Small scientific conferences are great if you enjoy learning. You can take in the latest advances in your field during the scientific sessions and then hear about how your colleagues are doing afterwards—generally over a beer. I was having a particularly good time with some younger colleagues at a meeting last month when the subject of career goals came up. These colleagues were successful in that they had recently received tenure at top research universities and had some grants and good students. Thus, the early career pressure to simply survive was gone. So now what motivated them? Solving challenging and significant scientific problems was at the top of their lists. Interestingly, they were also motivated by a desire to become one of the “good guys” in science.
Good guys are concerned with the welfare of the field in addition to personal research goals. They will not publish a paper unless ...
