Comics about mathematics, science, and the student life.

Significance

A scatter plot of "Significance" versus "Ease of calculation". On the top-left is a marker representing "Heavy-duty experiments" while on the bottom-right is a marker representing "Academic toy models".

There’s a reason all of the early academic work in field X deals with simple models.

06 May 2022

Project Timeline

A graph of "Progress on a project" versus "Time". At first, the graph increases linearly, with the label "Initial burst of motivation". Then it plateaus in the "Plateau of difficulty". Then it decreases in the "Decline of neglect". A slow climb ensues in "Remembering the project" followed by "Hitting snags" which makes the graph decrease again. Finally, it skyrockets to the finish with the label "Enough already. Let's finish this!"

Not shown: Extra pauses while people are confused, the many rewrites of the paper, bug hunting and data cleaning, and probably ten unique things that only showed up in this one project ever.

04 May 2022

Safe

A trailhead with two arrows. To the left is "Breakthrough Work". To the right is "Safe Career".

A breakthrough is just another way of saying it might not have worked.

02 May 2022

Positives

A mentor speaks with his student. He says, "You need to focus more on the positives in your writing." She says, "So I should put less emphasis on the negatives?" He answers while shrugging, "Or none at all. That's what I do."

I can’t help but notice that many papers try to minimize the drawbacks of their research. Oh, I’m sure that’s just a coincidence.

29 Apr 2022

Technical Details

A graph showing "Technical details" versus "My understanding". The curve starts off high and then asymptotes in an inverse relationship. Towards the bottom where I can understand when there are few technical details, I've marked an arrow with, "Why can't all talks be like this?!"

As I’ve listened to more and more presentations, I feel as though I’m less and less willing to follow technical details in a presentation.

27 Apr 2022

Questions and Answers

A graph showing "Number of questions" versus "Number of answers". The top-left has an "X" labelled, "Graduate studies", while the bottom-right has an "X" labelled, "Undergrad".

Graduate school: Where you learn that the only work is asking better and better questions.

25 Apr 2022

Now What?

A professor tells her graduate student, "Now that you're a grad student, you get to take control of your work." The student is holding his hands out to his supervisor in distress, and says, "Okay, but what do I do now?"

Ah, the stress of having unlimited freedom!

22 Apr 2022

Figure Density

A plot of "Comprehension" versus "Information in a figure". The curve goes up, reaches a peak, and then asymptotes back to zero. As the curve asymptotes, there's a vertical dashed line, and on the right I've labelled, "Most scientific figures".

“I know what we can do. We can split up the figure!”

“Yeah, that’s a great idea. Now, each figure can tell its own story–”

“We can make an awesome multi-panel figure!”

20 Apr 2022

Thought Organization

Left (Caption: Ordered): A person with a visualization of the thoughts in their head. They are all ordered. Right (Caption: Disordered): This person's thoughts are all disordered in their head, looking very messy. There's an arrow pointing to the person's thoughts labelled, "Thoughts in my head".

The best part is when they start looping.

18 Apr 2022

Perfect

Left panel (Caption: In my head): A sun-like object with the words "My perfect idea" in the centre. Right panel (Caption: Out in the world): Me with my idea, showing it to someone else. We're both at a desk, with my friend crossing their arms and not saying anything. I say, "But it looked so great in my mind!"

Happens to me every time.

15 Apr 2022