As December has already rung the bell for 2015 coming soon to an end, thoughts and memories of the recent past pop up in my mind. It has been definitely a crazy year. Elections, referendum, elections again, capital controls, political uncertainty and civil unrest have been major parts of the crisis in our poor land. But also rich personal moments that exactly one year ago redefined a whole new path for me making me face the future with a lot more optimism. Do not expect me to share those moments. This is not why I am writing this tonight.
The main reason is that this morning I received an email from an old collaborator that a year ago our paths followed different directions due to conflicts in the way we see things in research. I do not -and do not have the right to- claim I know more than anybody else in the field. Certainly not. But having almost 25 years of pure research on my back has resulted in the formation of a rather solid point of view on several things that I deal with every day efficiently. For such reasons, opinions bumping aggressively onto mine are usually left behind by me. It has not happened often in my career, perhaps one or two times. There has been one guy, however, that is really something! A true egomaniac! To a degree beyond repair. As I said, that guy emailed me earlier today after almost a full year with no correspondence (a very very very calm period for me) and reminded me why I parted ways with him. I realized again my complete incapability to work with paranoids. His argumentation on all kind of things leaves me with essentially no logic arguments against his sayings. An entire lack of self awareness, an emperor’s syndrome is what governs his mind. Unbelievable to a level of awe.
I share my personal story with you to mark one crucial detail I have not mentioned above. This guy has been a PhD student till recently by a close collaborator of mine, graduated and finally found a post-doc position at some lab abroad. He may be happy; I don’t know. He is definitely superficial, a pure mental case in need of psychiatric treatment. I am sure that he will be recognized as such very soon. But it will be too late because the guy who trained him during his PhD failed to explain to him modesty, humbleness and (self)respect. This is a crucial detail. It is not all his fault. If it is true that PhD genealogies share common genes between scientists across generations, he has beyond any doubt inherited the worst of the bunch.
An Isotopia 