Why I left academia?
From Biojustice.net
Why I left academia: Personal reflection.- Jong Bhak
I left academia in around 2003.
I acquired my Ph.D. degree in 1997.
During and after my Ph.D., I saw corruption, lies, cheatings, deception, plagiarism, mafias, racism, and hypocracy spread in research labs in the Western world as well as the ones in Korea.
We all make mistakes in the course of learning and growing.
I am not talking about such mistakes in researchers' lives. I am talking about intentional, systematic, habitual and malicious misthoughts and misconducts by my colleagues and friends whom I thought them to be of the best and most respectful human beings for their prestigious jobs and achievements under the premise of searching for facts, truths, and knowledge.
The practical world of science in the West is rotten.
It was one of the very typical examples of 'purpose disorientation'. Many scientists I know are purpose-disoriented. Some are intentionally cheating and abusing research community to promote their career. I think our education and training systems are producing 'academic sportsmen'.
I am not sure if that is the best way in performing research as when I look at the politics and sports field, power and money seem to be the only working forces.
Perhaps, philosophically and biologically, humans are meant to be ruthlessly competing each other for their own survival with selfish strategies. They will kill each other to get to "the land of altruism" first and put a national flag there first using massive number crunchers that run game of life algorithms.
Whatever the case, such ism and strategies produce contradictions to many virtues and rules we have been creating in the societies.
Hypocracy is common to the degree that it is a valuable asset of human livings. We all seem to try to be "hypocritically correct" in societies.
Young students need to be aware of that and take care of themselves to protect their passion and ideals from purpose-disorientation and the practices of scientific community.
Why am I interested in how we do science? | Purpose constancy
