Towards  an  Enjoyable    Career  in  Scientific  Research

Sagar Sen ’99 Batch Dr. AIT

Currently: Simula Research Laboratory, Oslo

Dr.  AIT  in  my  Life

1999-­‐‑  2003

Why  Dr.  AIT? My father (prof. at I.I.Sc.) had two students from Dr. AIT who did a project with him several years ago (‘80s). They settled in the USA and have been sending x-mas and new years greetings to our home for years expressing their gratitude. Humble and grateful students from Dr. AIT my father told me.

It is a bit embarrassing to have been concerned with the human problem all one's life and find at the end that one has no more to offer by way of advice

than 'try to be a little kinder.’ Aldous Huxley (1894 – 1963)

Going  down  memory  lane

Talk  Outline

1.  Introduction  to  Scientific  Writing

2.    Socio-­‐‑political  aspects  of  being  a  researcher

Scientific  Writing  Tip#1  : Read articles by power authors (not just scientists) who simplify/linearize complex and garbled subjects!

Herbert  Simon Djikstra Swami  Vivekananda

Scientific  Writing  Tip  #2  : Take a creative writing course!

Scientific  Writing  Tip  #3  : Motivate and create emotion!

Scientific  Writing  Tip  #4  : Write in active voice! Take the reader on a live ride. Use a conversationalist style of writing

Scientific  Writing  Tip  #5  : A sentence should have a maximum of 18 words! Minimize redundancies in details but emphasize on the closeness to main goal several times. Short titles have higher impact!

Scientific  Writing  Tip  #6  : Draw virtual boundaries. Go deep and contribute rigorously within these boundaries.

Scientific  Writing  Tip  #7  : One paper must answer to one principal question. However, we may have many sides to the same question.

Scientific  Writing  Tip  #8  : Do incremental research and look back from the top of the

mountain!

Scientific  Writing  Tip  #9  : Be honest and report truth. Validate your results multiple

times with respect to ground truth.

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05

1015

20

Scientific  Writing  Tip  #10  : Don’t use adjectives based on feeling/impression. Use them parsimoniusly if you have proof. Eg.: Proof with

rigorous experiments

Is  it  a  good  abstract?

The  boundary  between  well  structured  and  ill  structured  problems  is  vague,  fluid  and  not  susceptible  to  formalization.  Any  problem  solving  process  will  appear  ill  structured  if  the  problem  solver  is  a  serial  machine  that  has  access  to  a  very  large  long-­‐‑term  memory  of  potentially  relevant  information,  and/or  access  to  a  very  large  external  memory  that  provides  information  about  the  actual  real-­‐‑world  consequences  of  problem-­‐‑solving  actions.  There  is  no  reason  to  suppose  that  new  and  hitherto  unknown  concepts  or  techniques  are  needed  to  enable  artificial  intelligence  systems  to  operate  successfully  in  domains  that  have  these  characteristics.

The  Structure  of  Ill-­‐‑Structured  Problems,  Herbert  Simon,  Artificial  Intelligence  Journal  (1973)

Headache? Recognizable  languages  in  concurrency  monoids    Theoret.  Comp.  Science  150,  1995,  77  -­‐‑  108.   Automata  with  concurrency  relations  A  are  labelled  transition  systems  with  a  collection  of  binary  relations  indicating  when  two  actions,  in  a  given  state  of  the  automaton,  are  concurrent.  We  investigate  concurrency  monoids  M(A)  comprising  all  finite  computation  sequences  of  A,  modulo  a  canonical  congruence  induced  by  the  concurrency  relations,  with  composition  as  monoid  operation.  Under  suitable  assumptions  on  A,  we  obtain  a  Kleene-­‐‑type  characterization  of  the  recognizable  languages  of  M(A).  This  generalizes  results  of  Cori,  Métivier,  Perrin  and  Ochmanski  in  trace  theory.

Bonus  Tip

The  writer  should  work  hard  to  not  give  the  reader  a  headache.

Talk  Outline

1.  Introduction  to  Scientific  Writing

2.    Socio-­‐‑political  aspects  of  being  a  researcher

Socio-­‐‑political  Tip  #1

When  in  Rome  do  as  the  Romans  do!

Socio-­‐‑political  Tip  #2

Learn  the  local  language!

Socio-­‐‑political  Tip  #3

Socialize  with  people  from  everywhere!  Get  out  of  the  comfort  zone.  Learn  to  listen  and  exchange  ideas

Socio-­‐‑political  Tip  #4

Express  yourself  rationally!

Last  tip!  First  accept  all  then  select!

Develop  free-­‐‑shifting  aBention!   It  is  an  important  prop  of  vital  activity!  Dr.  J.E.  Barmack

Travel! Embrace  art!

Team  work! Embrace  cold  climates! Skill!

Go  crazy!

Thank  you.