Do you think that there is ever a conflict between the mentor and the student in post-doc in the sense that you want to set the student in post-doc free to make their own discoveries but the mentor has to get their grants, as you've just said, and therefore they need a project to move along lines proposed in a grant?
Yes, I think there is- I think that- that sort of constructive tension is inescapable. It is to do with, as you say, with resources, finding resources. A student who doesn't notice that and isn't aware of that and doesn't make allowances for that, is a second-rate student. Any competent student knows about those problems and makes allowances, I think.
What about the mentor giving the student freedom to make their own discoveries?
Well, there is a balance, I absolutely agree, and there- that balance, no doubt like all balances, there's a sort of perfect equilibrium, and in real life we aren't- we aren't at that point. Perhaps sometimes students are left on their own too much, perhaps sometimes they- they're are pushed too hard. Well, what can I say about myself?
I think it's clear that from the discussion which I have been having, that I take a fairly rosy view of my own life, I don't feel now that, you know, that there was a black period when I was lost for something to do or our resources just weren't there to do something that I wanted to do passionately, or I'd been let down by people, I just- I don't have that. And I don't actually think that's got much to do with the realities of my life, it's certainly got a lot to do with, you know, what sort of person you are, some people are a bit more pessimistic than others and sometimes with very good reason. So I can't recall an occasion in my own life where I think a student has been badly mistreated. Funny, working with my very good friend Järgen Roes, I observed students being very badly treated, and I cringe inside, but I think that sometimes the things which make me cringe I realise a week or two later, that's a matter of style, not of reality.
Do you think you can motivate a student or post-doc that's not internally motivated?
No, I don't think so. I'm just wondering what kind of motivation they could be plied with- wine, women, song? None of them seem quite- quite the right thing. Money? No.
