Food for thoughts

"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius -- and a lot of courage -- to move in the opposite direction." "Imagination is more important than knowledge." "Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love." "I want to know God's thoughts; the rest are details." "The hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax." "Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one." "The only real valuable thing is intuition." "A person starts to live when he can live outside himself." "I am convinced that He (God) does not play dice." "God is subtle but he is not malicious." "Weakness of attitude becomes weakness of character." "I never think of the future. It comes soon enough." "The eternal mystery of the world is its comprehensibility." "Sometimes one pay

Every fall, a fresh crop of Ph.D. students arrives. Since I'm actively looking for Ph.D. students, I get the same question a dozen times every year: "How long does it take to get a Ph.D.?" This is't the right question. "Ph.D. school takes as long as you want it to," I tell them. There's no speed limit on how fast you can jump through all the hoops. A better question to ask is, "What makes a Ph.D. student successful?" Having watched Ph.D. students succeed and fail at four universities, I infer that success in graduate school hinges on three qualities: perseverance, tenacity and cogency. If you're in Ph.D. school or you're thinking about it, read on. What doesn't matter There's a ruinous misconception that a Ph.D. must be smart. This can't be true. A smart person would know better than to get a Ph.D. "Smart" qualities like brilliance and quick-thinking are irrelevant in Ph.