Comics about mathematics, science, and the student life.

Pop

A person rides in a hot air balloon with the label "Uplifting Feedback". An arrow is flying through the air towards the balloon, with the label, "One small piece of negative feedback."

No matter how uplifting the balloon is, one arrow is enough to bring it down.

08 Feb 2023

Scientific Careers

A large blob representing the space of scientific careers. A small box inside has the label "Scientists", and within it, a student says, "But if I'm not a scientist, I will have to leave science!"

It’s so incredible to me that the conventional path into science that many students see is one of being a researcher, though there are many other roles.

06 Feb 2023

Calculable

A graph of "Ease of calculating a defined quantity" versus "How abstract a paper is". As abstractness increases, the function curves downwards and eventually plummets to zero.

“Oh, this quantity in the summary looks like the perfect thing I need for my project!”

(Reads paper more carefully and gets lost in the mathematics.)

“And…maybe this isn’t so useful.”

03 Feb 2023

Together

Left panel (Caption: On your own): A person moving against a headwind. Right panel (Caption: On a team): A person running with a tailwind.

Don’t go at it alone because of the slight startup costs in gathering a team. Working with a great team is so rewarding.

01 Feb 2023

Gist

Two students in the same research group are walking together. One asks, "Ready to present at the journal club today?" The friend says, "Of course." "So you'll share a good paper you've read?" she asks. The friend responds, "Well, I didn't actually *read* it yet, but I'm sure I can present the gist of it from the title!"

Pro tip: To make it seem like you’ve read the whole thing, pick some random sentence deep in the paper and bring it up during your presentation.

30 Jan 2023

The Good Stuff

A bar chart of "Information content" for different parts of a paper. The "Conclusion" has the lowest, followed by the "Intro" and the "Methods". The most informative part is the "Caveats" section.

Most papers would probably benefit from a dedicated “Caveats” section.

27 Jan 2023

Sawtooth

A graph of "Ambition" versus "Time". Ambition starts off high at the beginning of a semester and then linearly decreases until the end of the semester. There's a break where ambition is undefined, and then it begins the cycle anew at the beginning of the next semester.

Note to self: “Powering through” the breaks results in negative ambition at the beginning of the new semester.

25 Jan 2023

Punching Bag

A boxer is working out with a punching bag labelled "Math". Off-panel, a person shouts, "Come on Casual Conversation, it's time to go." The person (who is Casual Conversation) is punching the bag and says, "Just a few more punches..."

My heart breaks a little bit each time this happens.

23 Jan 2023

Work Radius

A dashed circle with an X in the centre marks your PhD. The symbol delta represents the small radius of all subsequent work you do. Caption: Changing is challenging.

Diving deep into one area your whole life can be very rewarding, but I think dipping into various fields can be great too!

20 Jan 2023

Model Warranty

Left panel: A person brings back a package marked "Model" to a store. He says, "Hi, I'd like to return this faulty mathematical model." The cashier replies, "What's the reason for returning it?" Right panel: The person says, "Well, the logical reasoning and results are fine, but the assumptions are terrible." The cashier says, "I'm sorry, but our Mathematical Warranty covers everything but the assumptions..."

In reality, the person would never return the model, because it gave the results they wanted anyway.

18 Jan 2023