The Jaded Scholar. I was talking with RR today about the problem of how one's research is less exciting 20 years after the PhD than during graduate school, even though one is so much better at it. (Click here to read more.)

The problem is not just middle aged loss of sensibility. We are slowly influenced in what research we do by career concerns, and these are more influential, perhaps, after they are less important to one's career. As students, we pursue what interests us. Then we learn what sells on the academic market, to get publications and grants and jobs. We adapt. But slowly we can get warped away from what is interesting and what made us do research rather than something more lucrative and easier in the first place. Maybe that's all bosh, though--- I don't think it applies to me, whatever problems I may have.