My examiner committee has finally been approved, so I can now finally submit the five copies I have previously made. Now all I need to do is pass the final exam on August 2nd and submit some more forms and the final copies of thesis and I’m done!
“Piled Higher and Deeper” by Jorge Cham www.phdcomics.com
Submission. That’s an interesting word. The American Heritage Dictionary defines it as:
Submission. n.
-
- The act of submitting to the power of another.
- The state of having submitted.
- The state of being submissive or compliant; meekness.
- The act of submitting something for consideration.
Am I relinquishing power or being meek and compliant by handing in my thesis? Does Nature (or the examiner committee as an agent thereof) have control of my future? Or am I thinking too much?
June 27th, 2007 at 10:00
Posted by
epsalon |
Academia |
4 comments
Friday was the second day of BISFAI. I woke up at 6:45 AM(!) and took the 618 “direct” bus to Bar-Ilan University. I arrived at the conference venue at 8:30. This day the talks were about subjects much more relevant to me - Multi-Agent systems and Game Theory.
Some of the talks were very interesting. In others, I could not avoid falling asleep. There was one talk about incentive-compatible routing that I really liked.
As Bar-Ilan is a religious university, in lunch they could not serve meat. Thus, they served a vegetarian lunch. What was interesting and funny was the fact that this vegetarian lunch was served right besides posters in favor of animal experimentation!
After the conference I found that only one person was driving back to Haifa, so I took a ride with him and then was picked up by my brother (not the one from yesterday) to the Technion and then home.
June 26th, 2007 at 21:41
Posted by
epsalon |
Academia |
no comments
The Bar-Ilan Symposium on the Foundations of Artificial Intelligence was last Wednesday - Friday at Bar Ilan University. I arrived at Bar Ilan right after my visa interview. As I noticed I arrived on time only for the lunch break, I decided to go and grab some lunch and meet with an online friend of mine who studies Biology at BIU.
After this very short but fun meeting, I made way to the main conference venue - the new Brain Research Center at BIU. The afternoon sessions were about Planning and Modeling, which are not my field of research. Moreover, I had trouble staying awake due to the early wake-up hours. So, I spent most of the time outside socializing with other people in the field. Many of them I have never met in Israel before, even though they were all Israelis.
I had a paper in the conference, which was presented by co-author — Avivit. I missed the presentation, but I heard from others that it went well.
After the conference day ended, I took a bus to Azrieli Center in order to meet with my brother and his wife and play video games. I arrived one hour early and looked for something to do, but all I could find were stores who sell clothes or food. So, I sat down on a bench and continued correcting Avivit’s paper.
When they finally arrived, we played many video games at the center and finally returned to their home in Hertzeliya to go to sleep for the second day of the conference.
June 25th, 2007 at 09:00
Posted by
epsalon |
Gaming, Academia |
4 comments
Here it is! Five copies of my PhD thesis (or disseratation), all bound and ready to submit. I applogize for the low quality of the image, as it was taken with my camera phone. The table is not even wooden.
Now I am only waiting till my examiner board is approved and I can submit my thesis. After that, I need to pass the exam and perform my final submission, and then you can call me Doctor Altman.
Tomorrow would be a long day, I’m getting my J-1 US visa and attending a local AI Conference. Expect updates later this week.
June 21st, 2007 at 02:10
Posted by
epsalon |
Academia, USA |
no comments
