had a sense that he was just being himself. And yet there is a lesson in there for me, even if I cannot be that person.

In lab meeting this past week, GROUPERs and I discussed the future of the lab, and what would best achieve the goals I have for myself and the remainder of my career. In essence, my query and fear was over a lack of effect or impact. And yet, I can recognize that my best work is done when I am most devoted to doing what I am built to do, what lives at the depths of my core. There is a lot I “can” do, in the sense that I have a range of skills and aptitudes. But just because I can do it, that doesn’t mean that is what I must do. For some tasks, not only are there others better suited for it, but I am not ideally suited to do it; it would take away from what I am best designed to do. I wasn’t really ready for what I heard next (but I want to let you know that I am learning to hear these voices, too).

GROUPER doesn’t recruit in a standard way. It’s not about ranking applicants on the basis of grade point and GRE scores. It’s about detecting “signs of life,” as I describe it. But, from the other side, that of the students who thrive best, there seems to be something else. It’s about someone who listens, and cares, and is passionately able and willing to alter the trajectory of one’s life. That is something I love to do, burn to do. It’s not the most lucrative choice, or the one with the most fame or adoration associated. How many people have I affected in this way? All of my estimates are too low. I undercount my effect in the lab now. I undercount it among the lab alumni (but maybe I should start coming to visit you, just for a day or two, and have another conversation with you and those who you think might be good for me to talk to), and among the students in class who go about their lives in some different way because of something they saw, or heard, or felt. In more mature consideration, I realize that the real reward is to be doing what I need to be doing for its own sake, not because of the external acknowledgements or rewards.

Doing what one was built to do, out of a sense of duty to a broader purpose… a passionate life. Defining one’s work, and one’s job, differently than just being based on an income, but by being able to touch others and having left the world better. That’s perhaps not a common framing of holding, or doing, one’s job… but common or not, this sense of purpose was part of Glenn’s holding a job. Doing what Glenn did, because he did it, isn’t the point. Doing what I do, because it is what I should be doing, is.

All the flags are at half staff today. But I don’t feel like I’ve lost someone. I feel like I’ve gained. I welcome the reminders, the tears and the passion, and most of all, the voices.

Godspeed, John Glenn.

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Category: Personal philosophy

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View #1: The Spectrogram

View #2: The Bowl

View #3: The Disk

View #4 = Function (#1:#3)

Whose Project is This?

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