The Last Update Before Graduation (Hopefully)

What have you been up to?

Since last year, I got one more paper published at ICLR! It is on experimental design using physics-informed neural networks, and it does lie closer to one of the interests that I have on fusing data selection and active learning with applications in natural sciences. The whole process wasn’t notable though – nothing interesting when decision came out[^1], nothing interesting during the conference since it was held in Singapore – but I did enjoy getting that paper out, and did talk to many interesting people during the conference. Since then I am starting to do more work in LLMs (particularly on different optimising the different aspects in LLM training), and do still look a bit into different data-efficient methods for AI for Science problems. I have a few ongoing works in both of these topics, and hope to have them out within the next year or so. I have also started to think about my thesis since naturally, once you enter your last year of your PhD, you have to think about how to exit.

Aside from research, I have continued to do TA work. I did get a bit of an increased workload, having to do an extra tutorial from usual, and be quite involved with drafting the final exam in one of the courses (if you took CS3264 in 2025 when I was the TA, I am so sorry).

How are your thoughts in general with your progress?

I’m content with it. I think I’ll be able to finish my thesis on time and I should have enough time to squeeze in one or two more works I want to do in the next year in somewhere. I do work a bit slow because I still do enjoy being very hands-on and doing the dirty work myself, so I am kind of okay with how quickly I am going with that. I am also being a bit less worried about how the others are doing and comparing myself against them, so that’s always a plus. At the same time though, I always feel I can be doing things more quickly. However at the end of the day, if I finish enough stuff by the time I graduate and it is enough to land me a decent job, I wouldn’t be too bothered about it.

As mentioned before I also am trying to diversify my research topics a bit, and I do think it has been a good thing recommended to me by my advisors. I think even if I don’t end up wanting to continue on those topics I still have learned quite a lot from those different topics. And it has been quite fun to challenge myself a bit there as well.

I had a quick skim at what I wrote last year. One issue I seem to have been a bit worried ahout was with not wanting to jump into newer work and be worried about failing to get a piece of work out immediately. I started to work in LLMs a bit (of course, through some techniques I have already been using elsewhere), and I feel I have been a bit less worried about getting work out since then. I had a spectacular failure with the last ICML submission, and I was not bummed out about it. It made me realise that it’s not the end of the world, and that the best thing to do was just move on and look towards the newxt conference.

Now of course, expanding the horizon did bring a couple of realisation as well, especially with what kind of research I wanted to be doing. I think there were certainly angles of LLM that I enjoyed and I could link to more science-y mindset I like to use at work. However I also do feel there are a lot of engineering type of work that could be done there that I don’t find super interesting. I guess that’s part of the journey to see what our interests are and what we want to be doing.

How’s your life been?

It has been okay. I have been fortunate that I don’t have much external pressure that forces me to do well or to rush things, and it has really been a blessing.

The adjustment into more adulthood still worries me a bit though. I was quite close to having a breakdown while trying to look for a new place to live and having to deal with moving out of my old dorm (which seems very insignificant to some but turned out to be a big deal once I had to do it – I suspect it was some attachment to a really nice room I have called home in the past two years). I was close to having another breakdown when I realise my close friends will not always be there because they also have their own work/issue/life to deal with, and it really made me think back to times with things were much easier. It becomes an issue of realising that things will change around you, and that there are very little you can do apart from dealing with it. And that terrifies me, even years after moving to a different country away from my friends[^2].

I guess this does link to the points I had in my last post about the worries of growing up and isolation away from what I find comforting. I still think this is a big thing that always bothers me, and I think every time I am home for a few weeks, I will feel especially attached by the time I have to leave (even now as I am writing this on the plane back to Singapore I still think about it). However I have talked to a few people and it does seem to be a sentiment many do share, and while it doesn’t help much, it is still nice to hear it is not something that I go through alone.

As the talented Hayley Williams once said: Ain’t it fun living in the real world?

Have you at least been up to anything else interesting?

Some people are looking for my concert updates I suppose. I could say I did get to see a lot of really live shows in the last 12 months including, in chronological order – Birdy (my top artist on Spotify in 2024), Laufey (my second top artist on Spotify in 2024), Olivia Rodrigo, Thom Yorke, Aurora, Sigur Ros, Gracie Abrams, and Jacob Collier. I am honestly quite glad I was able to see so many people live, particularly those artists I really enjoyed.

Hobby-wise, I have been getting into record collecting a lot. I recently had to move apartment and only then did I realise how much physical music I own. I have gotten to the point where I buy more records/CDs/etc. than I have time to listen to them all. But I do like having them quite a lot though for many personal reasons that I will not get into here.

Otherwise I haven’t been doing too much apart from taking very long walks and hanging out with people. Sometimes after a long work week all you want to do over the weekend is sleep in and not do other stuff. And personally, I think that’s a behaviour we should normalise. Your work week is so productive already (questionable sometimes) that I feel a hobby doesn’t always have to add to that. It’s fine to do things that adds nothing positive to you.

What now?

I have at most a year left before I probably have to go and get an actual job. This means finishing up my thesis, tie up loose ends of work that I still have, apply for jobs and go through that whole beauracracy for it. One of the things I have also been doing quite a bit recently was think about what sort of jobs I want to do. I have thought more about the things I value in life, and I realise how much I do value having time off to do things like making random YouTube videos (that I have had no time to make for the past few years) or go home to be with my friends and family. And I think apart from the size of the pile of money any future employer will give me, the amount and flexibility of free time I get from the job will probably also be a very big consideration for it. Not to mention how much I have enjoyed different aspects of research and teaching throughout my PhD, which I may also look for in my next job.

So now that I have a rough idea of what job I probably want, I’ll probably try to wrap up my thesis well, and look around for the jobs I want. Both of those will be hard, but it’s probably the main thing I’ll be doing in the next year Oh, and of course, to enjoy my last year of officially being a student. I am certainly not taking this part for granted.

I’ll see you guys again once I submitted my thesis.

[^1] I feel I should mention it here since it’s a nice story. When the ICML 2023 decision came out (around 8am Singapore time), I was still in bed sleeping. When the ICLR 2024 decision came out, I was watching Jimmy Carr perform live. When the ICLR 2025 decision came out, I was just chilling in the lab with the other labmates, so it was a much less interesting story.

[^2] I should say though that I do have very lovely labmates and countrymates in Singapore, many which I would consider my friends. While I do miss many of my old friends, I am at the same time very grateful to find many great people who do help me out here as well.