Academia as a happy place?

A conversation between pchvykov and jow on alternative research environments. This post is based on an audio transcript that we have edited with the help of Claude. We planned this as an experiment for ourselves in "thinking in public". Also, pchvykov is now organizing a "mindful research" retreat—related to the ideas discussed here—this summer at the INTP institute in the Pyrenees mountains (border of France and Spain), starting July 20, 2025. More details at the end.

jow: So I guess you should start by saying what you think's wrong in academia, because I feel academics already have, in some sense a very, very good job. Compared to many...

pchvykov: Yeah. My sense is they're not happy. That's the thing. I think most academics, there is this kind of narrative that as a scientist, you are depressed most of the time. There's a good number of examples of famous physicists and mathematicians who killed themselves. Right? Boltzmann, I think.

jow: First of all, I'd be interested to know if it was actually more common than in the general public. And if so I'm not at all convinced that that's academia's fault. My prediction is that maybe it's actually less common, but anyway, to the extent you see that kind of stuff, things like depression, I think it's just because smart people are more likely to be depressed or something like that.

pchvykov: But I think that either way, the question is whether academia can be an antidote to it.

jow: Having a support structure catering for those people. Maybe. Yeah.

pchvykov: For example, how common is it for, let's say, Buddhist monks to kill themselves? Right? Because I think they're also pretty smart people. And they're also working on a fairly impossible problem of enlightenment. So there's a lot of frustration that can come from that. But the places I've been to have a very joyful vibe among them. So it's possible to build an institution that is supporting you in working on difficult personal or scientifc problems, and yet that is also reducing the chances of unhappiness.

jow: I have to say that I don't have personal experience interacting with monks, but my initial reaction to what you're saying is to question the premise. I'm kind of unconvinced that Buddhist monks are on average happier than academics in a way that is meaningful. I'm willing to believe it, but I'm just saying my instinct is to not be convinced. In particular because I think that being a Buddhist monk, you're supposed to be happy somehow. And so I'm willing to believe that reports from these people would show differences, but whether they would correspond to things I would consider important... I'm not so sure.

pchvykov: There is a weird thing of conviction... if you convince yourself so hard of a certain thing that you yourself believe it, is that actually different from being so? If you yourself fully believe that you're happy because you're supposed to be... is it different from actually being happy?

jow: In certain circles it's actually high status to say that you're unhappy.

pchvykov: Yeah, if that's the thing you're supposed to be, then you're going to strive to be that and you're going to be more unhappy. So... Right. That's the lowest hanging fruit in the scope of the problem I'm talking about. Some academics wear their long work-hours and high stress as a badge of honor. Maybe. But yeah, still the environment of academia tends to be stressful. There's a lot of rat race. There's a lot of competitiveness. Especially if you get into fields that have this scooping each other and stealing ideas and all that. There is this distrust...

jow: I'm curious, do you think it's mostly just because of current day conditions related to how hard it is to get a job as a tenure track professor? Current market conditions in academia? Or is there some deeper issue in your view?

pchvykov: I think there's a deeper issue. Yeah. And it's related, I'd imagine to the supply demand thing.

jow: Yeah, I feel there's two separable things. One is that for various reasons we are producing more people with PhDs than people that can have academic positions at research institutions, let's say. So that's one element of it that's a very practical problem in my opinion, which you could easily solve by various policy choices. There's a deeper question of whether something about the nature of academia is creating a problem.

pchvykov: I think both are true because... I guess we need to think of is there an institution that is very competitive and kind of high up in society and all of that, and yet that has a very kind of joyful, supportive vibe? Right? And at least in Western society, I don't think I can think of something like that. Again, Buddhist monasteries come to mind, which can be extremely hierarchical and there is, you know, the Dalai Lama, and you want to be close to the Dalai Lama. I'm sure politics is a huge thing in Buddhist communities as well. But it also still has a different feel than the sort of cutthroat culture at the top of Western institutions.

jow: Yeah, I don't know. I guess I feel there's several things here to separate out, which I'm getting mixed up. First of all, I think what's bad about highly competitive cutthroat culture is when your job is at stake.

pchvykov: When your basic needs are at stake, effectively.

jow: That's one element of it, then you might say there's also this element where because even tenured professors are competitive. So it could be that even after they're very secure, they're essentially playing a status game in academia. And that itself is unpleasant because the nature of the status game is that only one person can be the highest status person, right? Status will always be scarce. So maybe that's what's going on also. But I feel these problems are separable. I think that not every field has the same status game.

pchvykov: I think there is a myth that is one of the issues - there's a myth perpetuated within academia that there are no interesting jobs outside of it, right? And that's the thing that a lot of people in academia kind of buy into. It's if I can't get a job in academia, then my life is going to suck. Sure, I can find another well paying job, people understand that, but I'm not going to be doing any interesting research, any interesting problems, et cetera. Right? And I think that myth is partly beneficial for the fitness of academia, because within academia, people want to have that myth to keep people in and to keep people competitive. But it does contribute to that fear that, okay, if this doesn't work out, then my life is screwed. Right?

jow: The things I don't like about academia, I suspect might actually be worse in other fields, in other careers.

pchvykov: And that's the myth that I'm talking about.

jow: Well, okay, but what's your evidence?

pchvykov: It's just that you believe that despite not actually having done the research and collected a sufficient amount of evidence about outside jobs to have that as a strong hypothesis – as a well validated hypothesis. I think academia, to some extent, is worse than other Western institutions because of the status game that I think is more cutthroat in academia than other places. Although, I mean, people fight for promotions in corporations as well. That is almost the reason academics can be underpaid. Because they're paid in the promise of fame. Right? There is that currency that you could become famous. And so it's that promise that keeps people working hard even if they don't get paid much.

jow: I mean, and a lot of other things. It's not just promise of fame, it's also tangible benefits that they receive every single day because they have a very flexible job.

pchvykov: Right, right, right, right. Yeah. And so in that sense, I guess that makes the status thing more maybe relevant or real.

jow: Can I ask a meta question here? I am a little skeptical of the idea of being able to assess whether there's a good culture somewhere by external observation. Simply because I feel it's something that is so commonly misrepresented.

pchvykov: Same as your Buddhist monastery pushback, right?

jow: Yeah, yeah, it's similar to the Buddhist monastery pushback. I'm looking for something a little bit more concrete, you know. I liked your idea about how people do the best work when they're happiest, which intuitively feels to me to be true. I don't think that unhappy people are doing important science. Well, I mean, I suppose they might be, but it doesn't seem to me... It's definitely not a plus, you know, it doesn't seem to be a plus. It's not better to be unhappy. So I do think it's clear that it would be good if we could develop institutions where everyone was happy. And excited about what they were doing and so forth.

pchvykov: There's a caveat there is that you can do busy work more effectively when you're unhappy because I think happiness puts your attention more on the long term. When you're happy, it's when you have all the resources, all the food, all the things. And so you're thinking more long term. So it puts your mind in this more creative big picture thinking state, et cetera. And you might get worse at doing the menial, busy work of, you know, filling out spreadsheets or something, but you'll do better work in the long run. Big picture. At least that is my understanding.

jow: One of the other things that comes to mind with this topic is that there's another trade off though, which is that we still want the thing to be recognizably work. Right? Because obviously you could have an institution where no one did anything. And you know, maybe that would be the one that they'd be happiest in.

pchvykov: First of all, I do think that if you have an institution where people are not doing anything, then they're not going to be super happy. I do think that happiness on some deeper level does require creating something that feels meaningful to you.

jow: Right, right, right. Yeah, exactly. But basically the reason I'm asking this is because I feel if you're trying to make the academic, you know, hypothetical institution where people are happy, then I think that a very common failure mode is going to be that essentially you end up in very low productivity states, with both low productivity and unsatisfying to the participants in other respects.

pchvykov: Yes, yes.

jow: So the question is, how do you avoid that kind of outcome?

pchvykov: So I think that's kind of my beef with a lot of the hippie culture that I really like and hang out in. It very often has that failure mode as a very sticky one. And that's kind of why I want to combine both. Right? I want to have that fulfillment of working on creating something meaningful and interesting, and also the happiness piece. And I think that happiness piece will then be conducive to asking the big picture questions that in academia are often not asked because they seem too long term or too vague or whatever. Right? So I think that other piece of creating a space that allows to do research that isn't usually done in academia is also related and somehow would come together.

jow: Can I ask you practically, where have you felt that has been the best environment for you to do research? Where you've done thinking or research type things? The best for you.

pchvykov: So I felt Perimeter Institute was... Are you asking most productive or happiest?

jow: I mean, some mixture of the two, I guess, whatever you think.

pchvykov: I mean, probably summer schools. Right? Some, not all, but some summer schools have been... Have felt like that. Because there's a very strong communal aspect. There's very much okay, we're in this together. We're working on these big questions. There's a lot of excitement and ambition that we came here from all over the world to be with science. There is an "us versus the world" sort of thing, which feels exciting. We are the top in this field and so there's a lot of trust and faith that, you know, together we can create something really cool. And there is the social aspect that you hang out a lot and you go out. Right? And that fuels that motivation. And then you kind of work really hard. It's not sustainable usually in that regime, but there is some sense in which they feel pretty good environments.

jow: Yeah. I mean, I guess I think maybe in part because it's short, I feel that it doesn't... I wonder how much work actually gets done in those environments or how much stuff is valuable gets done. I mean, obviously seeds can be created or whatever. Like at a conference, you know.

pchvykov: Yeah, yeah.

jow: And because there's more than normal socialization. It's socializing, it's fun. So that I understand. But I'm thinking about day to day environment.

pchvykov: The question is how do we extend it to a sustainable regime.

jow: Right.

pchvykov: Which would be very different but somehow keep some of those aspects better. So Perimeter Institute felt like that to me. But again... Right. It was a happy place. The productive aspect... I don't know. Productivity is really hard for me to evaluate in different spaces or times in science especially because it's so long term that, you know, it's really hard to say when something is really valuable... You could get a lot of results out in a short period. But that's because it's the culmination of previous many years of thinking and work where you had "no results." And that doesn't mean that that point when you're getting the results out is actually the productive point. So I think it's easier for me to just say where I felt most stimulated, happy and just the subjective sense that I'm doing something interesting and meaningful. Right?

jow: For me those are related because when I'm... I realize now that I'm thinking about when I'm most productive, I really am asking myself when I was happiest because that's kind of... It's true that there are periods where I'm very unproductive. And you might say that those are actually I was productive because I was building the foundation for something in the future. But basically I think that I'm sort of just saying that if I was unhappy then it means I was unproductive in some sense because I had a sense at the time whether I was making progress basically.

pchvykov: Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah.

jow: That's the kind of key question.

pchvykov: Just to finish... So it was... Perimeter Institute comes to mind as a longer term thing. And that's also right for me. It's because it had very much of a sense of community. At least the master's program that I was in. Definitely. But also the institute itself, they had a lot of events that were kind of community building and, all the researchers, professors, whatever, came, with their families and, open mic nights and... And so there was a sense of, okay, yeah, we're a sort of family. I think also the fancy interior and fancy food also contributes to that "feeling special." That you feel valued, you know.

And other than that, I guess in all honesty, I have enjoyed my freelance science thing lately to some extent because it takes the pressure off of being productive. Feels if I'm being productive, great. If I'm scientifically... I mean, if I'm not, then I have a lot of other things to do. So it dilutes that pressure.

jow: I feel I need to talk to people about the work I'm doing.

pchvykov: Yeah, I do as well.

jow: I feel, for me, I think it's important to be in an environment where there are people who are physically proximate to me who are doing the same thing. I think that that's important for me. Just casually interacting in some sense, with others who are in it.

pchvykov: Exactly! I just remembered happy productive spaces were a research visit, when I was visiting Georgia Tech lab or Northwestern Lab. Where it was kind of finite time thing where I'm going to a lab and we're focused, working with someone, collaborating on experiment theory. And that was definitely productive in the sense that I was working all the time. It was, during the day, it was lab time. During the evening, I was cramming in some theoretical calculation, and I was not tired of it at all. I was only excited and only wanting to do more. And to me, that was almost a little shocking to be, wow, this is a regime that's possible. And on the weekends we'd go hiking and hang out with the same collaborators and continue talking about the science. And so again, it's not sustainable. But I feel one version of this institution that I can imagine is having periods like that almost. Right? You have an institute that, you know, every three months has retreats for everybody or for different research groups. That go out into mountains, rent a cabin, live together and work. So there is a regularity to these pressure cooker containers.

pchvykov: I'd like to get into something... Well, first of all, this idea of a 'research monastery' or research ashram or something. The vision of having a research institute up in the mountain where you basically do your research as a meditation practice. And then you can have your work-retreats, which are fun in a different way. But at least the quiet library time piece of research seems to align very well with this Buddhist monastery type way of being happy, Right?

jow: In a superficial sense, yes. I'm not sure it does in the deeper sense, but.

pchvykov: In Buddhist monasteries, they actually do a lot of book studying. Quiet library times. That's a huge part of their practice, of their work - engaging with historical artifacts of original texts, discussing them with teachers, discussing them with each other, etc.

jow: I mean, to me, what I've heard about meditation, for example, it does not sound very similar to the reading part. I feel the real analogy is meditation maybe has to do with some observation, you know, making some observation, either about the self or if you're an experimentalist – I can just imagine the naturalist in nature observing an animal. Right? That, to me, feels like meditation, but the person reading the book, I mean, that doesn't feel like meditation to me.

pchvykov: So this is something a little bit weird that I'm still trying to understand because I haven't really spent much time in a traditional ashram or monastery. But there is something interesting there - I think I may be grossly misunderstanding what goes on in these monasteries and what meditation is. For example, in one ashram I was at, the teacher at some point mentioned that silent meditation sitting is not actually part of any traditional deep spiritual practice. Which to me was kind of shocking. He said that was just used for novices in Zen tradition who are coming from the world and can't even sit still. They tell them to just sit still, to quiet their mind, but that's not a true spiritual practice. Right?

So Tibetan Buddhist monasteries... I think they basically don't really do so much silent meditation. Right? They do a lot of mantra chanting, rituals, visualizations, book studying – original text, discussing them. From that they have a specific formalized version of debate in pairs. It's a very specific formalized practice where one person is trying to defend a certain position and the other person points out weaknesses in their argument. And it's very interesting. You should look it up on YouTube – some Tibetan Buddhism debate practices. It's very fast - they go through ideas and they speak very fast and it's very formal in a way. And at the same time it's very sharp. There is a kind of precision and sharpness to it.

jow: So when you're talking about your research monastery or whatever, you know, this idea, what is the key thing that you are trying to get? Could it just be that, you know, you think that this is some high quality of life in monasteries and maybe it's almost entirely attributable to their location, you know, in a beautiful natural place and maybe isolation? Maybe you're just advocating for that basically. Or is there something more specific that you're trying to...

pchvykov: So for me, the core things are: one is happiness, which I think involves some sort of community element, though I'm not exactly sure what. Maybe you don't need to live with 30 other people. Right. And the second is a sense... so here is maybe one of my core critiques of academia... Earlier you were asking whether the problems with academia is just sort of the problems of any other institution and exclusivity, or if there's something more fundamental.

And this is the more fundamental problem: I would like this research monastery to have an emphasis on being a place that is conducive to my personal growth. Right? I think research is about understanding, deeply thinking about the nature of reality and nature of our lives or all these aspects. And to me, that seems very related and very conducive to personally growing, understanding my own life better, my own psychology better, what makes me happy, etc. and some sort of personal development which I like to call "spiritual progress." But I think ultimately it's still just personal growth.

And I think academia does not emphasize that at all. And to me, that feels the core problem that causes it to be this sort of toxic place - in the sense that it addresses the really deep thinking about nature of reality part, but it misses that step of making it personal, of reflecting it on... Well, how does this new research insight that I found actually apply to my life? What does it teach me about how I can live my life better? Right?

jow: There's often a wall of separation, I think, between people's science and people's life, you know, whereas there doesn't need to be.

pchvykov: And that kind of means that we're not fully present with our research. We're not fully human. We're hiding, you know, if I am religious and I'm a scientist, I can't debate with my colleagues about my faith – but that's not me fully showing up. Right? I can't fully be myself.

jow: That's what I'm wondering though. Isn't it the case that by being a normal job, it's trying to be more accessible to a larger number of people, you know what I mean? I feel your vision would be a much smaller target audience. Right? And in particular, if someone has their own different spiritual journey they're on.

pchvykov: Yeah.

jow: Specifically, for example, suppose they're religious, right. The nature of religions is that, you know, they often don't get on well with other religions. I think that it could work if all the scientists were of the same religion. Right? But if you want an environment where scientists can have all kinds of different personal spiritual journeys but work together on science, it seems inconsistent with your vision.

pchvykov: Yeah, I think this is the point that maybe is actually very related to this vision and why it's important: yeah, it needs to be a place where people don't only discuss whether or not theories like cosmological inflation is true – but where they can similarly discuss their spiritual beliefs. You can have two cosmologists argue about whether or not they believe we're in inflation and what evidence there is, et cetera and they don't have to come to an agreement after that discussion. They can have a productive and useful discussion and then agree to disagree.

The environment that I think we need is where people can similarly discuss religion. So there can be a Christian and a Muslim there and they will fully discuss openly their beliefs and argue about it and also can agree to disagree for this discussion. But actually view those discussions as equally scientific, as equally important and equally, you know, possible to have. Right? Because right now within academia it's almost those topics are kind of off limits. Because you believe that you can never... Well, mostly people don't trust that people are open minded enough to have these discussions. Even they don't trust that they themselves are open minded enough to have their religious beliefs questioned. Right?

In all true deep monastic traditions, it is very encouraged to question the teachings, right? You read the teachings, you learn about that and then you really try to poke holes in it just as we do in science. Try to find the flaws. And that's why you have the teachers, you have the discussion to have those conversations to try to poke those holes and to develop your understanding deeper through those discussions. And I'd love a place where that's allowed. That's possible.

jow: So on a very practical level... I'm curious, have you considered doing a little tour of places that are a bit like your conceptual research monastery? You could learn a lot from observing them. The INTP Pyrenees in France, there's also Garrett Lisi's Pacific Science Institute in Hawaii place. Have you been to either of them or thought about it, I guess?

pchvykov: Yeah. So first of all, those are the only two I'm aware of this kind. Second of all, I haven't actually been to any of them. Garrett Lisi has two now, apparently. One in Hawaii and one's in Salt Lake City or near. Yeah. And for all of them, it doesn't seem it aligns very closely because they're kind of independent research institutes, but they don't seem they have much of a philosophy or a community thing. It's more a house where people can come, and it doesn't seem there's much of a structure or community values or all of this. Right? And everything we've been talking about so far is really about a certain way of being.

jow: I'll just say the one in France sort of does. They have activities and stuff like that. And... So, I mean, I understand what you're saying, but don't you think that the people that are running them may have had a similar journey to you? In the sense that even if the final product looks a bit different, maybe that they want the thing you're talking about.

pchvykov: So... So I think so. It's almost the interesting thing, at least first would be to just talk with them. Right? Rather than necessarily visiting, because sometimes you can visit and they're not even there. And then it's... I don't know, I just remember our friend spent some time at the Hawaii Institute. The way he described it just did not sound appealing.

jow: That in itself is evidence, though, I think.

pchvykov: Evidence to what?

jow: You know, it may also be evidence about how hard it is to create these things. Right?

pchvykov: I've actually started with an idea for where to start in terms of creation of this thing that I'm quite excited about. I feel the right starting point is a mindful co-working space. I don't know if we talked about this. Or...

jow: No, no, no.

pchvykov: And the reason is, even though it's starting kind of from afar, but I think, core to this idea of this community and the space that I want to create is that people do their work as a meditation practice and in particular as a joyful, fun meditation practice. Right? So that they see, you know, whatever work they do, their research, as they're thinking about it, they know how to think about problems from this perspective of "I am meditating as I am working." It's not that I meditate in the morning and then I work and then I meditate in the evening. It's not that you have both in the same space. It's that work is meditation. Right?

And I think that takes a certain learning. It's not easy. I'm still trying to figure it out, right. And there's a lot of tools available for learning it – even as simple as Pomodoro timer. That's a very common tool, but it's in that direction. Right? And to me that is the core aspect to this community. And because it's a complicated, difficult enough problem in itself to figure that out, I feel that should be the first problem to figure out before bringing research and science into it, which is a whole other level of complexity because then you need to think of how to get funding, et cetera.

So a mindful co-working space would be... The funding structure is clear, just like other co-working spaces. And so then the question you can really focus on is how to create that community and that sense of work as pleasure, work as meditation, work as introspection in a space. Right?

jow: Where would this be?

pchvykov: In a place that has both a lot of remote workers who want a co-working space and that has a lot of people interested in mindfulness and meditation. Because specifically the easiest target audience for this is various tech people who are having well paying jobs but then are somehow not satisfied with that. It's not enough. And then they find all these mindfulness, philosophical, spiritual practices and oftentimes in those they find the meaning they're looking for. And now they're kind of stuck with basically having to choose between either needing to quit their job and fully do the spiritual thing, or to keep their spiritual thing as this hobby side thing, and do their job as normal. But then they're spending most of their day doing something they don't like because now they know what they like, they know what really matters. So a lot of people quit their jobs and... Right. And the spiritual community becomes a lot of these people who have a lot of skills but they're not using them. And so it's kind of a bit of a waste of resources, you know, brain drain in some sense. And so I feel there is a niche there – if there was an opportunity to do both at the same time, then I think those people would jump at it.

jow: So, yeah, I mean, I think location is the key question. Right? And I agree that those are two desirable features. But I don't know... I think the other question is where? I don't know, where people need mindfulness. You know what I mean? Maybe you should do it in New York.

pchvykov: Well, no, no, no, because that's the thing with mindfulness is you can't force it. If someone doesn't know that they need it and they're not looking for it, it's not going to work. You can't introduce it to people who are already pretty happy where they're at and they're fine. It has to be people who are, you know, desperate and need something else or that already found it and know that yes, this is the thing I want.

So currently I started running workshops like this here in Ubud [Bali, Indonesia]. So we now have twice a week workshops because it's actually gotten a lot of traction. People are very happy and they want more. So each has just been three hours where we kind of start with some meditations, with some practices and then have these focused kind of co-working blocks and there's sharing practices. There's a lot of things to experiment with, to try. You know, even at the current stage where it is still, it's not really fully integrated as I'd like – where you work as a meditation – it's still you meditate, then work. But even that people are already finding really nice.

So because of that, I've been getting excited of just... Maybe I should build it here, you know, rent space for a year, commercial space, outfit it and just see how it goes. As an experiment, it's not a terribly huge investment. Right? Just to pay rent for one year and do some renovation, buy some ergonomic chairs...

jow: That's really cool. I think that the creation of a good physical space is very important and an interesting problem as well.

Note: pchvykov is organizing a "mindful research" retreat this summer at the INTP institute in the Pyrenees mountains (border of France and Spain), starting July 20, 2025. You can choose to stay for 1 or 2 weeks, and do your research while being supported in learning how to turn the work process itself into a deep meditation and introspection practice. While making work more joyful, this can also help you be more aware of your process and learn from your mistakes faster, without judgement, helping you grow as a researcher. See more and register here