When I close my eyes since a few days… here is what I see:

Bloody bells!

…

And multivariate regressions!

(Bells as a … nurturing belly????)

Gosh, has this PhD process been cathartic!!! In every way!

In close to 250 hours of classes in 3 weeks, we covered a program usually done in 4 months in the best universities in the world!

This lead to days of 10 to 12 hours of classes per day plus 4 to 6 hours of prep, reading, exercises, assignments additional, the last 3 days 20 to 22 hours of work to finalize papers, stats tests…!

I have probably read more theoretical articles, academic papers in those past 3 weeks than in the past 10 years.

What have I learned?

Freedom for example… is defined by df, not an absolute value, but a value that depends on the choices you make for the last value of a series of variables!

Basically…freedom is not being able to do everything I want, maximization of my individual pleasure but defined by my choices, and those choices which narrow down my overall freedom closely define my pleasure and values, called the treatment of your regression!

Df is determined by the choice of the value of your last variable. In a similar way you confidence interval is defined by your choice of α!

Freedom is a choice! And your choice reduces your freedom on one hand and strengthens it just as well… in a funny way!

The more variables you add to your priorities, your hypothesis, the thinner your Bell becomes, the narrower the population… the less your choices are solid in a way, the less you can analyze your claim… take decisions, engage!

Basically the more you spread yourself away from the mean, the less your analysis of randomness of a sample is accurate!

Engagement just the same way: this process of epistemology is so hard that being half engaged in the PhD methodology is simply impossible.

You can only do it fully… or not!

Any half commitment is simply a lie to … yourself first… and others, especially the person you are requesting time from to… guide you!

So yes clear values are crucial, central, pivotal for this exercise of research, knowledge compilation and hypothesis construction, theory building: strong engagement, persistence, ruthless self inquiry, honesty… faithfulness even!

But then of course engaging on such a path does not allow you to stay in an environment which contradicts those core values, endangers them, or even just brings insecurity.

And I gained so much clarity from it all, on what I really want, what I will not accept anymore in my life, what I study…now for myself, the strength, determination, perseverance I get from it.

Just what I needed to be sure… that that path is perfect for me… it all makes so much sense!

See D Diary, Moods for 1st PhD assignment!